Blizzards have swept across southern England threatening the worst disruption of the winter so far and there could be even more snow to come. Follow live updates12.23pm: The Met Office no longer has a red alert warning of extreme weather in the south, but it is forecasting up to 15cm for parts of London and the south east.An orange severe weather warning remains in place for much of the UK for the rest of the day. Tomorrow there's a warning of heavy snow and icy roads in Scotland, north east England and Yorkshire.12.19pm: James Whalley from Trafficlink emails with an update on the roads.The worst hit counties this morning include East and West Sussex - with long delays on the A27. The A3M in Hampshire is still closed north of Portsmouth, and the A3 through Surrey has been badly affected.Many roads in Oxfordshire have seen long delays, and the westbound M4 from Berkshire into Wiltshire is currently closed . The East of England, and Essex in particular , has seen some fairly substantial snow over the past hour, but Central London roads have largely been unaffected.12.00pm: Grit round up:AA president Edmund King said: "Although highway authorities have not run out, some are running very low and some are conserving supplies by using less salt and gritting fewer roads and pavements."There is only enough grit to cover 29% of roads in Oxfordshire. Liverpool City Council said it did not have "a huge amount" but was expecting a delivery today.There's only enough for one more run in West Berkshire.Norfolk county council has resorted to shipping gritting salt from from Ellesmere Port to Kings Lynn to avoid the roads.11.57am: Helen Carter has ventured out of her Cheshire house for the first time in 24 hours.It took half an hour to drag two children on a sledge and walk a mile to my parents' house. Bizarrely, my husband managed to drive to work but he said themile-long trip to the M6 was rather scary.My car is still under a foot of snow on the drive.11.47am: Perhaps I shouldn't have risked cycling this morning. A woman was rescued after being buried in snow after being knocked unconscious when she fell off her bike in Burnholme in York. Sarah Archdale, 25, was only spotted when a driver noticed the light from her bicycle under the snow, the York Press reports. The website of the York Press features a video interview with the driver.11.34am: I've just a had a nice email from fellow snow live blogger Rick Burin, who's doing great job withrolling snow news for the Harrogate Advertiser.One of his recent post's includes an offer of help to stranded households from a Pately Bridge councillor.Stan Beer has offered to come to your rescue! He says that if anyone can't walk to or get what they need from our local Lofthouse shop, then you can ring him at the George on 01423 755666 or at home on 01423 711103 (please leave a message on the answer machine) and he will deliver the necessary supplies to your home.(We could start a snow live bloggers union).11.21am: They've turned to hovercrafting in the snow in Fareham, Hampshire.And check out the snow drifts on the M62 near Marsden, in West Yorkshire. You can just make out a car buried in the snow, as a JCB clears great chunks of the stuff.11.09am: For the first time we can be thankful for footballers's fondness for keeping a fleet of cars.Newcastle United player Kevin Nolan stopped his Bentley to offer help to a vet from Ponteland, Northumberland, who was stuck in a snowdrift nearby, writes Martin Wainwright.When that didn't work, he drove home and came back in his 4x4 Jeep. Sarma, 33, says: "When Kevin turned up I knew I recognised him from somewhere but couldn't place him. He didn't act like a rock star or anything, he was just a really nice bloke. I just said, 'Do I know you?' and he just put his hand out and said, 'Hi, I'm Kevin'. It was only then that I realised who he was." Nolan, 27, has notched up 11 goals this season.10.54am: There's lots of snow related stuff on the Guardian's site today including: • A guide to day time TV if you snowed in.• A gallery of snow photos.• There's more on the travel disruption here and we are about to launch an update on school closures here.• As we get over excited Roy Greenslade reminds us"There's no journalistic business like snow business."10.46am: Today could be the day for finding out how well your roof is insulated according to our environment correspondent David Adam. He emails: I'm stuck up in Hertford where the snow is thick on the ground and still bucketing down. If the snow we have is heading south as forecasters said last night then London could be chaos this afternoon.Anyway, a green tint on the white stuff for you: it is said that you can tell a lot about how well a house loft is insulated by how quickly snow melts on the roof.A well insulated loft keeps the heat down in the house, which keeps the loft cold and the snow on the, cold, roof. A poorly insulated loft lets the valuable heat straight through to the roof, where it quickly melts the snow. Lots of other factors at play here too, such as sunshine (ho, ho) and the way a roof faces, but it might be something that people