Around 400 people have now died from the cold weather in Europe since the cold snap began 11 days ago and forecasters warned there would be no early let-up to some of the lowest temperatures seen in decades.

While there was some respite for people in Ukraine -- where more than 130 deaths have been recorded -- the mercury plunged overnight to minus 39.4 degrees Celsius (-38.9 Fahrenheit) in the Kvilda region of the Czech Republic.

More bodies were found either on the streets, in their cars or in their homes in Germany, Greece, Italy, Poland, Hungary and across the Balkans.

Authorities in Serbia said that 70,000 people were trapped in snow-bound villages in the south as officials declared an "emergency situation".

In a dramatic effort to prevent two of the country's main waterways from becoming completely blocked, officials called up army explosive experts.

As ice layers threatened to cause widespread floods on the Ibar, Alexander Prodanovic, the country's top water official, said dynamite would be detonated to break up the huge blocks which had formed.

Authorities also hired icebreaking ships from Hungary to ease the flow on the Danube, the main waterway for all commercial shipping in Serbia. The port authority said the Danube was navigable around Belgrade but with difficulty.

There was similar chaos elsewhere in the Balkans with train linking Croatia's central coastal town of Split and the capital Zagreb derailing as a result of a snow drift. There were no reports of injuries.

The army, firefighters and rescue services were trying to get food and medicine to the population in several hundred villages in southern Croatia where snow up to 1.4 metres (4.6 feet) high was piled up.

"This is a disaster, we have been cut off from the rest of the world ... Snowploughs cannot reach us, so we have to walk to get some bread and basic things," Marko Ancic told the Slobodna Dalmacija daily after trekking some 17 kilometres (10 miles) from his village to reach the nearest town.

Large parts of eastern and southern Bosnia were also cut off by the snow and avalanches. There has been no contact since Friday with the hamlet of Zijemlje, some 30 kilometres from the town of Mostar.

"We don't know what is going on there. They have not had electricity since Friday and phone lines are cut, they have no running water," Radovan Palavestra, the mayor of Mostar, told AFP.

"There are elderly people who are very fragile and children including a baby of two months."

A helicopter which should have flown in aid to Zijemlje was unable to take off Tuesday morning because of heavy snowfall.

In Romania, two heavily pregnant women had to be flown out by helicopter in the eastern area of Iasi after their villages were completely cut off. Another pregnant woman had to be ferried to hospital by tractor in the eastern Paltinis area after her ambulance became stuck in the snow.

Schools were shut in large parts of the country, including Bucharest, while many train services were cancelled. Around 40 percent of roads were also closed, although flights did resume from Bucharest airport.

Snowstorms lashed Bulgaria, a day after eight people drowned in raging rivers and the icy waters from a broken dam that submerged a whole village to the southeast.

A Briton living on the Greek island of Symi drowned in a river which had been swollen by heavy rains as he tried to move his moped to safety.

The numbers killed by hypothermia in Poland rose to 68 after the authorities there recorded another six deaths in the last 24 hours. The majority of those who have died were homeless, many of whom had been drinking heavily.

The cold snap has also seen a sharp rise in the number of people being killed by carbon monoxide poisoning from faulty gas heaters.

According to the state weather forecaster in Ukraine, temperatures there could rise to a relatively modest minus six degrees. But the respite will be short-lived with temperatures expected to plunge to minus 30 by the weekend.

The UN weather service said temperatures would remain low until March.

"We might expect the change in the current cold wave to to start easing from the start of next week up to the end of the month," Omar Baddour, a scientist at the World Meteorological Organization, told reporters.

It was a similar message from Britain where forecasters said the cold spell could last for two more weeks and heavy snow at the weekend.

And in France, authorities appealed to households to save power where possible as they predicted electricity use could hit a record high.

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]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:50 AEST Rome (AFP) Feb 7, 2012 - Wolves scavenged in isolated snow-covered villages and southern Italians skied around town on Tuesday, as the Italian economy began to pay the price for the cold snap and the death toll rose to 30.

Snow kept falling in the north of Italy, with temperatures dropping to minus 25 degrees Celsius (minus 13 degrees Fahrenheit) in Marcesina on the shores of Lake Garda, and black ice in Calabria and Sardegna in the south.

A woman froze to death in Monza, near Milan, on Tuesday, as did a mentally ill man who had wandered off from the institute where he was being looked after in the Campania region.

