Rain on Snow

Alf Åge Teigmo heard a huge crash: "First came a river, then forest and large boulders.

"Just when I get into the machine, I just manage to sit in the seat and then the body of the excavator fills with slush and presses me against the window and then presses the whole machine off the road into the valley."

Sweden is to build up to a dozen bridges so reindeer can safely cross railway lines and major roads in the north of the country as global heating forces them to roam further afield in search of food.

In the very north of the Yamal Peninsula, deer pastures were covered with an ice crust due to heavy frosts after the rains. Monitoring and communication of specialists with reindeer breeders confirmed the fears - ice may provoke deaths of the reindeer herd. Assistance will be provided with feed, but emaciated animals must be slaughtered.

Experts fear the future could be like the record year 2020: Shorter and warmer winters, wetter summers.

In December of 2020 an atmospheric river brought heavy rains on top of a deep snowpack.

People are advised to stay off the roads as city crews try to clear priority streets. Biggest snow event since the blizzard of 2007.

Grazing conditions for reindeer in Northern Norway are very poor this winter as an unusual amount of snow forces the reindeer to dig especially deep to find food. On top of that, mild weather has created layers with ice both in the snow and below, locking lichen into the ground and leaving reindeer to starve.

Grazing conditions are very poor this winter in Norway as an unusual amount of snow forces the reindeer to dig really deep to find food.

In Karasjok and Kautokeino, there has been greater snowfall than usual on winter pastures. The difficulty in digging down to pasture is effecting reindeer in large parts of Troms and Finnmark.

Several rainfall records in Nordland have already been struck. Now a warning has been sent out for even more of the same. - We are in the top tier of what we have measured by rainfall over the last 100 years, says meteorologist Bente Wahl.

Icy conditions in the mountains have caused wild reindeer to descend towards the hut areas to find food. In several places ski areas are now closed to prevent the reindeer from being disturbed.

400 residents lost the road connection and several houses were evacuated when a seven-mile-long ice stopper came loose, carrying large masses of ice and water. Today, the municipality is on inspection to look at the damage.

Hiila Inga is concerned about the health of his reindeer. His community herds 8000 head each year, between traditional grazing lands in the mountain and the forests further east.

In less than three years, the number of animals on the island of Kolguyev dropped from more than 12,000 to only 153.

Nome was hit by unseasonably warm temperatures and strong winds.

Sixty-one thousand reindeer starved to death in the northwestern reaches of the Russian tundra in November 2013 in the largest recorded mortality event of its kind.

Herders are struggling to find thousands of reindeer that have run away in search of food. "We are driving for hours and hours to locate our reindeers and to herd them back, but it has been very difficult in these wintry conditions. So, we are also using helicopters and this is very unusual - and very expensive too."