Two to four inches of snow and ice. Most people were unprepared since the forecast was only for light dusting of snow with little or no accumulation. Winter storm conditions have reached as far south as the Gulf coast.
http://www.gadsdentimes.com/article/20140128/APN/1401280618#gsc.tab=0
We got about 3" between 8:30 and 11:30 tonight, here in raleigh ,N.C.
I work about a mile from downtown Birmingham, AL. I’m one of about 600 employees spending the night in our office.
We literally went from weathermen saying “We might get some flurries and MAYBE a light dusting” to “roads are becoming impassable, don’t go anywhere if you can help it” in about 45 minutes. I got an email from our facilities manager at 10:30 that said “All the roads on our campus are fine so far.” At 11 a.m., I got another one from him that said “Employees are strongly encouraged to stay at the office tonight, because our roads are iced over.” It changed that fast.
Two (locally) famous weathermen sent out Tweets earlier today saying they had abandoned their vehicles and walked to their respective television stations, because both had completely missed the forecast.
Right now, shortly past midnight on Wednesday morning, I can look over Highway 280 from my office window and see flashing lights and running lights from dozens of abandoned cars. One lady from our office headed out around 10:45 to pick up her child from school. She called back at 2:30 to say she had made it to The Summit, which is a shopping center – four miles from our office.
I’m in SE Louisiana, and it’s been nothing like our local weather people made it out to be (thankfully). Schools closed Tues and Weds, with a lot of businesses planning to close or close early. I did my usual grocery run Monday and bread was sold out, with wieners and canned meats running low. I’ve never seen so many people at the grocery store during the middle of the day unless a hurricane was coming.
I had to laugh at the reporter phoning in on the 5 pm news. She was only a couple of miles from my house, and was saying how it was so cold she could barely speak. Seriously, it was around 31F. Maybe I should have worn more than pajamas when I took the dogs out to pee.
My family in east TN has had several inches of snow already. We had to cancel plans to travel there for a BCS championship party, and considered going up to watch the Super Bowl. We would have been leaving today, or canceling plans to leave again I should say. So glad DH decided to wait until it warms up a bit before taking more vacation.
Only a few flakes for me, most of the nasty stuff is south of where I am. Did still have it affect my day though. Had a hearing scheduled for the afternoon get cancelled, because the case required an interpreter, who lives several hours away. She wasn’t allowed to travel by her employer due to the weather, so the case got continued.
Gulf coast here, FL panhandle. A thick coating of ice on every thing. Can’t open car doors (shouldn’t go anywhere anyway) and a lot of power outages due to breaking tree limbs taking out transformers (we saw one go.) Although we’ve had several brown-outs we still have power, so yay heat. It’s about 24 degrees right now. No snow right where we are but slightly north of us they got some. On the news I saw that some kids were making little sleet snowmen (it was that thick.) That just sounds pitiful, doesn’t it? 
But down here we’re excited/freaked out about this weather. They closed some bridges earlier and schools etc. are closed tomorrow. It’s supposed to get all the way up to 35 so maybe things can thaw a little? Wrecks earlier till everybody got off the roads but last I heard no fatalities, traffic or cold related. Kind of dumfounding. To paraphrase Tom Hanks in A League of Their Own, “There’s no ‘winter’ in Florida!!”
There’s so much white ice on the ground I thought it was snow. 
Not so sure about the thawing out today.
Not too bad at all here in southwest Georgia. A dusting of snow on the ground but no ice on power lines or trees. Yay for that! We had already decided to take the day off from work, well, not go into the office, I can work from home should I feel the need. However, my state and federal offices are both closed (they’re in Atlanta and Arlington, VA) so I don’t see the point in that.
The boyfriend is still asleep as I post. We enjoyed snuggling down with some hot chocolate spiked with rum and watching a movie last night. I’ve been making jokes about the great “French Toast Event” of 2014, so I shall make French Toast for breakfast in a little while. Seems appropriate. 
Stay safe and warm all y’all who are in the worst of the weather.
Oh, and the predicted high for Sunday here is 71F. Go figure.
All this US cold is definitely having a knock-on effect over on this side of the pond. The jet stream is forced so far south that it’s been battering Europe with depression after depression and we are approaching record amounts of rainfall across the southern UK.
And here, at a latitude further north than Calgary, we have had not a flake of snow and barely a handful of frosts all winter. Quite amusing really, as one of our less reliable national papers ran a front-page splash back in autumn warning of “three months of snow chaos”, “worst winter since 1947” etc etc. It’s actually turning out to be one of the mildest and wettest on record.
Stay safe everyone and enjoy the snow!
