Winter arrives across Europe

Fouling traffic and tempers, heavy snow fell today on much of Europe that had been deprived of anything more than a dusting for weeks, giving Rome a rare winter blanket and shutting down the main airport in Montenegro.

Deep snow in Poland stranded Ukraine’s new president, Viktor Yushchenko, in Krakow and forced him to cancel a much-anticipated trip to the European Parliament in Strasbourg where he was to make his first post-election address.

In the former Yugoslav republic of Montenegro, heavy snow led to the closure of the airport in Podgorica, the capital, and left dozens of cars stranded on the roads.

Authorities said the situation was getting “worse by the hour” and urged people to stay at home.

A plane carrying mail from the Romania to Hungary crashed in a forest in snowy weather, killing the two pilots.

Whipped by high winds, snow blanketed northern and eastern Romania, closing several roads and cutting power to about 14 villages in the county of Harghita.

Austria closed key highways to truck traffic after more than 200 big rigs became stuck along with hundreds of cars.

The major east-west A1 highway was blocked by jack-knifed articulated lorries and buses buried in snow banks.

About 12 inches of snow fell on Vienna, the most on a January 27 since 1969.

Many schools were closed and students could be seen lugging snowboards up into the Vienna Woods, which were blanketed by snow for the first time since early December.

Rome woke up under a light blanket of snow which settled on car roofs and in parks in the higher parts of the city. The rare snowfall in Italy’s capital also held up commuter trains coming into the city, delayed by snow on the tracks.

Further south, part of the main highway that runs toward Reggio Calabria on Italy’s toe was closed to traffic and rescue workers used cranes to free heavy vehicles stuck in the snow.

Winter also arrived with a vengeance in Switzerland, where winds of 100 mph were clocked Wednesday on the peak of La Dole in the Jura mountains north of Geneva, creating blizzard-like conditions.