Heavy snow blankets South Korea on Lunar New Year holiday

Seoul, Jan 28 (IANS) Heavy snow blanketed South Korea on Tuesday, with about 120 centimetres of snow piling up in the mountain areas of the southern resort island of Jeju.

Other areas across the country were also pounded by snow, with more than 10 cm of snow falling in cities such as Chungju, Wonju and Daejeon. Seoul received some 2.5 cm of snow.

As of 8 a.m., 1 to 3 cm of snow was falling every hour in areas that were placed under a snow advisory, with some areas receiving about 5 cm of snow per hour.

The weather agency expected the snow, as well as rain, to continue to fall through Wednesday, with up to 15 cm of snow expected in the central and southern areas, such as Daejeon, Sejong, Gwangju, the South and North Jeolla provinces, and South Chungcheong Province.

Between 3 to 8 cm of additional snow was expected for Seoul, Incheon and the surrounding Gyeonggi Province.

A cold snap also gripped the nation, with morning temperatures coming in between minus 10 degrees celsius and 0 degrees celsius.

Daytime highs were expected to stay between minus 5 degrees celsius and 6 degrees celsius, Yonhap news agency reported.

Due to heavy rain, three flights were canceled, while some 70 passenger ships traveling on 56 sea routes were suspended, according to the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasure Headquarters.

The entrances to 19 national parks across the country were also cordoned off for safety, according to officials.

Lunar New Year is the beginning of a new year based on lunar calendars or, informally but more widely, lunisolar calendars. Typically, both types of calendar begin with a new moon but, whilst a lunar calendar year has a fixed number (usually twelve) lunar months, lunisolar calendars have a variable number of lunar months, resetting the count periodically to resynchronise with the solar year.

The event is celebrated by numerous cultures in various ways at diverse dates. The determination of the first day of a new lunar or lunisolar year varies by culture.

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