World War II relic comes to aid of the snowbound

WHEN stranded cars closed the A5 in Eryri (Snowdonia), local people were resigned to trudging through thick snow to get to wherever they needed to be.

- By ANDREW FORGRAVE Countryside and Tourism Editor

For a fortunate few, help was on hand from an unlikely source.During Sunday's big snowfall, heads turned at the unlikely sound of a WWII vehicle gunning through Bethesda. More surprisingly still, it stopped to offer lifts.

The tracked vehicle was a Studebaker M29 Weasel, one of the unheralded stars of the Second World War. Designed by the British, it was built in the US to support operations in Norway aimed at hampering the German nuclear weapons programme.