A homeless man was found dead under a cardboard shelter in Ferrara, while a woman who had been admitted to hospital several days ago died of hypothermia.

Seven people were injured in Trieste in northern Italy when they were blown off their feet by a gale, despite chains and ropes stretched along streets in the city which is often battered by a fierce northern wind known as the Bora.

One woman died on Saturday when she was knocked to the ground by the wind.

Residents in Potenza, in the southern Basilicata region, took to their skis to get around amid a heavy snowfall which blanketed the sleepy city.

In the town of L'Aquila, devastated by an earthquake in 2009, snowed-in residents warned of food shortages and wolves scavenged in the white, deserted streets of the nearby town of Trasacco, the Corriere della Sera daily said.

Life in the centre of Rome returned to normal after days of chaos in the wake of the heaviest snowfall in 27 years, but schools remained closed and thousands in the surrounding region were still without electricity or heating.

The capital's main shopping thoroughfare, the Via del Corso in the historic centre, was closed to traffic after fears that vast ice-sheets could slide off roofs and plummet onto passing pedestrians and vehicles.

Biting temperatures and widespread snow and ice have caused up to 500 million euros ($660 million) worth of damages to Italy's agriculture sector so far, the Confagricoltura association said Tuesday.

The cold snap is forecast to continue at least until the weekend.

The economic development ministry activated a plan Monday to maximise gas supplies to vulnerable households by reducing gas supplies to industrial clients and switching from gas to oil-fired power stations.

2,000 companies -- from steel to paper factories -- have contracts which mean their gas supplies can be suspended if necessary, and 300-400 of them have been affected so far, according to the Gas Intensive consortium.

The consortium's head, Paolo Culicchi, said that should the companies be cut off for more than three days, Italy would lose 1.0 percent of its gross domestic product.

Energy policy expert and former minister Alberto Clo' told Il Mattino newspaper: "There is no need to panic, Italy will not run out of gas."

"There won't be any scenes like The Day After Tomorrow," he said, in reference to the 2004 apocalyptic film about a modern-day ice age.

"After a mild winter and with industry running at low capacity, we haven't drawn very much yet from our reserves," he said.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:50 AEST Warsaw (AFP) Feb 5, 2012 - The toll from Europe's killer cold snap hit at least 360 on Monday with nine new victims found in Poland, most of them homeless, and five drowned when a Bulgarian dam burst after torrential rain.

The rain and snowstorms lashing southern Bulgaria collapsed the dam early Monday, submerging the small village of Biser under 2.5 metres (eight feet) of water, emergency services said.

Biser mayor Zlatka Valkova told state news agency BTA three elderly men had drowned in their homes and a massive rescue effort was under way in the village of about 800 people. National radio reported two other people were killed when their car was swept off a bridge.

"People are in panic," regional mayor Mihail Liskov said on national radio. "Ninety percent of the village is under water."

Two larger dams in southern Bulgaria risked spilling over and residents were told to prepare to evacuate. Heavy rains also triggered a landslide that derailed a train near the Turkish border. No injuries were reported.

Meanwhile, temperatures in Poland plunged to as low as minus 24 degrees Celsius (minus 11 Fahrenheit), bringing another deadly night for the homeless.

As has been the case throughout the 10-day-old cold snap, transients have borne the brunt of the suffering, with frozen victims found in abandoned and unheated homes, fire escapes or makeshift shelters on Europe's streets.

In a bid to save lives, Poland's homeless shelters have dropped a ban on drunken individuals.

Monika Golebiewska, a Warsaw police officer whose beat is a daily patrol bringing food and clothing to the homeless in the city's hardscrabble Praga district, said she has been unrelentingly busy since the cold snap started.

"New (fatal) cases are reported to us daily. Just today we got calls telling us about two new ones, one of someone who was living in a tent and another of someone in an abandoned train station," Golebiewska said. "I've got more and more people to feed, but just 40 portions of soup a day."

Overall, 107 people have died of hypothermia in Poland since winter hit in November. The current cold snap began at the end of January and across the continent, authorities have reported at least 360 weather-related deaths.

In neighbouring Lithuania, where the mercury has dipped to minus 31 Celsius (minus 24 Fahrenheit), the deaths of 12 more people over the weekend brought the cold snap's toll to 23.

