to a winter wonderland. or have we? look very closely in the next half—hour, because all is not as it seems. so... let it snow, let it snow, let it snow. welcome to weather world! also on the programme, 2017's biggest storms. tropical deluges, floods that carry a house and everything in it. safe from the storm, near impossible escapes. and even record rain cannot stop another wildfire crisis in california. humber, west or south—west, five or six... plus, we celebrate 150 years of the shipping forecast. its distinctive tones loved by sailors and landlubbers alike. and weather, but not as we know it. i will be taking a deeper look into space weather and the impact it can have here on earth. this time on the weather world, we are having some fun. we have come to a company in gloucestershire, snow business, which the 35 years has been making real and fake snow on demand. it is mostly for film and television. they are the biggest winter effects company in the world. some of their work includes the james bond films and star wars. later i will be looking at the materials they use to make this snow. i am off to meet darcy, the owner, and he is going to show me how you create a wintry scene. we've got a fairly green scene now, but we are going to transform it into something more white and wintry. i can't wait to see what it will look like. how are we going do this? we have a brand—new machine, we have some specially torn paper which locks together, we spray it with water so it sticks to anything it lands on. we can transform this into a winter scene. let's get started, then. music. this looks amazing. it's as if we have stepped into narnia. how do you create the illusion of falling snow? for that, we have a special machine, which mixes without to create snowflakes. with air to create snowflakes. wow! i feel like i'm in a snowstorm in lapland. so, creating this kind of snow is a really big business. in fact, you are the world leaders in winter effects. how'd you get into this? purely by chance. i worked for a company which made paper and a film company came along wanting a lovely, biodegradable snow. and they got us to make paper snow. it turned out quite well. so, this is artificial snow. and a little bit later on we are going to see a look at how they also make real snow here as well. this is real snow. but there is still something unusual here. our weather review of the year begins injanuary on greek island beaches. rarely does arctic weather on this scale reach so far deep into europe. and the bitter temperatures brought fears for migrants, at camps such as this one in serbia, with calls for them to be moved to warmer conditions. then disaster in italy. 29 people killed in the deadliest avalanche in a century. amazingly, some survived. rescued more than two days later. february in the uk, and storm doris blows in, with high winds and some lucky escapes. and here is another remarkable escape. in peru, as a mudslide churns up the debris of what was once somebody‘s home, a woman emerges. slowly she's able to scramble her way to help. but the flooding here did claim the lives of about 100 people in the first few months of the year. disaster in colombia in april. torrential rain sends a mudslide into the town of mocoa. more than 250 died here. in chile in january, a different problem. drought, heat, strong winds, then fire. this was the town of santa 0lga, destroyed by wildfires, said to be the worst in the country's modern history. severe drought hit africa. this was somalia, where disaster was declared in february. millions across east africa started the year facing starvation and famine. in california, after years of drought, a remarkable transformation took place. flooding rain from a succession of winter storms all but obliterated the drought. so much water so quickly that car swallowing sinkholes appeared. any hope that the soaking start to the year would offer long—term relief went up in flames, as we will see later in the programme. we often showed pictures of the aurora borealis, or the northern lights. this is the southern hemisphere equivalent, the aurora australis, putting on a spectacular display above new zealand in may. when and where we see the light depends on the behaviour of the sun, and trying to predict what the sun will be doing has created an emerging area of science, space weather. matt taylor has been finding out about it. imagine a few hours without traffic lights or your smartphone. sounds appalling, doesn't it? add to that trains, flights, your weekly shop, even money. and not just for hours. potentially days, weeks or even months. it could become a reality. it is all down to the impact that space weather could have on things like this. satellites shown here at the science museum in london. to the purists, space weather is not strictly meteorology, but it is driven by the same thing, and that is the sun. in this case it is all about coronal mass ejections and solar flares. to tell us about those i am joined by professor tim aubry, from the imperial college london. professor, tell us more about what solar flares and coronal mass ejections are? most of us think of the sun as a fairly boring yellow globe in the sky. but as we study it more we realise it is a dynamic object. solar flares are enormous releases of energy from the sun. they accelerate particles to high energies which can arrive at the earth and damage satellites, and they also release enormous amount of energy and coronal mass ejections. this matter floods out through the solar system and can arrive at the earth and impact us. you are the head of a mission investigating the sun? it is called solar 0rbit, being built by the esa at the moment. we will be going closer to the sun than ever before, closer than mercury. we'll be measuring what comes off the sun and travels past our spacecraft on its way towards the earth. and it is the magnetic fields which are important when