might want to watch out for? I've never had the chance to test it before!10.38am: The website of National Rail Enquiries struggling with volume of queries to annoyance of the frustration of passengers.Anthony Smith, Passenger Focus chief executive, said: "We're disappointed to hear reports that National Rail Enquiries is crashing due to increased traffic to the website. With severe weather already hitting parts of Great Britain and more expected this is an important tool for passengers to find out information about their journey and plan ahead."10.27am: In Scotland, the Borders is the most severely hit region, writes Severin CarrellNormal life there has ground to a halt. Hit by up to 25 cms of snow overnight, drivers around towns such as Kelso, Galashiels, Jedburgh and Hawick have been warned not to use their cars unless it is "a matter of lifeor death".Nearly all roads in the region are said to be impassable or veryhazardous: a snow plough sent out on one emergency to rescue twomotorists became stuck.Even the convenor of Scottish Borders council, Alasdair Hutton, told BBC Radio Scotland this morning he was working from home today – hemmed in, he said, by "18 inches" of snow."I'm not going to risk adding to the chaos by going out in it," he said.The council, which stretches from the Northumberland border west to the M74 and north of Peebles, was forced to close it social work centres and most community centres, and has begun rationing grit for the roads.Every school in the Borders, Midlothian and East Lothian, Aberdeenshire and Shetland were closed today, with several in Edinburgh shut down because of access and heating problems. Beaches at Dunbar, east of Edinburgh, had a very rare layer of snow.The A1 and other major roads south from Edinburgh, including the summit of the A701 at the Devil's Beeftub near Moffat, have been closed this morning, while motorists have been urged to avoid the A68.In south west Scotland, Dumfries and Galloway council said it had "barely a day's supply" of grit but announced that 71 of the 120 schools closed yesterday who reopen this morning.There is slightly happier news for Inverness. Effectively cut off from much of Scotland yesterday after closures of road, rail and air links, the A9 was reopened this morning with a warning that conditions remained "particularly bad".Police urged travellers to stay indoors and confirmed many other roads in the Highlands remained closed. Aboyne in Aberdeenshire recorded the lowest official temperature, according to the forecasters MeteoGroup, down to –13C.10.13am: My colleague Susan Smillie is having a hell of a time trying to return from holiday.She emails: Am currently stuck in Paris after flight to Gatwick from Lanzarote was diverted last night. We were due in at Gatwick at 10.40pm UK time, but landed Paris 11pm as Gatwick was shut. Around 173 passengers were sent to Hotel Ibis. After much faffing around we arrived at the hotel near 3am this morning and had to leave again at 9am this morning. We were told we would be fed but because it was so late that didn't happen, so lots of people haven't eaten since lunchtime yesterday. We've now been given 10 euro vouchers each for food and have been checked in to a 1pm flight to Gatwick which says it's leaving on time. 9.55am: High time for some YouTube. Here's a car struggling in snow (ignored the guffawing cameraman if you can), it looks clogged up on the Isle of Wight, and this was Bristol this morning.9.39am: Britain's traditional obsession with the weather is confirmed on its newest craze - Twitter. Trendsmap, which tracks popular Twitter terms by location, shows the main topics for conservation on the network this morning. The subjects tell their own story: 'cancelled', 'freezing', 'snowy', 'suspended' and 'inches' (it's interesting that Twitter users seem tied to imperial measurements).It all sounds a bit more serious than the tweets from Northern England yesterday when the terms 'sledging' and 'snowman' featured more prominently.9.26am: Martin Wainwright has woken to a "beautifully clear day" in West Yorkshire.But there was more snow overnight.Many people have clearly decided to hole up for the day, judging by much-reduced rush hour. All three of our local schools are open however - two primary, one comp - and neighbours are talking about how much worse it was in the early 90s when our boys' primary had its car park blocked by a double-decker bus slewed across Rawdon Town Street between drifts three feet high. So I advise caution on phrases such as 'worst/coldest ever...'Guardian North will attempt a breakout after breakfast as members of the garrison are going stir-crazy. Like many others in this part of the world, we aim to park our car on someone else's flat and preferably gritted street. Ours is like a ski run, so this may never happen.More than 250 schools are closed in West Yorkshire but the forecasters are gloomiest about the East Coast which is set for today's heaviest snow in our region, thanks to the weather pattern beautifully explained by the BBC last night: big High Pressure blob sitting on the UK, forcing nice pink wind