Hungarian authorities have reported at least 12 dead since the onset of the cold.

Italian authorities continued to clear up after a rare snow storm blanketed Rome over the weekend and crews struggled to restore power to about 60,000 homes across the country, especially in the Tuscan cities of Siena and Arezzo.

Italian energy giant ENI warned earned it may have to cut gas supplied to customers after shortfalls in gas imports from Russia.

Elsewhere across Europe, authorities struggled to clear clogged roads and runways that left tens of thousands of travellers stranded over the weekend.

After cancelling half its flights Sunday, operators of London's Heathrow Airport, the world's busiest passenger hub, said its schedule was almost back to normal Monday.

While parts of Britain were beginning to warm above freezing, other European nations remained in an icy grip.

In the Czech town of Kvilda, near the Czech-German border, the temperature hit minus 39.4 Celsius (minus 38.92 Fahrenheit), the lowest recorded in the country this winter.

Switzerland also recorded year lows, dropping to minus 35.1 Celsius (minus 31 Fahrenheit) in the eastern Graubuenden canton on Sunday night.

The bitter cold has engulfed most of Europe and even crossed the Mediterranean into north Africa, where as many as 16 people were killed on Algeria's snow-slicked roads or in other weather-related accidents.

Rare snow also fell in southern Tunisia for the first timme in some 40 years, media reported, with temperatures well below freezing in some areas of the country and villages cut off.

In France, 39 of the country's 101 regions were on alert for deep cold or snow, down from more than half the regions at the weekend, as a new record for electricity consumption was predicted later Monday.

Five people have died in weather-related incidents since the cold snap hit France, the latest a 56-year-old homeless man who is believed to have succumbed to hypothermia in a suburb of Paris.

People in the Netherlands, however, were sharpening their skates in the hope that a legendary long-distance race on frozen canals may be held for the first time in 15 years, though organisers cautioned Monday the ice was still too thin.

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]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:50 AEST Rome (AFP) Feb 5, 2012 - Snow and treacherous black ice caked the streets of the normally mild-weathered Italian capital Sunday, as snowed-in residents warned of food shortages and the cold snap's death toll rose to 17.

Following what was Rome's heaviest snowfall in 27 years, more than 400 members of the armed forces were called in to help clear the ancient city and surrounding areas.

Snow also fell in Milan and areas of northern Italy, and the bitter cold's toll rose to 17 after three homeless people were found dead, including one at Rome's main train station. The bitter cold that has gripped Europe for more than a week has claimed over 300 lives across the continent in total.

Fierce winds knocked over and killed an elderly woman who was walking to mass in Trieste in northern Italy, three men died shovelling snow and a 19-year-old man was killed in Florence when his car skidded off an icy road and into a river.

Large areas of the Lazio and Umbria regions had intermittent or no electricity, water or heating, taxis and buses struggled without snow chains and basic foodstuffs were running out in some areas.

In two towns in the Ciociaria region south of Rome, people cut off without water drank snow melted down in kitchen pots, La Repubblica newspaper said.

Riccardo Santucci from Frosinone told the paper: "We've been abandoned to ourselves, isolated from the world. We've had no water or light for 24 hours. We're warming ourselves by the stove and eating from cans."

As residents resorted to sawing through fallen trees blocking the roads themselves, many people said they had had no assistance from the authorities.

"It's awful. I had to walk two hours through freezing temperatures just to get to the metro," Rome resident Federico Maneski said. "The area is full of trees that have fallen on cars but no one's come to help us."

The chaos in the capital sparked a row between local and governmental authorities, with each blaming the other for the crisis.

Rome's right-wing mayor, Gianni Alemanno, was widely criticised for failing to activate a winter emergency plan, but he said he had been badly informed.

Italy's civil protection agency said it warned Alemanno in advance and even offered assistance, which he turned down. The agency's head said the mayor then called him in desperation after the heavy snowfall on Friday.

As the city shuddered to a halt on Saturday, the mayor's suggestion that Romans should get out on the streets and shovel the snow themselves sparked an angry reaction from incredulous residents and calls for his resignation.

"Snow emergency. Abandon the city. I'm already in Milan!" a fake Alemanno said in a Twitter message that quickly spread online, much to the chagrin of the real mayor, who threatened an investigation and legal action against whoever wrote the Tweet.

