Panic in the Supermarkets

According to the television there was "panic buying" in the supermarkets yesterday ahead of the forecast snow, and that many of the shelves were bare.. Women were shown with their trolleys stacked high with their purchases, something that can be seen almost any day if one has patience.
Panic or Gross Exaggeration?
The latter I suspect like everything these days from the media and the authorities.
The Met Office predicted snow which would probably be up to 30 cm deep (it sounds far worse in cm than inches) and advised that no-one should go out on Friday unless absolutely necessary. So, as we normally do our main weekly shopping at the local supermarket on a Friday, because it ensures that we have fresh vegetables over the weekend, we decided that in view of the forecast we would go yesterday. Panic? No way, just simple prudence. We were just doing what we had been told, avoiding going out today. And of course some of the shelves were bare, particularly in the bakery, something that might reasonably be expected even if only half the normal Friday shoppers arrived a day early.
Of course it wouldn't make nearly such good headlines to announce that
"Prudent shoppers were getting in their weekend supplies early in view of the forecast snow".

Snow has just started to fall more heavily here, we probably have about an inch by now, but cars seem to be managing our un-gritted street without problems. I've just noted a group of children from the secondary school walk past the house, presumably sent home on safety grounds.

England isn't what it was in my youth, I can just about remember the winter of 1940 when the outside pump for our water supplies froze as did the outside toilet, Even so I still had to walk to school, the county was at war and we weren't going to let a bit of snow stop us from getting on with it.