Role model. This guy cleared all windows of two cars by taking defroster liquid. He didn't idle the engines although he switched on the lights. Of course, this procedure takes time.
Kiel-Holtenau. Public parking lots for people without carports or vehicle halls. Thin layer of snow is hard-frozen on the windshield.
Dec. 1st - The meteorologists call it the begin of winter here. Of course, then cold weather normally trickles in from Scandinavia or East Europe and causes traffic havoc. It seems as if this is also the start of a special silly season, initiated by an inundation of idiots and sleepyheads on the road. Well, the dumbness starts in the very morning.
It's selective Alzheimer's, in my opinion. Prior to any morning rush hour, you get radio transmissions about the weather and road conditions, right? But it seems, who cares? Really savvy people get their crucial pieces of information the evening before, but you are quite nudged to say that this part of the population is the exception. The majority keeps making business as usual without taking any extra time for own and other's safety and precautionary measures.
What happens? Well, scratching the hoarfrost off the windshield while idling the car engine is their initial mistake.
This is the first morning chore of theirs, in a hurry, of course. In the belief that the motor will warm up by this, especially tree-huggers make this non-sense without getting any smarter in the long run. Germany's biggest motorists' association, the ADAC, gives bits of advice about tackling the onset of winter conditions on cars and roads; all is in vain, it seems - pure ignorance or just being intellectually challenged?
Extremists in negligence are those who only scratch off only parts of the windshield. These 'optimizers' always think they get this job done in seconds. When being in the cold car, their breath condenses, and they cannot see a thing through the bull's-eye, thus they drive very slowly.
Albeit being equipped with winter tires since mid-October, a lot of other people are very anxious when driving on roads with the first frost and/or thin layer of snow. The morning rush hour becomes a standstill because those slow-pokes often reduce their speed to one quarter or less of the average morning rate.
Another reason to get up a lil bit earlier, right?
This behavior is endemic in N Germany, esp. in the northernmost federal state of Schleswig-Holstein. Don't come during wintertime except you are really keen on having an increased fun factor by this.