‘More salt is not the answer’: Officials deal with fallout of major ice storm
By
Chaffin Mitchell, AccuWeather staff writer &
Mark Puleo, AccuWeather staff writer
Updated Feb 12, 2021 2:19 PM EST
AccuWeather's Bill Wadell was live in Lexington, Kentucky, on Feb. 11, after a winter storm brought ice and sleet to the Bluegrass State.
After a long day of freezing rain across multiple states, residents woke up Thursday morning to an "icy, dangerous mess," consisting of power outages, homes without heat and roads coated in an icy glaze.
A potent winter storm spread across the Ohio Valley and mid-Atlantic on Wednesday, delivering freezing rain that left ice clinging to power lines, trees, roads -- anything exposed to the elements during the storm.
“Hours of freezing rain have finally stopped and now this is what we’re dealing with, tree limbs and branches coated in thick ice,” AccuWeather National Weather Reporter Bill Wadell said, holding up a fallen branch with an icy glaze. “Freezing rain fell for hours coating trees and parking lots in ice. Road crews worked long shifts, trying to stay ahead of the storm.”
Police officers in Lexington, Kentucky, are urging people to stay indoors "unless absolutely necessary" as crews get to work clearing downed trees and power lines that had knocked out power for more than 100,000 residents by Thursday morning.
By Friday morning, there were just over 500 customers still without power in Fayette County, the county in which Lexington is located.
“When we’re dealing with extremely low temperatures, more salt is not the answer. It’s not effective," Kentucky Secretary of Transportation Jim Gray said in a news conference. "We need Kentuckians to be good neighbors, good Samaritan, and in this case, avoid driving when you don’t have to. Better to be stranded at home instead of out on the roadway."
Conditions quickly deteriorated across the Ohio Valley on Wednesday as the winter storm, the latest in a relentless stormy pattern that has taken hold of the eastern U.S., ramped up.
The ice storm caught 77 Delta Air Lines passengers off guard on Wednesday evening when their Boeing 717 plane slid off of a slick taxiway at the Pittsburgh International Airport.
No injuries were reported from the incident, however, all passengers aboard on Flight 2231 were taken back to the terminal by bus.
One passenger who was on the aircraft tweeted that the plane slid off the runway "because [of] a random snow storm" and added that "I've been stuck on a plane that is at the edge of a ravine for almost 2 hours."
An ice storm warning stretched across the central U.S. Thursday morning while winter storm warnings (dark blue) and winter storm watches (light blue) were in place elsewhere.
The freezing rain also caused roads to turn into sheets of ice and proved to be too much for the first responders who were out to help those stuck in the wintry conditions.
One area of black ice was tricking drivers in Henderson, Kentucky, where police tended to more than a dozen vehicle accidents on Wednesday.
Farther south in Fort Worth, Texas, that ice wreaked havoc for dozens of drivers on Thursday morning, triggering a massive pileup with over 50 vehicles. According to Fort Worth Fire Department, multiple people were trapped in the wreckage.
The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet highway called on nearly 2,000 frontline employees, supplemented by contracted crews, to maintain safe travel on state routes. Unfortunately, the quick-hitting snow and ice were still too much to handle for crews.
An ice storm warning was issued for more than half of Kentucky since total ice accumulations of two-tenths to almost half of an inch was forecast along and south of a line extending from Doniphan, Missouri, northeastward to Henderson, Kentucky, then eastward to Owensboro, Kentucky until 6 p.m. CDT Thursday. Although the ice storm warning expired after that time, patchy light freezing drizzle was an ongoing hazard.
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Conditions turned icy within a few hours at the National Weather Service office in Louisville, Kentucky. Small icicles dripped down from vehicles in the parking lot, warning drivers of the black ice that lurked on roadways.
Salt and snowplows couldn’t keep up with the snow and freezing rain in Ohio, which led to hazardous travel for the Wednesday evening commute. Cincinnati was hit particularly hard on Wednesday afternoon with snow covering much of interstates 71 and 75 around the city.
The Ohio Department of Transportation had nearly 970 crews battling to keep the snow off of the roads across the state, but low visibility due to whiteout conditions made travel nearly impossible.
Coronavirus vaccination clinics started to close on Wednesday as the first signs of deteriorating weather began to show. Patients that had an appointment for a COVID-19 vaccination will be contacted by phone to reschedule their appointment as soon as possible.
Keep checking back on AccuWeather.com and stay tuned to the AccuWeather Network on DirecTV, Frontier and Verizon Fios.
