It simply never dawned on the people here that cold air goes down and even if the temperatures are above freezing after 3 days of below freezing temps the ground may still be below freezing.

Dry all night and a light rain came in right at rush hour. Its "Black Ice" everywhere.

My wife and I have been talking about this for two days, that it was coming.    

The schools here close for a dusting of snow but not ice.  At least a dozen or so school buses are either in ditches or been in accidents.  Kids are being dumped where ever they are.  Two ambulances responding to accidents with injuries have turned over.  

I live on secondary road with not much traffic.  All my neighbors are outside watching the cars go into the ditches.  One slammed into the creek with enough force the sound shook my house.  They're OK but wet.  My son is down the hill watching it all and keeping me posted. Besides here on my hill, I have good vantage point.

I'll probably be pulling people out after a while but I know better than to try to get out until this stuff melts or somebody gets hurt.  

The media still hasn't figured out its the ground and the air temp above freezing doesn't matter.  

911 has stopped taking calls unless its a severe injury.  Its been jammed and nobody can get through.  The schools number is constant busy signal.  Although the road to the school has been closed and no buses have made it, its still open.

I'm listening to the scanner.  Its crazy.  One LEO just called saying he was at a school bus that the driver refuses with good reason to go on asking for help ferrying small children and the responders just got stuck.  The children are walking home.  That can be miles.  One lady cop floored me.  She was reporting on a five car pile up and said she needed a salt truck and someone bring her spiked boots she's tired of falling on her keester.  

One salt truck salting the road ran across his children walking along the road that cars were going into ditches, picked them up, and has forsaken salting for getting them home. Same road now in front of the highschool is reporting accidents now.  

On a somber note, there's injuries all around the county.  The police are putting chains on  way after the fact.  The hospital is still below freezing so under staffed.  The usual channels of communication still haven't done anything.  Finally the police is telling everyone to stay home.  

I always knew our system was fragile but dang, a fast coat of ice just collapsed it. You'd think we just got invaded here.  Its crazy.  

Tj

Quoted: Black ice is some nasty stuff, an entire area can get crazy fast. Somehow I'm not surprised that you're smart enough to know the conditions were coming, and to stay the off the roads. Btw, your thread title scared the hell out of me.

It only takes a hand on the ground to know its cold and radar has been tracking this light rain for two days now.

It's pretty sad listening to all these injuries, many of them very serious, knowing for everyone they are getting two aren't.  The radios a buzzing with activity.  

Tj

Quoted: the same thing happen around Raleigh about 2 years ago. A lit dusting of snow iced up the roads about lunch time. Schools tried to let kids out, sent buses out, traffic was complet grid lock, most folks taking 4-6 hours to get home, some kids spent the night at schools. It was a big mess. Of course the blame game started after that- why didn't school close the night before, why werent the roads pretreated, the gov. did not do enough. It was a big joke. Stay safe.

I expect the same here tomorrow.  I guess they need the government to put their hand on the ground for them.

The principle of my boys school just came on TV and magnanimously advised they were keeping the children who made it but those others will be excused.  All I could think was "No shit."

Tj

Hey this is cool.  

Some of the LEOs have emergency blankets, the reflective kind, and are handing them out to the children they find stranded on school buses.  Most have blankets but a couple have as many as a half dozen of the EM blankets due to their small size and low cost.  

Tj

Quoted: wow, black ice, ice storms, freezing rain and blizzard like snow is a weekly occurance around here.  amazing that something that's routine in one area could wreak so much havok in another.

You have no idea.  In 1993 when the blizzard hit, I was lucky I had my own power and heat so I could hear the news announce all the salt trucks, both of them, were in the ditch.  

That was a bit of an exaggeration but we do have more now than then.  

What got everyone on this one, IMHO, is they really didn't see it coming and the timing, rush hour.  The media is still air temp scratching their heads when its ground temp that's causing the ice.