it comes to impact on our planet, isn't it? yes. at imperial college london, we're building the instrument which will measure those magnetic fields in space, and when those fields arrive at the earth and interact with the earth's magnetic field, and it is those interactions which drive things like the aurora and geomagnetic storms. will this help us ultimately forecast space weather? solar 0rbit to itself not a space weather mission, but it is designed to study the fundamental physics of what's going on in the sun and into planetary space and by understanding that that we hope to do better space weather forecasting in the future. thank you. we will find out later in the programme a bit more about forecasting space weather and the impact it can have here on earth. at the start of the programme i said, look very closely this time on weather world, because all is not as it seems. it might look like i have entered an icy cave, but there isn't any ice in here. and none of this is real. it is another fake winter environment. paul is here to tell us how they made this. what materials have you used? we use a lot of different materials here. plastic, paraffin wax, recycled packaging material, litter as well. with led lighting we can bring it all together and give you the stuff that you see here. the materials that are used to make something look wintry in film and television, they have evolved over time, haven't they? in the very early days of black and white film they didn't have any other materials at all. they had to wait for it to snow. that was time—consuming, and it was also dangerous. three members died from the cold while they were filming this. that wasn't good. later they made it with different materials. laurel and hardy used painted cornflakes, which was effective. by the time we got to wizard of oz, they were using asbestos. 0bviously that's really bad, but they didn't know it was dangerous at the time. you use things which are good for the environment and good for people. what are the good materials going forward? we're developing materials like this, which is a glitter, which is made from cellulose. so within a couple of weeks or so that will biodegrade. now, normal glitter, which has been banned in cosmetic use by the government, would just wash off your body when you come back from your festival, down the drain and out to sea where it gets eaten by plankton and fish and unfortunately by us again. this is gone in a week or two. it has the texture of icing sugar but you can see the glitter. what else are you using? we are using things like this, which is fake frost. this is pure cellulose. you could eat it if you wanted to, though it wouldn't taste nice. once that washes into the soil that completely biodegrades. it is no more harmful to the environment then dead leaves. of course, the least harmful thing to the environment is real snow. we haven't had much of that yet, but it can be made on demand, and we'll be finding out about that later on. now, from snow to extreme heat. 0ur weather review of the year continues with a scorching summer in southern europe. wildfires led to holidaymakers being evacuated from campsites in france, spending the night on beaches near st tropez. portugal injune, and a catastrophic forest fire kills more than 50 people. than 60 people. it is the country's worst disaster for more than a quarter of a century. when a flash flood rages through a major city, disaster strikes. in august, a massive downpour sends muddy water surging through the streets of sierra leone in west africa. and then a mountainside collapses in an avalanche of mud, burying whole communities as they slept. hundreds of people killed, thousands losing their homes. now, more snow, and your bbc weather watcher pictures of the wintry weather which swept across the uk in early december. the most widespread december snow since 2010. you can become a bbc weather watcher by signing up at the bbc website. still to come on weather world, we head to the alps to discover how sometimes, the old ways are still the best, especially when it comes to predicting an avalanche. this time on weather world, sarah and i are looking at how they make snow for the film and television industry. we have seen fake snow, the material they use, but now this is real snow. this may look like something which came from the clouds, but actually, it came from this metal box. darcy, explain to me how we are about to make real snow inside this box, then? the box is a cryogenic chamber. water, compressed air, and the water is smashed into tiny, tiny pieces. we also fire liquid nitrogen. so the smashed water is like a cloud inside a box, with liquid nitrogen, freezing it down to —20. so it falls like snow inside the box. wonderful. let's close these doors and get started. so, darcey, this has been churning away now for about 90 minutes now. shall we crack open the doors and have a look at the snow inside? yes, indeed! wow, check this out! look at that snow. i can tell you, that is soft and fluffy and freezing cold. it feels just like real snow. is it exactly the same as naturally occurring snow? it's exactly the same as natural snow. so once you've made all of this snow here, how do you transport it to a film set? we initially shovel it into a refrigerated truck and we set the temperature at the perfect temperature to keep it in top condition. and do people tend to like to use more real snow or fake snow? they think they want to use real snow, but fake snow is faster and warmer. you can imagine, if you lie on this all day you'll get pneumonia. if you lie in the fake snow all day, it's lovely and warm and cosy. thank you so much for showing us around and showing us how this snow is manufactured here. for now, where is nick? heavy snow in february led to avalanches in afghanistan and the french alps, both resulting in several fatalities. sarah thornton travelled to austria, where heavy