...just a bit in defense of the mess that happens when winter strikes the south...

[NRaleighLiberal]

I lived in Rhode Island and remember the Blizzard of 1978 (nearly 3 feet of snow). When I was in grade school, I remember groaning when school wasn't called despite a pretty decent snowstorm.

I went to grad school in New Hampshire - lots of snow, but also subzero cold...cars that simply wouldn't start.

Winter is dealt with in the north for all sorts of reasons - familiarity, equipment, type of roads, snow, cars, practice, prep - you name it. I've lived it and seen it.

We lived in Seattle for a year - and remember how a 1 inch snowfall kept everyone off the road - since we knew how to drive in the stuff, we had the roads to ourselves as we headed out to do some Christmas shopping.

And....we've been in Raleigh for over 20 years now. We've endured a few monster snow storms (up to 2 feet) - a crippling sleet storm, an even more crippling ice storm. And now this - 3-4 inches of snow, now sleeting really hard.

It's so easy to poke fun at what happens on the roads, but some - not all, of course - some of it is inescapable. It is about timing - when storms hit, if people pay heed and stay home - hell, IF they can stay home. It is an area where nearly all kids are bused to school. (very, very different from my youth in RI - nearly all walked to school, so whether the buses could run or not was far less an issue).

It is about equipment, about preparation, about communication, sure.

But they've been salting roads down here for days. They do have plows. They have a strategy. What they can't do is keep people home - schools may close, but hospitals, grocery stores, many other businesses - don't. Absolutely nothing fell from the sky in our area until about noon (which is exactly what was forecast). But once it started, it didn't just flurry - it went from nothing to a very heavy something. So all of those who either chose to or had to go to work headed out....the temperatures (low 20s) and rate of accumulation rendered much of what was sprayed on the roads ineffective. There are lots of hills just tall enough that cars got stuck - and that stuck everything behind them....which blocked plows.

I was lucky - I am retired from the corporate world, my wife and I both work from home. But we are probably the exception, more than the rule.

And so we had a storm that plays big on national TV, and it is so easy to say that the traffic issues were avoidable...well, perhaps in an ideal situation, which is also completely unrealistic....

[TBF]

1. I think I've probably told you

that I grew up in the frozen tundra commonly known as Wisconsin.

We had a school that rarely opened late, much less closed unless it was a full white-out blizzard. But it also was an area that was very prepared. Sand and salt were budgeted for every year and stored in large buildings in our town (of under 500 people). We had massive snowplows, fewer cars on the road, snow tires, and folks knew to keep their foot off the brake and steer out of skids. They knew to slow down and down shift as needed. They would also stay home. I was talking to my mom a few weeks ago and she mentioned that there are even local laws in Wisconsin to encourage folks to heed the conditions - for example they will sometimes order folks to stay off the roads if it is particularly bad. In that situation if someone drives anyway and slides in the ditch no one is going to rescue them. Their car will be stuck until the ban is lifted.

A storm hitting a major city that rarely gets this kind of weather can hardly be prepared much less know the little tricks we all grew up with in the northern states. And they certainly aren't going to be able to cope with ice - there's really not much you can do but stay home when roads are sheets of ice, no matter where you live.

[JustAnotherGen]

2. +1000

I don't make fun of South - they are doing the best they can with climate change.

[zazen]

3. thanks: very accurate, thorough description of what happened here today

And I applaud WCPSS for closing school. They're cutting into Spring Break and maybe even senior's graduation at this point, but they definitely wanted to avoid what happened here in 2005. They made a good call.

I wonder if Durham Public Schools had not been in session instead of letting out around noon if things might have been a little better (given the interrelated nature of the Metro traffic).

Even so, no one expected it to be undrivable in a span of 30 minutes, and people who have to be at work don't have any choice.

Stay safe and warm. Hope your power stays on (from here in Cary)--

[marions ghost]

6. They need to warn the public better IMO

but they are so reluctant to tell people not to go to work.

If you looked at the hourly forecast for today--it was very clear that in the space of one hour, the chance of frozen precip would go from 20% to 100%. That tells you that it will come down thick and fast and it will paralyze traffic, because the plows that do exist will not get ahead of the slowed traffic.

