The Big Nashville Storm of '14 (Franklin: best, county, map)

[NARFALICIOUS]

Snow driving is nothing to be terrified of, as long as your tires are decent. Ice is a different story and should be avoided unless you have studded tires (which I doubt anyone here has).

But to be honest, even people from areas that regularly get snow are bad drivers in it. And most are also not prepared for it. Throw in Middle TN's hills plus congestion and you have a recipe for easy crashes.

1-3 possible inches shouldn't be anything to worry about, but I think it may rain some and freeze over and ice the roads. Watch for ice or avoid driving if possible.



Driving in the Snow and on Icy Roads: 10 Winter Safety Tips - Edmunds.com



To add my own personal driving tips, from experience:
Considering snow from anywhere between 3inches to over 1 foot:

- Avoid it if possible, stay at home and drink hot chocolate, but if you have to go out,
- Leave earlier, like twice as early as you normally do, if possible. 30 minute commute, leave an hour earlier.
- This is personal opinion, but I would avoid high speed areas. 70MPH? Not in 1 foot of snow. Maybe 1-4 inches...Snow gets sloshed and wet and gives way to the road that low. But heavy snow, no way. Take a slower speed street.
- Give twice the distance or more than you usually do between the car ahead of you.
- Accelerate and steer slower. (this is regardless of FWD, RWD, 4/AWD) Ever ice skate or roller blade? When you first learned, remember how you kinda stayed stiff not knowing what to do, and if you made a sudden move, you fell on your butt? Similar concept....You can move, but don't move suddenly. Even a regular, slow speed right turn could swing the car around if you jerk the steering wheel. Accelerating quickly in a RWD car can swing out the rear end to one side. Accelerating quickly in any car can have your tires spinning for a second before they gain traction, this can also burn up your transmission.
- Braking - Depends on if you have ABS or not. Functioning ABS, don't pump the brakes when you stop. If you feel a shudder from the pedal, that is the ABS working.
If you don't have ABS, you may want to increase your stopping distance from not just double, but maybe triple. Brake early, don't brake hard, similar to accel/steer above. If you start to feel it lose traction, pump the brakes.
- If you have poor tires, avoid driving in the snow please, for my sake, I don't want you ramming into me.
- In relation to poor tires, or poorer than normal, avoid ascending a hill from a stop, you will not go anywhere, burn up your transmission spinning, and eventually cause an accident for the car behind you. Avoid descending a hill when there is traffic ahead of you. Or just don't drive lol.
- In relation to the article, technology doesn't always save you, drive smart.

[CountryGirl2b=]

yeah, hot chocolate . . with a little Kahlua!

My big lesson when I learned to drive in CT was to turn in the direction of the skid if you slip on ice or snow. So if the rear of the car is fishtailing to the left, you turn the front wheels towards the left. It will (hypothetically) stop the car doing a 360.

[BirdieBelle]

Originally Posted by CountryGirl2b=

yeah, hot chocolate . . with a little Kahlua!

My big lesson when I learned to drive in CT was to turn in the direction of the skid if you slip on ice or snow. So if the rear of the car is fishtailing to the left, you turn the front wheels towards the left. It will (hypothetically) stop the car doing a 360.

I am impressed that you knew how to spell Kahlua!



I'm thinking Irish coffee.

[CountryGirl2b=]

Used to drink something in Switzerland called Cafe Fertig. Fertig meas "finished" so I don't know if you drank it when you were finished skiing (as we did) or if after you drank it, you were "finished" for the rest of the day (we were).

Cherry Schnaps.

Yum.

Oh what a great excuse to drink a hot toddy! (don't even know what that is . . .)

PS. They keep cutting back on the snow amounts. Now it's a WIND CHILL advisory (-5 to -14) and one to two inches of snow. Drat.

[nashvols]

I'm interested to see how this is going to play out.

Most of the time when they make a big deal about weather like this, it doesn't quite live up to expectations. But it seems the forecast keeps getting worse with this one...so even if it's not as bad as they say, it might still be pretty bad.

3 inches of snow or more will freak some people out, but that's not really a big deal. What concerns me is that it is supposed to rain first, then freeze fast. That could create an ice sheet below the snow. It may also wash away some of the brine that has been put on the streets to keep them from freezing. I don't know.

In any case, driving in the snow does not concern me...but the potential for ice is going to keep me from using my car until it clears up a little bit.

[Antioch]

Actually they are only saying like 1 inch now, if that...maybe more... I really really really wish they would just stop predicting the snow... Just say their is a chance of snow so be prepared, and then if it does really snow tell how much we got... They have consistently missed most snows for about 10-15 years now... The old weather men, Bill Hall, and others seemed to tell it more how it is rather than getting peoples hopes up... And also Nashvilles weather has mysteriously changed so much, I think more than most other places, especially in the winter. I never remember getting the fluffy, dusty like snow that never accumulates, as a kid that we have gotten the past 5 years. And no where else can it be 33 or even 32 degrees and still get straight liquid rain like it did early last month and some last year. The North East had a huge snow storm last year and the temp was around 33-32 degrees and it still liked up, we get thunderstorms at that temp now... Ever since that tornado in 1998 our weather pattern has been different, that tornado was the shift of things.

[Wartrace]

I'd be more worried about busted pipes than snow.

[Antioch]

Now they are pretty much saying there pretty much not going to be any snow because the cold air is going to dry out all the moisture... Duh... When they said how cold if was going to be I said it is too cold to snow around here because cold air in this area 9 times out of 10 is very dry... For us to get a big snow here, 3 inches or more, the temperature has to be around 35-28 degrees, maybe 40, with not such a drastic drop like they are predicting tomorrow, 50-2.. and there has to be a large supply of moisture from the Gulf mixed with the cold air... I guarantee tomorrow we will have a little dry dusting that will simply blow away Monday....

[Antioch]

Now the weather channel is calling for less drastic of a drop in temps between 6-10 and has a higher percentage for snow, there temps are at like 33 for 6 pm and 28 for 8 pm with that hour having the highest percentage of precipitation in the form of snow... Now that makes more sense, a more gradual drop through the 20's will support snow, and they have it at like 21 at 10 p.m., when I'm sure it will be dropping by the second, and they have the lowest percent for snow at that temp.

[bobtn]

Originally Posted by Wmsn4Life

I am impressed that you knew how to spell Kahlua!



I'm thinking Irish coffee.

I'm also a Ct transplant and what they called Dublin coffee (Baileys and coffee) is my 1st choice. I'll be watching my Packers, and rooting for the temps to be lower than the 5 degrees projected. SF should love that!!