Pakistan: Snow, severe cold paralyzes routine life in Gilgit-Baltistan

GILGIT, Jan 9 (APP): The people living in Gilgit‑Baltistan were facing hardships as snow and heavy winds disrupted their routine life besides business activities.

Snow and cloudy weather which gripped all Northern Areas, further brought the mercury level in the mountainous region forcing the people to stay indoors.

The upper portions of the region have received heavy snowfall which is expected to continue till the month of March.

Due to abrupt change in the weather, seasonal diseases have broken out, affecting mostly children, women and elderly of the area.

Madrid airport closes

MADRID - A RARE, heavy snowfall in central Spain closed Madrid's airport and paralysed traffic in the city and several German rivers were frozen over as much of Europe remained in the grip of Siberian conditions on Friday.
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The northwestern city of Santiago de Compostela, a destination for thousands of pilgrims, recorded the heaviest snowfall in recent memory on Friday, according to the online edition of daily newspaper El Mundo.
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In Germany, the death toll from the cold snap rose to three and several rivers were frozen over, blocking ship traffic, authorities said.

Drift ice covered 80 to 90 percent of the surface of the river Elbe from Doemnitz to the Germany's main port of Hamburg in the north, a spokeswoman for the Water and Shipping Office said.

Some barges had to be freed late Thursday with industrial ice breakers.

Germany is experiencing one of its coldest winters of the past 100 years, with the mercury dropping as low as minus 34.6 C (minus 30.3 F) in the mountains in the south.

One person also died from the cold in Poland during the night, bringing the death toll in the country to 83 since November 1, most of them homeless people.