First snow for 100 years falls on Baghdad

An Iraqi girl enjoys playing in the snow in Sulaimaniyah, 260 kilometres (160 miles) northeast of Baghdad, Iraq on Friday, Jan. 11, 2008. Further south, Baghdad residents saw snow for the first time in living memory on Friday. AP

BAGHDAD, Saturday (AFP) - Light snow fell in Baghdad yesterday in what weather officials said was the first time in about a 100 years.

Rare snowfalls were also recorded in the west and centre of Iraq, plunging temperatures to zero degrees Centigrade (32 degrees Fahrenheit) and even colder, an official said.

The snow in Baghdad, which melted as it hit the ground, began falling before dawn and continued until after 9 am, residents said.

“Snow has fallen in Baghdad for the first time in about a century as a result of two air flows meeting,” said a statement by the meteorology department.

“The first one was cold and dry and the second one was warm and humid. They met above Iraq.”The director of the meteorology department, Dawood Shakir, told AFP that climate change was possibly to blame for the unusual event.

“It's very rare,” he said. “Baghdad has never seen snow falling in living memory. “These snowfalls are linked to the climate change that is happening everywhere.

We are finding some places in the world which are warm and are supposed to be cold.”Snow was also reported in the mountainous Kurdish north of the country, where falls are common.