"We can and must do more, much more, to anticipate and minimise the consequences," Italy's Prime Minister Mario Monti said.

Meanwhile, the national rail operator faced class actions after hundreds of people spent the night on trains that lost power after electric cables froze. Trenitalia came under fire for severe delays and abandoning passengers in the cold.

Trenitalia issued a statement denying reports that passengers had been stuck on a train in Tivoli for 25 hours, saying they had been put up in a hotel -- but the local mayor, Sandro Gallotti, said the passengers would seek damages.

Consumer associations Federconsumatori and Adusbef also threatened to launch a class action against Trenitalia for "serious inconveniences."

The cold snap is expected to last into the middle of the week at least, and the civil protection agency said it may snow again in Rome on Friday.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:50 AEST Rome (AFP) Feb 5, 2012 - The death toll from the vicious cold snap across Europe has risen to more than 260, with the winter misery set to hit thousands of those seeking to escape it Sunday as air traffic was hit.

Ukraine has suffered the heaviest toll with 122 deaths, including many who froze to death in the streets as temperatures plunged to as low as minus 38.1 degrees Celsius (minus 36.5 Fahrenheit).

Airports were shut, flights and trains delayed, and highways gridlocked as emergency services raced to clear falling snow.

London's Heathrow Airport, Europe's busiest air passenger hub, cancelled 30 percent of its flights Sunday to cope with heavy snowfall overnight and possible freezing fog.

Heathrow said up to 10 centimetres (four inches) of snow were expected to fall which, without reductions to the flight schedule, would cause major disruption at the west London airport.

"We deeply regret any disruption caused to passengers by the cold weather," said Heathrow's chief operating officer Normand Boivin.

"Reducing the flight schedule means we can fly as many people as possible and return the airport to normal as quickly as possible."

The changes could affect around 400 flights at the world's busiest airport for international passengers.

In the Netherlands, Amsterdam-Schiphol airport reported dozens of delays and cancellations on Saturday.

In Italy, the poor weather also hit boat passengers, when the ferry Sharden hit a breakwater shortly after setting off from the port of Civitavecchia near Rome on Saturday.

It caused panic among the 262 passengers who feared a repeat of a cruise ship tragedy in the area last month that is thought to have killed 32 people.

Coast guard spokesman Carnine Albano said the accident, which tore a 25-metre (80-foot) hole in the ship's side above the waterline, happened after the vessel was buffeted by a violent snow storm from the north-east.

All passengers were evacuated and no injuries reported.

The heaviest snowfall in 27 years in Rome caused the capital, better known for its warm sunshine, to grind to a halt with taxis and buses unable to navigate through the icy streets without snow chains.

Parts of the Venice lagoon also froze over.

Among the cold-weather deaths in Italy was 46-year-old woman who died in Avellino, near Naples in southern Italy, after a greenhouse roof laden with snow collapsed on her.

A homeless man in his sixties of German origin was found dead, apparently of cold, in the central town of Castiglione del Lago. These latest deaths brought the total in Italy to seven.

In Poland, the death toll rose to 45 as temperatures reached minus 27C (minus 32F) in the north-east. In Romania, four more victims were found, bringing the number of fatalities in the country to 28.

The cold snap has also killed people in Bosnia, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Italy, Slovakia, France, Austria and Greece.

In France, snow fell from Lille in the north to Marseille in the south, though the west of the country and the capital Paris were spared.

A 12-year-old boy died in the eastern French city of Strasbourg when the ice broke as he played with a friend on a frozen pond, paramedics said.

His friend, 11, was in hospital being treated for hypothermia after plunging in to try to save him.

Snow fell in Bosnia for the second straight day, paralysing traffic, with one patient dying as an ambulance was unable to reach his village in the south of the country.

In Serbia, a man was found dead in the southern town Lebane as the authorities in 28 municipalities, mostly in remote mountainous regions in the south and southwest, declared a state of emergency.

In tiny Montenegro, where one person was found frozen to death in a village, many hamlets in the mountainous north were cut off. Rescuers managed to evacuate 120 people, among them 31 school children from neighbouring Albania on a field trip, Interior Minister Ivan Brajovic said.

But as Europe huddled indoors for warmth, Russian gas giant Gazprom said it could not satisfy western Europe's demand for more energy.

