Clean Up and Recovery, Stella

Stella hit us pretty hard. This was a historic blizzard that started locally around 2:55 a.m. on Tuesday morning. I know this because it’s part of my job. It was well into the night that I tracked the storm. Multiple reports came in from Pennsylvania around 2 a.m. that they were getting snow. Most were reporting light flurries, a few flakes.

As time past and Stella had yet to introduce herself to us, I focus radar in on the area to get a broad time frame when we might get hit. That’s when I saw it. Stella was tip toeing around us quietly with many unaware we were in the eye of the storm.

At 2:55 a.m. Stella hit and as I predicted, she hit with a steady flow of snow falling. We were covered in a matter of minutes. It was around 9 a.m. I took this photo that I’m sharing with you today. Conditions were a mess, schools closed, a travel ban was enforced, emergency teams were coming together because locally “no one could keep up”.

By 9 a.m. Tuesday morning we were roughly between 19 and 23 inches of snow. Stella was here to stay. It was a steady stream of snow with low visibility and I was out in the thick of it getting photos and video footage posting LIVE updates out on Twitter.

It wasn’t until mid-Thursday that the County-wide ban was officially removed. Some area schools opened which brought into question the safety of students. That’s when I got in touch with the Mayor Office,

“The National Guard is at present shoveling out fire hydrants which is our first priority.  Sidewalks are the responsibility of the individual homeowner, if you have a problem with an individual please let the Code Department know the specific address.  The School District makes their own decision on whether to open or close schools on their own.  Mayor Bertoni had requested not to have school today.”

I have to admit, I agreed with the Mayor. Sidewalks were untouched, unpassable and/or blocked off from students. This also led to a closer look at messages left for parents from local schools. In the message to parents, the school’s announced a 2-hour delay, asked parents NOT to drive students to school because of road condition and buses needing to get through. They also stressed that student walkers be “very very careful” coming into school because of all the snow and large piles.

Later on Thursday, the sun came out and it helped the area a great deal as well as the National Guard who had been called into the county and arrived late Wednesday night to help clean up. With a few areas still needing work, Friday was a major improvement over conditions on Thursday.

While the current forecast calls for another 2 – 4 inches of snow over the weekend. It doesn’t seem to be an issue. Roadways are wet, not snow covered and it doesn’t seem to be sticking. It’s 1:24 p.m. with current temperature at 32 F and our high for today was expected to be 33 F.

I’ll keep you posted as the clean up continues.