Police officers were "outnumbered" by hundreds of people who defied lockdown to sledge en-masse. Northumbria and Cleveland Police forces struggled to get the throngs under control when joyous crowds headed to Cow Hill in Newcastle and Flatts Lane Country Park in Middlesbrough on Wednesday and Thursday.
Heaps of beer cans and food packets were left on the snow covered hill by revellers. On Wednesday in Newcastle people were spotted whizzing down the hill on upturned shopping trolleys.
While police can legally disperse crowds and fine or arrest those refusing to leave, they need a reason to do so. Although strict lockdown rules ban organised public gatherings, crowds made up of individual households who happened to have come together aren't