"Gazprom at the moment cannot satisfy the additional volumes that our Western European partners are requesting," the company's deputy chairman Alexander Kruglov said at a meeting with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, according to Russian news agencies.

Frigid temperatures even edged into north Africa, with the temperature forecast to drop below freezing in Algiers on Saturday night.

In Algeria's eastern region, a 17-year-old man was assumed killed after he was swept away by a swollen river. Many domestic and international flights were cancelled.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:50 AEST Rome (AFP) Feb 4, 2012 - Hundreds of people were plucked to safety Saturday after a ferry caught in a snow storm hit a breakwater off Italy, as a vicious cold snap that has claimed over 260 lives across Europe maintained its grip.

Ukraine has suffered the heaviest toll of 122 deaths, including many people who froze to death in the streets, as temperatures plunged to as low as minus 38.1 degrees Celsius (minus 36.5 Fahrenheit) in parts of the continent.

Airports were shut, flights and trains delayed, and highways gridlocked as emergency services raced to clear the falling snow.

But as Europe huddled indoors for warmth, Russian gas giant Gazprom said it could not satisfy western Europe's demand for more energy.

In Italy, the ferry Sharden hit a mole shortly after setting off from the port of Civitavecchia near Rome, causing panic among the 262 passengers who feared a repeat of a cruise ship tragedy in the area last month which killed 32 people.

Coastguard spokesman Carnine Albano said the accident, which tore a 25-metre (80-foot) hole in the ship's side above the waterline, happened after the vessel was buffeted by a violent snow storm from the north-east.

All passengers were evacuated to safety and no injuries were reported.

The heaviest snowfall in 27 years in Rome caused the capital better known for its warm sunshine to grind to a halt, with taxis and buses unable to navigate through the icy streets without snow chains.

Parts of the Venice lagoon also froze over.

A 46-year-old woman died in Avellino, near Naples in southern Italy, after a greenhouse roof collapsed on top of her with the weight of snow and the ambulance failed to get through the blocked roads to her in time.

In Poland, the death toll rose to 45 as temperatures reached minus 27 Celsius in the north-east. In Romania, four more victims were found, bringing the number of fatalities in the country to 28.

The cold snap has also killed people in Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Bulgaria, Serbia, Czech Republic, Italy, Slovakia, France, Austria and Greece.

Snow fell in Bosnia for the second straight day, paralysing traffic, with one patient dying as the ambulance was unable to reach his village in the south of the country.

Public transport was disrupted in Sarajevo, with several tramlines blocked by snow since Friday evening.

Even Croatian and Serbian Presidents Ivo Josipovic and Boris Tadic were forced to postpone their departure from a regional meeting, as they were blocked in the ski resort of Jahorina, near the Bosnian capital.

"I can only leave the house if I dig a tunnel with a shovel, my car has become a mountain of snow," IT worker Eldar Hajdarevic told AFP by phone.

In tiny Montenegro, villages in the mountainous north were cut off. Rescuers managed to evacuate 120 people, among them 31 school children from neighbouring Albania on a field trip, Interior Minister Ivan Brajovic said.

Both airports -- in the capital Podgorica and the Adriatic port of Tivat -- were closed to traffic, while the authorities ordered a railway service to be halted fearing mountainous avalanches.

The Netherlands' Amsterdam-Schiphol airport meanwhile reported "dozens of delays and cancellations," and London's Heathrow, the world's busiest in terms of international passenger traffic, cancelled 30 percent of Sunday's flights as it braced for heavy snow and freezing fog.

In France snow fell from Lille in the north to Marseille in the south, though the west of the country and the capital Paris were spared for the time being.

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]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:50 AEST Kiev (AFP) Feb 5, 2012 - The deadly cold snap that has gripped Europe for more than a week wrought more havoc across the continent Sunday, straining emergency services, grounding flights and pushing the death toll past 300.

The homeless population has borne the brunt of the suffering, with dozens of transients freezing to death in unheated apartments, fire escapes or in makeshift street shelters.

French authorities on Sunday found the body of a homeless man who had frozen to death, bringing to at least 306 the number of cold-related deaths reported across Europe.

With night-time temperatures plunging as low as minus 40 Celsius (minus 40 Fahrenheit) in Finland, the grim winter toll also rose in other countries.

Italy, Poland and Ukraine all recorded more deaths.