arrows from the West to divert to Spain and France, and allowing nasty blue ones to swoosh in from Siberia via Scandinavia.Leeds Bradford airport open, heroically, on its high plateau. Robin Hood at Doncaster has terminal open but no flights yet. Sheffield-Leeds trains cancelled and reduced East Coast mainline service to King's Cross. Buses mostly on main roads only at the moment. Closed roads include the Snake Pass between Manchester and Sheffield - no surprise there - plus the A628 Woodhead Pass and A616 Stocksbridge bypass.9.20am: Today it's the turn of our west country correspondent, Steven Morris, to get snowed in.He's just emailed this: Well, looks like I'm stuck. I was due to go and visit a gritting depot this morning in Gloucestershire, but I don't think I'll be able to get there - more than 20cm of snow in some parts of the county. We only want to get to places like that when we can't.Actually at the edge of the village where I live just north of Bath, the roads aren't too bad. It's just that I can't drive out of the village because of pretty deep drifts - up to my knees in some places. There could be lots of very isolated communities over the next fewdays.The children's school is closed so it's sledging for them. But it doesn't sound like there have been huge falls of snow just everywhere.The BBC in Wiltshire was broadcasting from the spire of Salisbury cathedral and sounded disappointed that it wasn't more snowy there.Deep snow in north Dorset but my colleagues in coastal resorts like Bournemouth and Poole are wondering what all the fuss is about.9.07am: I'm losing track of the number of school closures. Every few minutes an update from PA has news of closures from more areas. We're now talking thousands of schools closed rather hundreds. It's getting on for 1,000 in west country alone (330 schools in Gloucestershire, 143 in Wiltshire, about 200 in Somerset and 80 in Bristol).9.03am: Radiokate has just recorded the "grrauchhy" sound of walking through snow in Walthamstow, north east London this morning (You might need to turn up the volume on your computer to hear the grrauch in full).8.51am: Last night the Met Office was warning that there could be more than 40cm in parts of the south overnight. There has been nothing like that so far.Odiham in Hampshire had registered about 24cm or 9.5 inches snow so far.There have been reports of around 30cm or 12 inches in north east England and the Scottish borders.8.42am: Yesterday we heard lots from a snowed-in Martin Wainwright on the outside of Leeds. Here's some more, and this time it's properly recorded.8.32am: My colleague Helen Carter emails from Cheshire with the story of a lucky escape for a 10-year-old girl.Emilie Pease was playing in the snow on her drive in Walton-le-Dale, Lancashire when a Vauxhall Vectra, skidded on the ice and collided with a wall. It then flipped into air over her head, missing her head by inches, before landing next to her.8.17am: Ben Marsh's wonderful #uksnow map continues track the snow in tweets and pictures. A reminder of the rules: tweet the first part of your postcode, give the snow a mark out of ten and include the hashtag #uksnow. It's currently one of the top ten trending topics on Twitter.This was the map a few minutes ago (left).The Guardian liked the idea so much that we've launched our own version with pictures.If you look to the top right of this blog you'll see Guardian journalists tweeting their way into work.8.05am: These are the number of school closures by area, to be announced so far:296 Gloucestershire176 Buckinghamshire 164 Oxfordshire60 Liverpool108 Manchester70 East and West Sussex10 Surrey100s in Hampshire and DorsetAll schools in Warrington and St Helens7.57am: Nothing but slush and muck on my journey into work today, I even managed to cycle in. If you want to brave it on bike Matt Seaton has plenty of advice.He writes: There's no need to leave the bike at home, just because of a bit of the white stuff. In fact, with bus, train and London underground services severely reduced by the inclement weather, cycling might be about the best bet for getting to work vaguely on time.But you might need to let air out of your tyres, "steer with your hips", and don't get cocky.7.35am: Here's a round-up of some of the disruption:• Hundreds of schools have closed. • Several airports including Bristol, Gatwick, Luton, Birmingham and Southampton were forced to close overnight.• Grit supplies are running very low. In West Berkshire, one of the worst hit areas, there's only enough left to cover the main roads one more time. The Highways Agency has the latest news on the delays on major roads. • Rail travel has been badly hit with many companies operating revised timetables.• There are some delays on the London Underground, but London has escaped the worst of the snow. The Met Office said outbreaks of snow are now not expected to be as heavy as previously forecast in London and and south-east.• This morning the Met Office was still warning of an "extreme weather event" affecting parts of southern England.

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