snow in the first part of this ski season has meant predicting avalanches is especially important. every year, hundreds of thousands of people descend here to the alps looking for someone to fun, but for the thrill seekers, and especially those who like to go off—piste, avalanches are an ever present threat. the main methods of protection date back decades and there's not a computer in sight. i put the shovel on the top and i pound like 30 times, with different intensity. now, here we can see the first crack. after the 27th time of pounding... you're saying it took quite a few times for you to pound this and get this crack here? if it had been fewer times you would have said, don't ski here? yeah. here in the tyrol, they're concerned about two key danger patterns for avalanches. early season snow forming a weak ground level layer and forecast winds leaving fresh powder around. but the team say on piste skiers are protected. they have the avalanche barriers, they have in the morning the avalanche commission, who is opening the runs or completely closing the runs if it's unsafe. off—piste skiers and snowboarders are most at risk from avalanches. there are high—tech gadgets that can help save anyone caught up in an avalanche, but it's low tech tools that keep people away from danger in the first place. some of the biggest weather headlines of 2017 came during a record—breaking atlantic hurricane season. texas, in august, where harvey becomes the first major hurricane to hit the usa in nearly 12 years. scientists have estimated harvey dropped 127 billion tons of water — no other tropical cyclone has produced so much rain in the usa. hurricane irma is next, slamming into the caribbean. it's getting really intense now in the centre section. more than 100 people are known to have died as a result of irma. it's september and there's another category five hurricane in the caribbean, maria. with ten consecutive hurricanes, this was one of the costliest atlantic seasons on record. august, and typhoon hato slams into china with the same terrifying mix of destructive wind and torrential rain as a hurricane. the pacific typhoon season was much less active than normal. even so, there were still several powerful systems, including this one in vietnam, in november. but as a cyclone‘s every twist and turn is tracked minute by minute, the annual monsoon deluge in south—east asia goes on for months, causing the worst floods in decades. in india, the eastern state of bihar is hit hardest. in total, millions of people are forced from their homes and more than 1,000 are killed. this is what's left behind after a flash flood in pakistan's most populated city, karachi. the monsoon rains give much—needed moisture for crops, but they always come with a human cost. in september, the weather in space was as tumultuous as it was on earth. so much so that it led to radio blackouts. nasa recorded the biggest solar flare for over a decade. but why should a flare have such an impact? matt's been to cambridge to get the answer from the british antarctic survey. so antarctica is a brilliant place to observe space? it is, actually. it's very, very radio quiet, so we can pick up radio signals in the antarctic which we can't do elsewhere. we detect special types of radio waves and those charged particles, when accelerated at high energies, pose a risk of damage to satellites. in fact, they are called killer electrons, because they've been known to kill spacecraft in the past. one of the largest solar flares ever to be witnessed was the carrington event, named after the british astronomer who observed it in 1859. he sketched what he'd seen on the sun, telegraph systems went haywire worldwide. scientists have estimated that something similar today could cost billions, if not trillions, given now our ever increasing reliance on satellite technology. colour—coded here, you can see the radiation belts, the regions of high energy charged particles, electrons. they're trapped in the earth's magnetic field. geostationary orbit is out here, in the outer edge, and the gps satellites, they fly pretty much through the heart of this radiation belt here, where the radiation is most intense. ideally you want the satellites to be stationed in between the radiation belts? there's a gap between inner and outer belt where the radiation is much lower, but there are periods where that region gets filled with high energy charged particles and that's a high risk period for those spacecraft. and that can have a big impact on daily life here on earth, can't it? well, if you think that we rely more and more on our satellites for mobile phones, for tv, for internet, for all kinds of communications, banking, that kind of stuff, yeah, it's a really important major part of our life in the modern world. so next time you gaze skywards or simply pick up your smartphone, just think how seemingly small changes in the sun could cause sudden and drastic changes to the way you live your life. november marked 150 years of the shipping forecast. the shipping forecast for the next 12 hours. the disturbance near the hebrides is almost stationary... produced by the met office on behalf of the maritime and coastguard agency, it's believed to be the longest running forecast of its kind in the world. that crucial forecast data is produced daily here at the met 0ffice. there was just a feeling that there was too much risk of loss of life... catherine ross, the chief archivist, showed me the first weather charts from under 150 years ago. what they did rather cleverly was basically put pins through the paper, and so you can kind of see just about these little pinpricks here, and that meant they were always plotting the same information in the same place. and you can see how they changed from having no maps to very detailed maps and it was known as the storm warning service, but it became known as the iconic shipping forecast. humber — west or south—west, five or six, occasionally four later. the shipping forecast is notjust for mariners but it's also listened to by hundreds of thousands of us every day on radio 4. ..five to seven. 