Ukraine announced another nine deaths, bring their total to 131 -- most of them homeless people who perished on the streets since the freeze started nine days ago, Ukraine's emergencies ministry said.

Some 1,800 people had been hospitalised, and 75,000 people had sought warmth and food in over 3,000 shelters across Ukraine.

The bitter cold front has engulfed much of Europe and even crossed the Mediterranean into north Africa, where as many as 16 people were killed on Algeria's snow-slicked roads or in other weather-related accidents.

In Rome, traffic was virtually paralysed by black ice as snow covered the city.

As residents resorted to sawing through fallen trees blocking the roads, many people said they had had no assistance from the authorities.

"It's awful. I had to walk two hours through freezing temperatures just to get to the metro," Rome resident Federico Maneski said. "The area is full of trees that have fallen on cars but no one's come to help us."

The Italian death toll reached 17 when three homeless people were found dead, while two men suffered heart attacks as they shovelled snow in the Abruzzo region and Campania regions.

London's Heathrow Airport, the world's busiest passenger air hub, cancelled half of Sunday's 1,300 flights after it was blanketed in six centimetres (2.4 inches) of snow. Heavy snow falls in other parts of Britain left motorway drivers stranded overnight.

The cold claimed eight new victims in Poland, bringing that country's toll to 53, and in Serbia, which has recorded nine deaths, authorities declared states of emergency in 32 municipalities, mostly in the south and southwest.

Almost 70,000 people remained cut off in snowed-in Serbian villages, with police and military units providing basic necessities, said Predrag Maric, the police official in charge of Serbia's emergency services.

In Romania, six new deaths brought the toll there to 34.

But there was better news in Croatia, where a woman gave birth to a girl with the help of two neighbours after emergency services were unable to reach her as she went into labour in a village cut off by a blizzard.

She named her daughter Snjezana -- "Snow-White" in Croatian.

Overnight temperatures in Finland plummeted to minus 40 degrees Celsius (minus 40 degrees Fahrenheit), but that did not deter many Helsinki voters from turning out to vote in a presidential election.

Motorists were warned of more arctic winds and slick roads and poor visibility because of powdery snow.

Similar conditions led to pile-ups Friday near Helsinki, in which more than 200 cars were involved, and about 40 people taken to hospital.

The cold spell is forecast to last until at least the middle of the week.

Hope grows for unique Dutch ice skate marathon
The Hague (AFP) Feb 6, 2012 - The Dutch are sharpening their skates in the hope that a legendary long-distance race on frozen canals may be held for the first time in 15 years, but organisers said Monday the ice was still too thin.

"At this point we cannot set a date. It all depends on the weather," Wiebe Wieling, chairman of the Society for the Frisian Elf Steden (11 cities), the race organiser, told a press conference in the northern city of Leeuwarden, broadcast on national television.

"Although we have excellent quality ice in northern Friesland, there is a problem area in the south -- the ice is simply too thin," Wieling said.

"Today we can unfortunately not give any conclusion (whether the race will be held)," he said.

Officially skated for the first time in 1909, the so-called Elfstedentocht (Eleven Cities Race) is a race over 200 kilometres (120 miles) on the frozen canals that run through Friesland province's main cities.

Seen as the Netherlands' ultimate ultra-race, it can only be held if the ice is thick enough -- at 15 centimetres (six inches) -- to hold some 16,000 skaters, cheered on by two million spectators, Wieling said.

Since 1909, the Elfstedentocht has only been skated 15 times, notably three times in a row during World War II in 1940, 41 and 42, making it a rare event that has been dominating headlines in the Dutch media since cold weather set in a week ago.

Dependent on weather conditions, the race had no set date and race organisers usually give 48 hours' notice before its start, setting in motion an army of volunteers to prepare for the invasion of skaters and spectators.

Wieling said Monday more inspections would be done, particularly in southern Friesland with the next announcement on ice conditions expected by Wednesday.

"Our motto is that if it's too dangerous, we won't do it," he added.

The record time for completing the race was set in 1985 at six hours, 47 minutes, according to race organisers' official website.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:50 AEST Warsaw (AFP) Feb 3, 2012 - Europe's cold snap has claimed 164 lives, as countries from Ukraine to Italy struggle with temperatures that plunged to record lows in some places and with more cold weather forecast.

