Were you in Rlaeigh for the Ice Storm Back in 2005? (Raleigh: power lines, chapel)

[North_Raleigh_Guy]

Candies earlier post got me to thinking about the weather here in Raleigh. I have been here for two winters now and have yet to see snow which is fine by me. I am originally from NJ where although we did not regulalry get full on blizzards like upstate NY we would get snow almost everywinter and after the third snow or so it would start to loose it’s charm.

Anyway I remember coming down to Raleigh to interview for a job back in Feb 2005 and the person I met with told me Raleigh had just had a freak ice storm a week earlier that completely shut the area down. I know a lot of people like to make fun of the south for not being able to handle snow ( I am not one of them), but I heard that it was just a bad chain of events that lead to the chaos…..1) ice instead of snow, 2) schools let out which lead to 3) parents leaving work early to pick kids up, which lead to 4) roads being gridlocked preventing salt trucks or plows on the road which just made the problem even worse. Believe me, a serious ice storm would cause havoc in just about any metro area under those conditions!

My point is, that person who told me about the storm told me that people with commutes that normally took 45 minutes spent over 8 hours driving home ! I have heard similar stories from other people as well. I was wondering if anybody on this board was here when that happened. If so did you get stuck in all that mess? I hope we never see anything like that here again.

[MikeJaquish]

True story.
It made a lot of news, because there was almost no precipitation.
It only takes a thin sheen of ice to eliminate all traction, and it happpens very quickly sometimes.

December 5/6, 2002 was the real ice deal.
3/4" of ice on tree limbs, and thousands of trees and limbs down. Power lines pulled down all over the Triangle.
Stepped onto the deck and the treetops snapping off sounded like a machine gun.
Some people didn't have electric service for two weeks.
Bad stuff.

[leighbhe]

Yes, we were here. It was about 2 inches or more of ice, then snow. The schools all let out, the parents all had to get the kids, the roads were VERY slick, causing lots of accidents because you couldn't see the ice, then the snow packed on top of it. Although for us, it only took 2 hours to get home (which should have taken 15 minutes...............I had friends who were on the road for 6 and even 8 hours because the accidents blocked the roads, the wreckers couldn't clear them, people were just stuck. The worst part was the kids, they were stuck because their parents couldn't get them, and the parents that were taking care of the stuck kids (teachers, day care workers) were stuck because not all of the kids were able to get picked up.

It was an odd day because when you looked outside, you were like, oh it is a little sleet, no biggie. Then it was a lot of sleet, ice and a little packed down snow.

not fun

But, also get used to the idea that when they CALL for snow, many schools cancel the night before it may snow.....................

leigh

[MikeJaquish]

in Cary, we really had about 1/2" of ice. It was enough.
When you see vehicles on TV with the brake lights lit, and they are sliding backwards and sideways from a standstill, it isn't driveable for anyone.

I wanted to go to a job in Garner and decided that if I did I would hit drive time coming home, so I stayed at the house. Quite delighted that I did. Took the wife an hour and 45 minutes to make the drive home from RTP. 8 miles.

[DebbieF]

My daughter worked 5 minutes from home, and it took her over 1 hour to get home. Gridlock for sure. She was on her way home for lunch. Then she was about to go back to work, and I wouldn't let her out of the house. ;-) Hope that never happens again.

[DebbieF]

I also heard of someone leaving work in the late afternoon, and getting home at 1am. I bet some people ran out of gas for sure. A friend that was stuck in all that said she saw people leaving their cars and running into the woods to pee. Crazy....I'm so glad I wasn't out there.

[Desdemona123]

I couldn't believe the entire thing.

It was hardly anything....and people went into a panic and that is what caused the problem.

When I found out school let out early, with no bus service (bus drivers had turned around because the roads were too bad!) I left work early (up in Granville county). I got down Rt. 50 when traffic just STOPPED right before Rt. 98. It made no sense what-so-ever.

I was upset, not because of the weather, but back in Ohio if you didn't pick up your child from school within an hour, they'd call CPS. Here I am in a state with no family and little experience and I am scared that my child is going to be put into a foster home, at least for a time, because I couldn't get to the school! (And believe me, they would not have accepted a heavy frost as an excuse in Ohio!)

I ended up turning around. tracing back and taking way-back roads into Wake Forest. (Which were not bad at all.)

Turns out that at the time I was freaking out, the teachers were breaking into the cafeteria to get the kids milk and cookies and when I arrived at the school, around 7pm (I had left around 3:30.....it's a half hour drive.....at most!) the Wake Forest police officers were ferrying home those kids whose parents couldn't get there (being stuck in traffic or such) but there was someone home to care for them.

If something like that happens again....since my daughter goes to Ligon in Downtown, there is no way that I could come get her. She'd be one of those kids spending the night at school! (There were a few hundred at various schools (mostly the magnets, that couldn't get home.)

The wife of the CFO at work later told us it took her 6 hours to go less then 5 miles on Six Forks Road.....stories like that were all too common.

[I'minformed2]

I'm confused.... the ice storm was in December of 2002 (and then another one a few months later in February 2003). The storm of Jan 2005 was .7 inches of snow that fell, melted on the roads, and then froze solid on the roads. The "storm" of Jan 2005 caused a 12 hour grid lock and that's it (relatively speaking of course) the Dec and Feb. ice storms of winter 2002-2003 caused region wide power outages that lasted for over a week for some people; closed EVERYTHING and brought tons of trees down. Jan. 05 was an inconvenience and if any disaster.... one of infrastructure, timing, and planing. The real ice storms were actual natural disasters that if I remember correctly claimed several lives from Carbon monoxide poisoning.

[magicmk]

Originally Posted by i'minformed

I'm confused.... the ice storm was in December of 2002 (and then another one a few months later in February 2003). The storm of Jan 2005 was .7 inches of snow that fell, melted on the roads, and then froze solid on the roads. The "storm" of Jan 2005 caused a 12 hour grid lock and that's it (relatively speaking of course) the Dec and Feb. ice storms of winter 2002-2003 caused region wide power outages that lasted for over a week for some people; closed EVERYTHING and brought tons of trees down. Jan. 05 was an inconvenience and if any disaster.... one of infrastructure, timing, and planing. The real ice storms were actual natural disasters that if I remember correctly claimed several lives from Carbon monoxide poisoning.

Yeah I think the damage from the '03 ice storm was quite a bit more significant. If I remember right, there was a UNC basketball game the next day after the '03 storm and a lot of people were still without power, some couldn't make it to the game for obvious reasons. ESPN showed some of the fallen pines on campus and around Chapel Hill, so it actually got some national exposure. You could drive along I-40 for months afterward and still see a lot of the trees along the right of way for the highway that were downed from that storm.

[cary native]

The difference between the the earlier and the latter was that the 05' storm was not forseen by meteorologists, therefore there were no warnings.That led to the busses being let out and all the people leaving work right in the middle of it.
The severity of it all depended on where you were that day. Areas north, and east, where i was(Johnston Co.) had no ice at all.