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Zoveel variatie zit daar niet op, dat hebben ze zojuist in mijn geliefde IJsland ervaren.
Ik kreeg zojuist een mail van een goede IJslandse vriend.
....the record of sunshine hours was broken by hundreds of hours. The first three weeks of August the temperature was around and above +20°C almost every day, which is a real heat wave in Iceland.
The first week of September was quite normal, some rainy days, some sunny days. But on the 10th of September everything turned wrong. A narrow, but strong stream of very cold air from the arctic hit the north coast with very heavy precipitation. At the coast, like here in Akureyri, it was mostly sleet and wet snow, but above 200 meters it was a terrible snowstorm, like nothing we have seen for centuries. At lake Myvatn the wind speed was 62 m/sec, like hurricane category 4. Because of the mountains, wind gusts were measured up to 103 m/sec. The temperature was just below the freezing point and the snowfall was big.
There was a total blackout of electricity everywhere from Blönduós to Vopnafjörður. Here in Akureyri only for 4 hours, but some farms at Lake Myvatn were dark for three days. Worst of all - thousands of sheep were still in the mountain pastures. Rescue teams from the whole country have been working every day since to dig up sheep from the snow, thousands have been found alive, and so far only few hundreds dead.
The situation at Grænavatn, where my brother is running his sheep farm is not good. His good luck was that he had already taken all the lambs and sent them to the slaughterhouse only a few days before the storm. But his 350 mother sheep were back in the pastures along with 150 from the other farmers at Grænavatn. Even rescue teams, friends and family have been working hard, there are still more then one hundred missing, somewhere in the snow. We have been using super jeeps and snowmobiles to get into the area, and dogs and avalanche rescue equipment to do everything possible.
Yesterday the dogs found a cave under the snow with 22 sheep, 15 dead, 7 still alive. 30 or 40 sheep where found in other places, almost all alive. I was helping today, and spent 7 hours walking in the lava fields where the snow drifts are sometimes 2- 3 meters deep. The weather was terrible, wind, rain and sleet, and when I came back to the car, after finding one sheep (!) alive I was so wet and cold that every piece of clothing was dripping water, even I was using all my modern, "waterproof" stuff.
Ik kreeg zojuist een mail van een goede IJslandse vriend.
....the record of sunshine hours was broken by hundreds of hours. The first three weeks of August the temperature was around and above +20°C almost every day, which is a real heat wave in Iceland.
The first week of September was quite normal, some rainy days, some sunny days. But on the 10th of September everything turned wrong. A narrow, but strong stream of very cold air from the arctic hit the north coast with very heavy precipitation. At the coast, like here in Akureyri, it was mostly sleet and wet snow, but above 200 meters it was a terrible snowstorm, like nothing we have seen for centuries. At lake Myvatn the wind speed was 62 m/sec, like hurricane category 4. Because of the mountains, wind gusts were measured up to 103 m/sec. The temperature was just below the freezing point and the snowfall was big.
There was a total blackout of electricity everywhere from Blönduós to Vopnafjörður. Here in Akureyri only for 4 hours, but some farms at Lake Myvatn were dark for three days. Worst of all - thousands of sheep were still in the mountain pastures. Rescue teams from the whole country have been working every day since to dig up sheep from the snow, thousands have been found alive, and so far only few hundreds dead.
The situation at Grænavatn, where my brother is running his sheep farm is not good. His good luck was that he had already taken all the lambs and sent them to the slaughterhouse only a few days before the storm. But his 350 mother sheep were back in the pastures along with 150 from the other farmers at Grænavatn. Even rescue teams, friends and family have been working hard, there are still more then one hundred missing, somewhere in the snow. We have been using super jeeps and snowmobiles to get into the area, and dogs and avalanche rescue equipment to do everything possible.
Yesterday the dogs found a cave under the snow with 22 sheep, 15 dead, 7 still alive. 30 or 40 sheep where found in other places, almost all alive. I was helping today, and spent 7 hours walking in the lava fields where the snow drifts are sometimes 2- 3 meters deep. The weather was terrible, wind, rain and sleet, and when I came back to the car, after finding one sheep (!) alive I was so wet and cold that every piece of clothing was dripping water, even I was using all my modern, "waterproof" stuff.
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