Entire villages were cut off in parts of eastern Europe on Thursday, trapping thousands, while road, air and rail links were severed and gas consumption shot up during what has been the severest winter in decades in some regions.

In Ukraine, tens of thousands headed to shelters to escape the freeze that emergencies services said has killed 63 people -- most of them frozen to death in the streets, some succumbing to the hypothermia later in hospitals.

Nine more people died in Poland as the mercury dropped to minus 32 Celsius (minus 25.6 Fahrenheit) in some parts, bringing the country's toll to 29 since the fearsome spell of cold weather started last week, police said.

The Met Office in London warned that the cold snap was set to continue in many areas, with more snow expected in Kiev overnight Friday, though the temperatures could rise off their recent lows.

Berlin would have snow Friday with temperatures hitting minus ten Celsius overnight, the Met Office forecast.

Snow was also forecast in many parts of Britain over the weekend.

Homeless people in the region are at highest risk, warned the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

"Although we expect harsh winters in this part of the world, this current freeze has come towards the end of a mild winter," said Zlatko Kovac, IFRC representative for Belarus and Ukraine.

"Homeless people have been caught unawares and unprepared. They dont follow long-range forecasts and are extremely vulnerable."

Red Cross Societies have helped with hot meals, warm clothing and blankets. The organisation said it had released more than 100,000 euros ($140,000) from its Disaster Relief Emergency Fund to boost the aid effort.

Russian gas giant Gazprom, meanwhile, said it had boosted deliveries to Europe, while several European countries reported drops in Russian supplies, with operators in Austria and Slovakia both reporting falls of 30 percent.

Ukraine -- the transit point for most Russian gas headed to Europe -- denied it was taking a greater than usual share of the gas.

Tens of thousands of people in Ukraine have sought help in more than 2,000 temporary shelters as temperatures fell to minus 33 degrees Celsius in the Carpathians and minus 27 in the capital Kiev.

"I am unemployed. I have somewhere to live but nothing to eat. I ate here and it was good -- bread with a slice of fat and an onion as well as porridge," said Olexander Shemnikov after visiting a shelter in Kiev.

In Romania, eight people died overnight, bringing the country's overall toll to 22, the health ministry said. Schools remained closed in some parts.

In Bulgaria, at least 10 people have died, according to media.

With parts of the Danube river freezing, authorities moved some vessels to ports further away to protect them from the advancing ice.

In the Bulgarian capital Sofia, some residents found their money frozen as automated teller machines stopped functioning, according to local media.

In Latvia, 10 people have died around the capital Riga alone, with no figures available for the rest of the country. In neighbouring Lithuania a 55-year-old homeless man became the ninth victim of the deep chill.

In Estonia, organisers had to postpone a trio of cross-country skiing events after temperatures plunged to minus 30. Many Friday and weekend sports events have been cancelled elsewhere on the continent.

In north and central Italy, hundreds were trapped overnight on trains as freezing temperatures and heavy snowfalls caused widespread transport chaos.

The cold has so far killed an infant in Sicily, a 76-year-old in Parma and a homeless man in Milan during what forecasters say is the coldest weather in Italy in 27 years.

In France, 41 of the 101 regions were on alert for snow or "deep cold". In Paris, the army set aside nearly 600 places in military buildings to shelter the homeless from the cold.

Two people died in Austria, and seven perished in Serbia, where 11,500 others were trapped mostly in remote mountain villages inaccessible by road.

Five have died in the Czech Republic and two each in Slovakia and Greece.

In Belgrade, homeless people unable to secure one of the 140 spots in the capital's sole shelter took refuge in trolley buses and trams.

In neighbouring Bosnia, several remote hamlets in the east were cut off, forcing helicopter airdrops of food and supplies this week.

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]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:50 AEST Warsaw (AFP) Feb 3, 2012 - Hardy fans of swimming in the frozen lakes of northern Poland have decided to call off a mass outing this weekend due to vicious cold snap gripping the country, organisers said Friday.

"In the interests of our participants' security, we've decided to call off this year's Bath of the Brave," Ireneusz Dzienisiewicz told Poland's PAP news agency.

This year's edition of the annual swim in a lake near the city of Elk -- which draws around a hundred participants -- was due to take place on Sunday.

But temperatures in northern Poland have plunged to minus 30 Celsius (minus 22 Fahrenheit), far below the minus 15 Celsius experienced by swimmers in 2010 during the coldest ever edition of the event.