Tj

Quoted: Well sounds like a total ball dropping by those in charge,....school for being open, the local governments for not prepping the roads and lastly the parents not smart enough to stay home with thier kids until the roads are passable.  I'm sure the insurance companies will be pissed. I understand that you southerners don't have this stuff as frequently as the north but it shouldn't be a completely strange and new thing.  (TJ excepted) -Oh and chains for black ice?  I'm not sure that's a always a good idea, they reduce the tire's contact patch and frequently increase stopping distances not shorten them.  I was under the impression they're for snow and not so much ice unless you have the sharp V bar type to cut into the ice. Well best of luck to all those affected! especially the children!!! SoS

We're in the mountains.  Without chains the emergency responders can't get up hills.

I was raised quite a bit north of here and spent five winters on the great lakes.  I'm the exception not the rule here.

Tj

Quoted: Quoted: wow, black ice, ice storms, freezing rain and blizzard like snow is a weekly occurance around here.  amazing that something that's routine in one area could wreak so much havok in another. . Trust me when I say ice down here aint like ice up there......Grew up in ohio and lived all over but have never seen damage like an ice storm causes down here......think its because the trees grow faster and are weaker.....more pine trees too.

During the 93 blizzard, I couldn't sleep.  All the trees popping and breaking was like incoming arty in a war zone.  

Even if the roads had melted, nobody was going anywhere.  The only way out was via chain saw.

Tj

Its starting to clear up a little, I guess.  The radio is slowing down some.  At least two of the school buses are on the road now.  

There's EM responders are at the entrance to my valley all three directions waiting to get down here.  They're telling ambulances to make other calls till it's passable. They still don't know what is happening or road conditions on the rural roads west of me.  At least two of the cars in the ditch on my road were warned not to come down here and did anyway.  

It sounds like they are finally getting around to my area and finally made it out to the elementary school.  

This radio is a great thing.  It kind of really let's you know where you stack up on the priority level.  

My wife left early to avoid this event and be at school for the kids who made it.  Only one did but she's there for him.

Tj



 

I've been in western Tenn in a snowstorm before. Coming back from duck hunting at reelfoot lake.  Back then, we were the only ones on the road.

I went through Atlanta during an ice storm once. Now that was an adventure.

Quoted: Quoted:It only takes a hand on the ground to know its cold and radar has been tracking this light rain for two days now. It's pretty sad listening to all these injuries, many of them very serious, knowing for everyone they are getting two aren't.  The radios a buzzing with activity.   Tj as a fire fighter and medic i can tell you just because it sounds bad on the radio doesnt mean it is in real life. thats probably one of the reasons the 911 center was taking real emergency calls only. everybody and there mother calling in the same accidents over and over gets old and ties up the phones if there is a real emergency.

How about some examples?

I can see six cars in ditches and two in the creek and I'm pretty rural.  For a while there a couple hours, every radio crack had sirens in the background.  I can't count the number of IV started calls I heard.  One 84 year old lady laid in the road with a broken hip for an hour before an LEO showed up.  God bless him, he took the initiative to move her into a home rather her freeze to death. They are still trying to get to the little old lady in an ambulance.   Kids line the roads making their way home slip sliding away from stranded buses.  A couple cars have called in, they are starting to pick some of these kids up.  I can see the kids coming home but not picking them ups since they still won't come in here. They're still concentrating only on stranded cars in the roads not off the roads.  They haven't been taking non-injury calls for over two hours and still the wreck calls are coming in all with injuries.  They simply haven't been able to get to them yet half volume and half the roads are impassable still.  

Not one routine call has been called in for 2.5 hours now.

I have little doubt 911 is swamped with BS calls but its also those BS calls that are a big part why there are many people out there needing assistance and not getting it.  The dispatcher is calling in for response and getting a lot can't get there or I'm not going anywhere due to being busy.  They're just now starting to respond to non-vehicle accidents.  Mostly people who were in wrecks getting out then falling down.  They differentiate that on the radio.  At least six people are still known to be trapped in cars but not injured enough to be a priority yet.  

I've haven't seen it this bad since 1993.

Imagine say rush hour in Stockton CA and suddenly there's an ice storm and you have the picture.

Tj

Whoops, here they are just now.  Ambulance, police, and wrecker.  

