You run the heater to defrost the glass in your car. It often takes a few minutes for it to be effective. Otherwise, you can’t see and you’re a danger to yourself and others.
In the winter, it’s more common than putting gas in your car. It’s kinda odd explaining this though
I live in the subarctic region, a stone’s throw away from the arctic circle. We have snow and frost in winter.
We use ice scrapers. :) As a matter of self-reliance and/or common courtesy.
Defrosting the windows with the engine is really not nice, especially not when it’s a diesel with the fumes hanging in the winter air and going inside people’s windows and into baby carriages and kindergarteners’ noses.
It's not only not nice, it's a genuinely bad idea. If you have large sheets of glass (truck windows) and large heat differentials, you are asking for catastrophic failure due to uneven expansion. I know multiple people this has happened to personally, and there are also some truck manufacturers who recommend against this kind of defrosting for exactly this reason.
In the winter, it’s more common than putting gas in your car. It’s kinda odd explaining this though