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News / Winter Weather
‘More salt is not the answer’: Officials deal with fallout of major ice storm
By Chaffin Mitchell, AccuWeather staff writer & Mark Puleo, AccuWeather staff writer
Updated Feb 12, 2021 2:19 PM EST
AccuWeather's Bill Wadell was live in Lexington, Kentucky, on Feb. 11, after a winter storm brought ice and sleet to the Bluegrass State.
After a long day of freezing rain across multiple states, residents woke up Thursday morning to an "icy, dangerous mess," consisting of power outages, homes without heat and roads coated in an icy glaze.
A potent winter storm spread across the Ohio Valley and mid-Atlantic on Wednesday, delivering freezing rain that left ice clinging to power lines, trees, roads -- anything exposed to the elements during the storm.
“Hours of freezing rain have finally stopped and now this is what we’re dealing with, tree limbs and branches coated in thick ice,” AccuWeather National Weather Reporter Bill Wadell said, holding up a fallen branch with an icy glaze. “Freezing rain fell for hours coating trees and parking lots in ice. Road crews worked long shifts, trying to stay ahead of the storm.”
Police officers in Lexington, Kentucky, are urging people to stay indoors "unless absolutely necessary" as crews get to work clearing downed trees and power lines that had knocked out power for more than 100,000 residents by Thursday morning.
By Friday morning, there were just over 500 customers still without power in Fayette County, the county in which Lexington is located.
“When we’re dealing with extremely low temperatures, more salt is not the answer. It’s not effective," Kentucky Secretary of Transportation Jim Gray said in a news conference. "We need Kentuckians to be good neighbors, good Samaritan, and in this case, avoid driving when you don’t have to. Better to be stranded at home instead of out on the roadway."
Conditions quickly deteriorated across the Ohio Valley on Wednesday as the winter storm, the latest in a relentless stormy pattern that has taken hold of the eastern U.S., ramped up.
The ice storm caught 77 Delta Air Lines passengers off guard on Wednesday evening when their Boeing 717 plane slid off of a slick taxiway at the Pittsburgh International Airport.
No injuries were reported from the incident, however, all passengers aboard on Flight 2231 were taken back to the terminal by bus.
One passenger who was on the aircraft tweeted that the plane slid off the runway "because [of] a random snow storm" and added that "I've been stuck on a plane that is at the edge of a ravine for almost 2 hours."
An ice storm warning stretched across the central U.S. Thursday morning while winter storm warnings (dark blue) and winter storm watches (light blue) were in place elsewhere.
The freezing rain also caused roads to turn into sheets of ice and proved to be too much for the first responders who were out to help those stuck in the wintry conditions.
One area of black ice was tricking drivers in Henderson, Kentucky, where police tended to more than a dozen vehicle accidents on Wednesday.
Farther south in Fort Worth, Texas, that ice wreaked havoc for dozens of drivers on Thursday morning, triggering a massive pileup with over 50 vehicles. According to Fort Worth Fire Department, multiple people were trapped in the wreckage.
The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet highway called on nearly 2,000 frontline employees, supplemented by contracted crews, to maintain safe travel on state routes. Unfortunately, the quick-hitting snow and ice were still too much to handle for crews.
An ice storm warning was issued for more than half of Kentucky since total ice accumulations of two-tenths to almost half of an inch was forecast along and south of a line extending from Doniphan, Missouri, northeastward to Henderson, Kentucky, then eastward to Owensboro, Kentucky until 6 p.m. CDT Thursday. Although the ice storm warning expired after that time, patchy light freezing drizzle was an ongoing hazard.
CLICK HERE FOR THE FREE ACCUWEATHER APP
Conditions turned icy within a few hours at the National Weather Service office in Louisville, Kentucky. Small icicles dripped down from vehicles in the parking lot, warning drivers of the black ice that lurked on roadways.
Salt and snowplows couldn’t keep up with the snow and freezing rain in Ohio, which led to hazardous travel for the Wednesday evening commute. Cincinnati was hit particularly hard on Wednesday afternoon with snow covering much of interstates 71 and 75 around the city.
The Ohio Department of Transportation had nearly 970 crews battling to keep the snow off of the roads across the state, but low visibility due to whiteout conditions made travel nearly impossible.
Coronavirus vaccination clinics started to close on Wednesday as the first signs of deteriorating weather began to show. Patients that had an appointment for a COVID-19 vaccination will be contacted by phone to reschedule their appointment as soon as possible.
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