Frozen Lockdown: When Snow Stopped a Country Cold

The Netherlands kicked off 2026 with a brutal New Year’s Eve marked by extreme violence: a historic Amsterdam church, the 154-year-old Vondelkerk, was gutted by fire as its 50-meter tower collapsed amid showers of burning debris, forcing evacuations of dozens of nearby homes.
Police faced unprecedented attacks nationwide with fireworks, petrol bombs, and stones—over 250 arrests, two deaths (a 17-year-old in Nijmegen and a 38-year-old in Aalsmeer from fireworks mishaps), and 14 eye injuries treated in Rotterdam alone—fueled by record €129 million in fireworks sales before a planned ban.

Just days later, around January 6-9, a sudden heavy snowfall blanketed the country in chaos, paralyzing everything despite the prior unrest not yet calming. Up to 30 cm of snow and -10°C temperatures shut down major highways like the A2 and A27 with massive pile-ups involving hundreds of vehicles, halted all train services (NS suspended for 48+ hours), canceled 70% of flights at Schiphol Airport, and closed schools, ports like Rotterdam, and supermarkets as power outages hit 100,000+ homes.
Daily life ground to a halt: grocery shelves emptied nationwide due to blocked supply trucks, emergency services overwhelmed with 5,000+ snow-related calls, and even ambulances snowed in—turning the vibrant post-NYE nation into a frozen standstill, with plows unable to keep up and some areas isolated for days.


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