On top of the risks to the swimmers, there were also practical reasons for cancelling the event.

"The water freezes so fast that we wouldn't be able to keep a large enough hole in the ice," said Dzienisiewicz.

Since the cold snap struck Europe at the end of last week, 37 people have died of hypothermia in Poland, according to the police. Most of the victims have been homeless.

]]> Wed, 08 FEB 2012 08:56:50 AEST Kiev (AFP) Feb 3, 2012 - Temperatures plunged to new lows in Europe where a week-long cold snap has now claimed more than 220 lives and forecasters warned Friday that the big freeze would tighten its grip over the weekend.

A total of 223 people have died from the cold weather in the last seven days according to an AFP tally, with Ukraine suffering the heaviest toll.

People have been found dead on the streets in some countries, while thousands have been trapped in mountain villages in Serbia. In Italy, Venice's canals started freezing over and even Rome was dusted in snow.

The lowest temperatures recorded in Europe overnight were in the southwest of the Czech Republic, where the mercury dropped as low as minus 38.1 degrees Celsius (minus 36.5 Fahrenheit) overnight.

The EU executive said vital Russian gas deliveries had dropped in nine countries, with Russian giant Gazprom invoking flexibility clauses as it also braves a cold snap. Supplies fell 30 percent in Austria and 24 percent in Italy.

Ukraine's emergencies ministry raised its death toll to 101 since the cold snap took hold, 64 of whom died on the streets.

Almost 1,600 people have sought medical attention for frostbite and hypothermia and thousands have flocked to temporary shelters.

The chilling temperatures killed eight more people over the last 24 hours in Poland, bringing the death toll to 37 since the deep freeze began a week ago, police said.

Temperatures plunged to minus 35 Celsius in some areas of Poland.

In Bulgaria parts of the River Danube froze over, while another six people were found dead from the cold, bringing the overall tally to 16 in the last week, according to local media.

Most of the dead in the European Union's poorest country were villagers found frozen to death on the side of the road or in their unheated homes, the reports said.

More than 1,000 Bulgarian schools remained closed for a third day amid fresh snowfalls and piercing winds in the northeast.

In neighbouring Romania two more people died, bringing the overall toll to 24, and hundreds of school remained closed.

In Rome, residents experienced only their second day of snow in 15 years, with white flakes covering palm trees, ancient Roman ruins and Baroque churches across the capital.

Up to five centimetres (two inches) of snow fell in some districts and ancient monuments like the Colosseum were closed to visitors for fear of damage to the structure.

Canals in Venice, where temperatures fell as low as minus 5 Celsius, started freezing. However trains resumed normal service across the country except in and around Bologna and on a local line near Rome after days of delays.

Three people have died due to the extreme weather in recent days, including a homeless man found in Milan on Thursday.

In Estonia, a man was found frozen to death on a street in Tallin, the first reported death there.

France also reported its first death after an 82-year-old man suffering from Alzheimer's wandered out of his home in his pyjamas in the eastern French village of Lemberg and died of hypothermia.

One person died in Serbia, but teams of workers ploughed through snowdrifts to get food, supplies and aid to thousands of residents of mountain villages cut off by the weather.

"To help a woman who needed to reach a hospital we were breaking through two-metre (six-foot) snow drifts, which lasted for two and a half hours," said Vedran Taskovic, a rescuer in the southeastern town of Vranje.

The cold snap has also killed people in the Baltic countries of Latvia and Lithuania, as well as Austria and Greece.

Swathes of Britain were bracing for snow after temperatures plunged to minus 11 degrees Celsius overnight in some areas, with authorities warning that the cold could catch people off-guard after a warmer-than-normal winter so far.

Further north, about 40 people were injured in about 100 road accidents caused by powdery snow and icy conditions, police said.

The first snows to hit Belgium caused more than 1,100 kilometres (690 miles) of traffic jams on roads and highways, said automobile associations. The last record was 948 kilometres registered in February 2010.

Algerian officials announced they had cancelled ferry services to the southern French port of Marseille because of the conditions.

In France, three of Saturday's top league football matches were brought forward to afternoon kick-offs to escape the worst effects of the freeze and matches in Italy were also brought forward for the same reason.

France's opening Six Nations rugby match against Italy in Paris was still on for 1430 GMT Saturday.

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