How to Talk About Extremely Cold Weather in English

Well hello and welcome to this English lesson where I'm going to

help you learn how to describe extremely cold weather.

It's really cold here right now.

In fact, here's the first two

things I wanted to teach you.

The river is frozen over, but it's not frozen solid.

I'm actually standing on the river right now.

The ice is probably about 4 or 5 inches thick.

It's been minus 15, minus 20 for a while.

Right now it's minus 12. It's quite cold.

So the river is frozen over.

When we say a body of water is

frozen over, it means there's no water visible.

It's ice everywhere.

In fact, if I turn a little

bit, you'll see that there's just...

I mean, it looks like water, but it's not.

This is all ice, but it's not frozen solid.

When we say something is frozen solid, it

means that there's no water underneath. Here

if I was to chip through the ice,

eventually I would find water and there would

be fish and everything down there.

If the river was frozen solid, it would mean that it's

ice all the way down to the bottom of the river.

So there's your first two terms.

The river is frozen over, but it's not frozen solid.

So an interesting thing about really cold, extreme

weather is that you can see your breath.

I'm not sure if you can see it on camera, but when

I breathe out, I can see my breath in the air.

This happens because there's moisture, there's water in your

breath, and when it comes out of your mouth,

it turns into small drops that you can see.

I wish it was a little more visible.

I could just see little wisps of it right now.

But another thing that happens when it's

this cold, you can see your breath.

So there's something important that you have to do when it's

this cold, and that's that you have to bundle up.

I am bundled up right now.

When you're bundled up, it means

you're wearing a lot of clothing.

I'm wearing my winter hat.

I'm wearing my winter gloves.

I'm wearing my winter boots.

I'm wearing actually several layers of clothing, but

I'll talk about that in a little while.

So when it's this cold outside,

it's important to bundle up.

I really like this sweatshirt.

This is an athletic sweatshirt because it zips up

all the way and it keeps my neck warm.

So I have my winter hat, my toque, my gloves, my

boots, and this nice thing to keep my neck warm.

I am bundled up.

And I'm happy that I wore lots of layers.

I'm happy that I'm bundled up because when it's this cold

you have to be careful that you don't get frostbite.

Frostbite is when the skin freezes.

It happens sometimes on your nose.

If you don't have good gloves

it can happen on your fingers, it can happen on

your extremities that are exposed to the cold air.

Thankfully it's not windy out right now and thankfully I'm

not going to be outside for a very long time.

But one thing you have to be careful of, if

it's minus 10 or minus 20 or, or even colder,

you have to make sure you don't get frostbite.

When I was out walking the other day, I

was often walking like this to stop the wind

from hitting my nose because I certainly don't want

the tip of my nose to freeze.

I certainly don't want to get frostbite.

So we're actually experiencing what I

would call a cold snap.

A cold snap is when it's suddenly colder

than normal for a day or two.

Usually around this time of year it's about

minus 3 or minus 4, maybe minus 6.

But a couple of days ago it was 2 degrees and then

they said it was going to go down to minus 15.

And then it came up to minus 11 yesterday, down again

to minus 14 last night, up to about minus 3 today.

So I would describe the last couple

of days as a cold snap.

The weather quickly got a lot colder, stayed really cold,

and then it's planning to come back up again.

So right now we're in a cold snap.

So you might be surprised to know

that I'm actually quite warm right now.

Even though it's extremely cold.

I'm warm because I'm wearing lots of layers.

Let me describe them to you.

I'm obviously wearing socks in my winter

boots, but I'm also wearing underwear, long

underwear, sometimes called long johns,

and my jeans. I'm not going to show

you, but underneath these pants I'm wearing what's

called long underwear or long johns.

Up here I'm actually wearing four layers.

I'm wearing a T shirt, a long sleeve T shirt.

I'm wearing this athletic sweatshirt and

I'm wearing my winter coat.

And then of course up here,

my winter hat and my gloves.

Layers are very important when you

go out in extremely cold weather.

When you dress in layers, it's just

a lot easier to stay warm.

Layers trap air, I think, and it all acts

as insulation. Insulation is something that stops cold temperatures

from getting through and keeps warm temperatures inside.

So if you want to stay warm in extremely

cold weather, it's important to dress in layers.

So how would I describe today?

I would probably say it's bitterly cold today, or

it's freezing cold today, or just it's freezing.

Those are probably the three most common phrases

that we would use to describe extreme cold.

When it's minus two, it's not that cold.

It's a little bit cold.

But when it's this temperature, when it's below

minus 10, we would say it's bitterly cold,

it's freezing cold, or it's freezing.

By the way, do you like this tree?

Did you... Have you hugged a tree today?

Aren't you supposed to hug a tree every day?

These are my three favorite trees, by the way.

I'm not sure if you can see

the two in the background as well.

They're at the far end of my farm and

I often walk here to come and visit them.

Sounds kind of funny, maybe to visit a tree.

By the way, the farm is way back over there.

And yeah, these three trees have

been here my whole life.

When I was a kid, it was often

fun to come and play down here.

It's actually also right by the river.

So just a little tidbit about Bob's

life and go hug a tree today.

So, luckily, this cold spell did

not come with lots of snow.

Sometimes when you have a cold spell, it

can also be very windy and very snowy.

There's just lots of snow coming down and it

can cause what's called whiteouts or whiteout conditions.

Right now I can see the barn and

I can see the house from here.

But if we were having whiteout conditions, if there

were whiteouts, there would be so much snow blowing,

I wouldn't be able to see them.

This is especially dangerous when you're driving.

When you drive on the road in the winter, and if there

are whiteouts, you can't see very far in front of you.

Extremely dangerous and not fun at all.

Very, very stressful.

So, thankfully, this little cold spell

we're having is just cold.

Not a lot of snow, not a lot of whiteouts.

Everything has been fairly safe when we're

driving on the road, so that's good.

Another thing that can be extremely

dangerous when you have extremely cold

weather is something called black ice.

Black ice is when there's a thin

layer of ice on black pavement.

And what makes it dangerous is that you can't see it.

Black ice sometimes forms at the beginning of a cold

snap when the weather's warm and there's a bit of

water on the road and maybe it's raining.

As soon as the temperature drops, a very, very

thin layer of ice forms on the pavement.

And ice is like glass.

You can see through it.

So sometimes you're driving and there's black ice

and you don't realize that it's extremely slippery.

Thankfully, right now there's no black ice on the road.

It's safe to drive.

It looks like the road crews have kept the

road safe by putting down lots of salt

to melt any black ice that would form.

But yes, another dangerous thing when you're driving in

extremely cold weather, watch out for black ice.

So, thankfully, there wasn't a lot of snow during

this extremely cold weather and we're not snowed in.

You can see the snow is only about 2, 3

centimeters deep, an inch to an inch and a half.

And so we are not snowed in.

When you are snowed in, it means there's so much

snow that you can't drive out of your driveway, you

can't go anywhere until you remove the snow.

And sometimes the snow gets so deep during

extreme cold weather that you're snowed in.

You could also say that you're snowed

under, but this also has another meaning.

If you're ever really busy at work or at

school, you can say that you're snowed under.

So thankfully, we're not snowed in.

The snow is not very deep at

all, and thankfully we're not snowed under.

And hopefully you're not snowed under in the sense that

you're so busy you can't get all your work done.

Well, thank you for watching this English lesson.

I hope you were able to learn some new

English words and phrases that you can use the

next time you talk about extremely cold weather.

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