The myth

Sometimes, during cold weather, it snows – but other times, it’s just so cold that it’s too cold even for snow.

The “truth”

Anyone who’s lived in a country where it snows in winter will recognise the feeling behind this popular piece of folk meteorology: there are days when the cold is so intense, you have the sense that even the snow is too frozen to fall. “It’s been trying to snow all day,” people will say, “but it’s just too cold.” Professional meteorologists, however, say that nowhere on Earth can ever be literally too cold for snow; it can and does snow at extremely low temperatures.