Beijing embraces first snow this winter 2011

First snow fell in Beijing Wednesday night and continued into Thursday morning. It was the latest first snow for the city in 60 years.

"Now there is snow at last. I love the taste of snow." "The world in pure white! It's the most beautiful landscape in winter." Beijing residents who stayed late in the night and happened to see the first flakes of snow in the city left their postings on microblogs.

However, meteorologists said the first snow won't last long and it will end on Thursday noon. In midnight, the city will have a cloudy weather, and Friday will be a sunny day.

"As the precipitation is small, it will have limited effect on easing drought," Song Jisong, the municipal meteorological bureau's chief weather forecaster said.

Sun said that the capital city's record-long winter drought occurred in the winter of 1970/71, when there was no precipitation for 114 days. This winter drought was the second longest in 60 years.

Beijing welcomes the New Year 2010 with heavy snow

China’s capital got off to a slow start in the new year, with the first snowstorm of 2010 and seriously subfreezing temperatures bringing the city to a halt after the long holiday weekend.

A day after Beijing experienced its biggest snowfall in 60 years, a similarly historic cold front swept into the city. Temperatures were forecast to drop to as low as -20 degrees Celsius (-4 degrees Fahrenheit) Monday and schools remained closed, giving students an extra bit of winter holiday. Beijing has mobilized a sizable army of 300,000 workers to clear the snow, China Daily reports, though it appeared that few cars were willing to brave the city's icy streets Monday.

Transportation in northern China faced disruptions as well, with road closures and airports shut down. At Hong Kong’s Chep Lap Kok airport Sunday, this reporter was among the thousands of Beijing-bound passengers waiting for bi-hourly updates on the grim situation at the capital’s airport, where only one of three runways was operational and more than 90% of flights were cancelled or delayed, according to China Daily.

The current conditions make the big storms of November seem like a dress rehearsal, and this time around, no one has mentioned government-sanctioned weather manipulation.

北京迎来新年的降雪。图为雪中的故宫银装素裹。

Beijing receives the earliest snowfall in 22 years

BEIJING — Government scientists in Beijing have been pilloried for inducing a recent heavy snow fall that jammed traffic, delayed air travel and left city residents shivering, state media said Wednesday.

Sunday's snowfall dropped more than 16 million tonnes of snow on the Chinese capital, blanketing a city where winter heating services have yet to be switched on and leading to howls of public protest, the China Daily reported.

The Weather Modification Office shot massive amounts of chemicals into clouds over the city the night before to provoke the snowfall, which it said was needed due to a lingering drought in the region, the paper said.

Heating in most Beijing buildings was due to be turned on November 15, but city officials were forced to move the timetable forward and were working Wednesday to bring buildings onstream ahead of schedule.

"This arbitrary government decision had disregarded the interests of the people... we should (have) considered the potential hazards of cloud seeding," said one commentary carried in the paper.

Sunday's snowfall, the earliest to hit the capital in 22 years, delayed 200 flights stranding thousands of passengers, led to traffic accidents and disrupted electrical services dozens of times, it added.

"(This) shows there is a lot of room to improve the national weather manipulation warning system for the public," the paper quoted Chen Zhenlin, spokesman of the China Meteorological Administration, as saying.

Chinese meteorologists have for years sought to make rain to reduce an ongoing drought.

But ahead of the massive celebrations marking the 60th anniversary of communist rule in China on October 1, cloud dispersal chemicals were used in the Beijing area to ward off unwanted rain clouds.