They're getting through now.  First vehicles to make in or out since 7:30 AM.

Tj

Quoted: blog.syracuse.com/news/2008/01/local_news_64.html Fulton, NY received about 40inches of snow in a little over a 24hr period. Not that unusual in "lake effect" country, and normally easily handled. What sucked was when the town DPW's roof collapsed due to the weight of the snow. All the plows were out, but the town's garbage collection rigs are buried, among other gear. Major clusterf--k. Lake effect can be very localized, for those of you who don't know what it is. It can fall in very narrow bands. I live maybe 35 miles S of Fulton, and enjoyed sunny skies while they were getting hammered. I agree that bad ice storms are the worst.

Boy I can relate to that too.  Use to travel the great lakes every other week.  I use to have a saying.  They don't call out the snow plow till somebody dies.  I use to pray for the damn lake to freeze.

Man, Dunkirk NY is the worst place for lake effect in the US.

Tj

It never got bad here like it was supposed to. We had sleet and some freezing rain through the night, but it was all gone by 6 this morning with nothing frozen on the ground.

My parents on the other hand are 50 miles to my northwest and barely got to work this morning. On newly packed gravel roads, they got caught in a traffic jam in a valley between 2 big hills, both iced over. 1 school bus, 2 cars and a SUV were stuck wanting to go up, 1 big Dodge truck was stuck trying to get down.

Dad put the Chevy in 4wheel low and went right up.


The 93 storm you speak of came through here first as well. At said parent's house, we were covered in ice and snow for 5 days+ and didn't have power for over 2 weeks. We kept 2 gennys running the whole time and wouldn't have needed to go into town at all, but mom is a CPA and needed to take work to the office and bring more home every 3 days or so. It took a chainsaw to get out, everytime.

Quoted: TJ, I feel your pain, but I would be lying if I didn't tell you I chuckled while envisioning southerners coming to grips with slick roads!  Even in Indy, people get a little jittery the first snow or two. Hope all turns out well and nobody else gets hurt!

Well I was laughing this morning myself at the idea that nobody realized that it was the ground temperature that was freezing the rain not the air.  

They seriously didn't see this coming.  

Other than watching how the people didn't know how to drive (they were still hitting my hill at normal speeds and it was solid ice), the amusement ended as I realized most people listen to the news before they go out the door in the mornings.  

Only half the school systems closed and those that did only did it 15 minutes before opening.  

So far the death count is two just from traffic accidents and that's just one county, Knox.  Their schools were scheduled to be out nothing to do with the storm.  They're reporting now  4 out of 5 ambulance runs were for actually falling on the ice and they weren't responding to those calls for two hours until those injured in cars were taken care of first.  It will take a while to sort this out if they ever do.

It was a real wake up call how fragile this system is when something semi-catastrophic hits without warning.  I can only imagine how bad it would be if it was something so widespread and more catastrophic.

Tj

Quoted: Some cars in the ditch and kids having to walk home from school. Sound like every winter where i grew up.

Little more than some there buddy and I've spent my five winters on the Great Lakes.  In fact, I will be Chicago next week.  It was little more than an average winter event.  People died today.  

Tj

Quoted: i was gonna say the say thing..im in Green bay WI...we get it all too ( black ice, regular ice, ice storms, lot's of snow ) ....its normal and not a big deal around here..yet other places get a little ice & the world ends ... Amazing

It truly is amazing.  

I tell folks here the white stuff scares me and its not on the ground but knuckles on the steering wheel.

Now take Green Bay and imagine everyone leaving for work and nobody in the media smart enough to tell them they were going to get ice because the ground was frozen and you have what happened here.  It happens so seldom here nobody clicked to the ground being frozen. Mind boggling.

BTW, Talk about reactions.  The events over now and schools open for the event are now closed tomorrow.  Figure that one?

Here's the tally,  1,200 calls in Knox County.  400 reported accidents. Keep in mind, they stopped taking calls without injuries telling everyone to just exchange information less than an hour into it.  My county a 1/3 the size has almost the same number.

Its really amazing they made it into my valley when they did.  

Tj