(looks out office window)
I don’t know what your Arlington office’s excuse was, but it couldn’t be snow. There’s nothing on the roads here, and barely a dusting on the green parts.
Now, 40 miles south where I begin my commute, we got about 2 inches of thick, fluffy, dry snow. Made getting out of the subdivision a little tough, but once I was on 95 it was smooth, at-speed sailing.
My friends in GA, on the other hand, definitely suffered. Took one former coworker 12 hours to drive home 10 miles. That was in the I-20 area near the AL border.
The highways are crazy around here. They’re either (1) full of people, presumably still stranded from last night, or (2) completely empty. Check out this webcam:
http://www.trafficland.com/city/ATL/camera/4011/
That should be 400 at Holcomb Bridge. Usually that’s bumper to bumper traffic, but all there are are cars parked on the siide of the road.
The thing with the South is that, not only do we not have all the equipment and the volume of equipment, but the ice is a totally different animal than just plain snow. You can drive in a small amount of snow, but you can’t go anywhere if there’s a layer of solid ice on the road.
We have a nice, manageable amount of dry snow here in Raleigh. The kids are off school today and my office told us all to stay home, too, which is nice (my husband had to leave bright & early, but he has a 1.5 mile commute, so no big deal). Good luck to you all down in GA and beyond.
[quote=“C3, post:32, topic:679982”]
The thing with the South is that, not only do we not have all the equipment and the volume of equipment, but the ice is a totally different animal than just plain snow. You can drive in a small amount of snow, but you can’t go anywhere if there’s a layer of solid ice on the road.
[QUOTE]
Yes. Worst driving conditions I’ve ever been in were south of the Mason Dixon line, when there was a freezing rainstorm onto cold ground (I’ve experienced this a couple of times at least). No actual snow, but with half an inch of black ice on every surface, you just can’t drive anywhere at all.
A six inch snowstorm, even if it’s not plowed, is actually easier to get around in.
Again, for northerners, imagine black ice, not just a patch of it, but coating every single inch of the roadway. Would you really be able to get around either?
Seriously? It looks like you can still see the tips of the blades of grass. Just drive through it.
I wish I lived in a place where any amount of snow = stay home from work. I have to brush my car off every morning and drive through this crap. Even after a day last month where we got more than 12" in 24 hours
Yes I could move, but it’s more fun to bitch.
East Tennessee reporting in. My trusty ‘snow gauge’ (also known as a ‘stick’) shows that we received about 5 inches of pluffy snow all of which is really frozen since it is 10 degrees F. Nobody is moving until tomorrow around here. I believe there will be a general party going on until then.
1.7". Everything shut down.
Some schools weren’t able to get the kids home and they’re still there. A few were stuck on school buses on the highways all night.
Mrs FtG and I went for a walk in the afternoon. Up at the top of the neighborhood there’s an area in perpetual shade. It got icy fast. We saw (shoot, I heard it) a car coming way too fast into it. Started skidding into the oncoming lane. Fortunately it managed to get back over before plowing into the oncoming car. Idiot.
Take it easy folks.
Anyway, shoveled my driveway and sidewalk early on. Was 8 but warmed up to 12. Still a thin layer of ice on it but that should go away as the sun hits it.
Shoveling a bit of snow off the driveway once every few years is nifty nostalgia. More than that: fie!
SE Louisiana. We never did get snow, but a few hours of sleet, which accumulated on the ground like snow. And then froze into ice. I know people are out salting the bridges, but the advice is to stay home if you can. Lots of places are closed anyway.
My big south Georgia snow is pretty much melted now. Some area roads were and may still be closed due to icy conditions. All in all a good day to stay inside. I made French Toast and remembered why I never make FT. I really don’t like it all that much. The bf agrees with me on this. Pancakes and waffles are definitely better.
Stafe safe and warm everybody!
[quote=“Quercus, post:33, topic:679982”]
[quote=“C3, post:32, topic:679982”]
The thing with the South is that, not only do we not have all the equipment and the volume of equipment, but the ice is a totally different animal than just plain snow. You can drive in a small amount of snow, but you can’t go anywhere if there’s a layer of solid ice on the road.
We get that in Minnesota. Snow over glare ice is the worst. But we do get it here, and we do understand that not much moves. Until our huge salting trucks go by and pit the ice up to the point that it has some stiction to it.
And mid-westerns sneer too - we smile politely to your face, then shake our heads - not that you can’t drive on glare ice, we don’t do well with that one either. Or that it takes you three hours to get home - been there, done that - and getting into your own driveway after the snowplow has been down your street and you haven’t been home to shovel after a foot plus of snow isn’t fun. But that its the end of the world - every damn time it happens.