They should tell people to stay home, period. (Except for hospital and emergency personnel of course). No silly half days. Stay home.

[struggle4progress]

7. This one has been driving the forecasters crazy for the lat two weeks

[justiceischeap]

4. I don't make fun of the South either but I do have to wonder

at the leadership of the South. I'm in Maryland (technically considered the South) and Martin O'Malley declared a State of Emergency yesterday. That basically means, don't get on the roads if you don't have to. Work from home if you can (I know not all people can do that). So why does it seem so difficult for Southern Governors to grasp the seriousness of these situations. We ALL know what happens in the deep South when this happens--and yeah, some of us poke fun but is your state leadership really that out of touch that they think snow or ice won't cripple a state not used to snow or ice? That's my big issue with "the South" and winter weather.

[angstlessk]

5. It is the 'Right to Work' south...or die trying n/t

[JoeyT]

8. You're talking about a region that has governors

that think a bunch of people praying will end a drought that's lasted for years or that let some crazy person spend hundreds of thousands in taxpayer dollars painting fruit trees with magic water in the hopes of curing a blight. Yes, they're that out of touch.

In all seriousness, I think most of them just plain don't care. It isn't going to hurt them personally, and that's the only thing that matters.

[marions ghost]

9. Y'know....

This kind of wholesale South bashing bugs me.

The South knows how to deal with hurricanes just fine. This unusual winter weather event in the South should be a lesson in how to do it better, but the unpreparedness can't be blamed entirely on local governments being stupid. It's true the current crop of Southern Governors are no intellectual heavyweights--but they're shrewd tightwads, good at skimming people out of lots of money. It's all about cutting corners and calling on "personal risk and responsibility" in the face of natural disasters. They have left people vulnerable. Don't worry leaders in these Southern states are extremely embarrassed by this --and it does hurt them politically.

Even intelligent people (such as you) have been caught by this storm across the region. I know of office workers and academics in the area who didn't leave work soon enough --despite the clear warnings. A lot of people you would consider smart misjudged and obviously had no idea how quickly dangerous conditions develop. The leaders let people down by underestimating the risks in this case. They should have cancelled things and shut down business/school travel sooner. But nobody wants to tell people not to go to work. It's all about money.

[JoeyT]

10. I'm not bashing the South.

The first paragraph was a joke. The second paragraph was bashing governors from the South, many of whom would rather cause a disaster than shut down roads and cost money/risk looking silly.

People didn't leave work soon enough because we're all right to work states...Without a formal announcement that they're closing the roads, you risk your job by going home. It certainly isn't the people that got caught that are to blame, and I hope it didn't come off that way.

This is one of the few times you'll hear me say I'm fortunate to live in Alabama. We're far enough south we utterly panic at the mere mention of snow. The county sent out robo-calls that sounded less like "It's going to snow, don't drive." and more like "ZOMBIES! EAT YOU ALL! HIIIDE!" in tone.

[marions ghost]

11. Mkay

maybe if you made it clear you're bashing yourself LOL. I didn't get the joke because often something said like that is NOT a joke.

You have a point about the "right to work" states --add that fact to the Rethuglicon attitude that people need to be resourceful and not depend on "Big Govt" to haul you out of a ditch (attitudes which exist in other parts of the country too).

Zombies-- well, better that they overdo it. In the case of NC, the weather people were on it every minute and second, but the PTB in business & govt) were very lax in closings and cancellations. If you looked at the forecast carefully the fact that it was going to be sudden and a fast build-up WAS PREDICTED. Yes--it was all about skinning it as close as possible--and look where it got them. The ridiculousness of cancelling the Duke-UNC game long AFTER people got stuck on the roads trying to get there, says it all.

The snow started at 1pm and they didn't cancel the game until 6 pm!!! Money over people. A little embarrassing that Dukies couldn't get from Durham to Chapel Hill (basically the two urban areas are contiguous). Going to Chapel Hill is (guess what) UP HILL

all is forgiven (I was born in Birmingham)