0ccasional rain, good, occasionally moderate. and that's a flavour of the bulletin which is broadcast four times a day. at 5:20am it needs to be exactly nine minutes long, so on a calm day i can take my time in describing the weather conditions for the 31 different sea areas, whereas on a stormy day i'll have to speak much quicker in order to fit all that information into the same nine minute window. storm warnings in october as the remnants of hurricane 0phelia hit ireland and the uk. 0phelia was the easternmost major hurricane ever recorded in the atlantic. this roof was ripped from a school in ireland. the government here called the situation a national emergency. and 0phelia had a stranger side to it, turning the sky an eerie orange because of saharan dust swept up on the storm's path to the uk. but when it comes to air pollution, this is just about as bad as it gets. delhi, in november, and the smog so thick and toxic it's said to produce effects equivalent to smoking 50 cigarettes a day. in the usa, more tropical rain and flooding and this remarkable view of a house being swept along a river in new hampshire, as tropical storm philippe hit the east coast of the usa at the end of october. but over in california, fire, as months of hot, dry weather followed last winter's record rain, plunging the state right back into wildfire crisis. in december, fires hit the south of the state, near los angeles. the largest burning an area the size of new york. in the uk, storm caroline arrives in december. scotland bears the brunt with winds of up to 90 kilometres per hour, but colder air that follows caroline is felt across the uk, blanketing large areas of snow. the most in seven years. not everyone is a fan of snow. but if it's the very first time you've seen it, you can't help but be excited, even if you're a dog. truffle, the yorkshire cocker spaniel puppy, trying to get to grips with the white stuff. and that's it for this time from our weather world winter wonderland. and for highlights from our previous programmes, go to bbc.co.uk/weatherworld. there's one thing i want to know about fake and real snow. which is the best for a snowball fight? let's find out! bring it on! 0k. they are quite hard, aren't they? yours are harder! come on, sarah! you're not even trying! 0h! that's right in my ear! i got you back! you deserved that one. 0h! sorry, that must have hurt. hello again. although it has been a mild run up to christmas and that will continue today on christmas eve, we will notice a change by the end of christmas day. it is set to get much colder. the snow risk will increase and some of us may yet have a white christmas and it could be windy in the next 48 hours. we had some brightness through the day on saturday. this was durham late in the day. we might not see as much brightness. there is an active weather front marching into the north and west of the uk now. we still have tightly packed isobars, so windy weather. they are coming from a mild south—westerly direction and it is behind this weather front that the cold air is lying. it stays north for most and we start on a mild and murky note. there could be some morning fog but not as much as yesterday morning. it will still be dank, drizzly and grey for most of us as as we move in to this morning. 9s and 10s already as we get to day break. we may see some brightness around inland areas but not as much as yesterday. not as much brightness for northern ireland and scotland because this weather front stays put. it sinks further south as we go through the day but the intensity remains with us for scotland. argyll northwards in particular. it gets heavier through northern ireland through the afternoon. there is a fairly brisk wind and that is why i hope for the likes of the north—east england and north wales, we may see some brightness. we might see it temporarily in northern scotland. as we go through this evening, another weather front joins forces with the one we already have so we are concerned we may see some flooding because it looks like a thoroughly wet 2a hours. as i say, argyll northwards could see 80—100mm of rain over the hills. the winds strengthen ahead of these two weather fronts as we get into of christmas day. it looks quite squally, the wind, across england and wales. it starts to move across the western side of england, wales, northern england as well, and it is behind that that we get the snow risk. very mild and windy ahead of it to the north of it, for the afternoon and evening, snow could be seen through lower levels of northern scotland and possibly northern england. and then over night across the hills of wales and the south and west. that is because the cold air is coming back. notjust across the north. it looks as though it will filter southwards across many areas by the time we get to boxing day. it will feel markedly colder. that is the weather system i am talking about. it is clearing out of the way. then this weather system which could also bring a risk of snow. please, stay tuned. hello, this is breakfast, with rogerjohnson. the rescue effort continues today after a tropical storm kills more than 180 people in the phillipines. dozens more have been injured and around 40,000 people have been forced to leave their homes. good morning, it's christmas eve on sunday the 24th of december. also this morning: political leaders pay tribute to those who help others in their annual christmas messages. travel trouble over christmas as rail lines close for more than 250 engineering works. after warnings about a "busy—body" approach to anti—social behaviour the government issues new guidance for councils in england and wales.

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