British agency tells residents to build snowmen to prevent flooding

Hey, snow-covered residents of the United Kingdom! If you want to protect your property from post-snow flooding, go out and build yourself a snowman. That's legit advice from England's Environment Agency, which says that sculpting Frosty in your front yard will slow down the thaw rate and potentially prevent flooding. "If you notice when people clear their [driveway], the snow thaws … but the compacted piles stay," spokesman Roy Stokes said. "We would rather it be a gradual thaw than a really quick one." This is either ingeniously simple advice or an excuse for Environment Agency staffers to drive through neighborhoods, pointing and snickering to themselves, "Look! Those people believed it, too!" [Source]

Click to see more on msnNOW.com, updated 24 hours a day.