Sit around long enough and old
folks will start telling stories from the last century.
Inevitably, those stories include huge snow storms... you know
the ones where they had to walk five miles uphill both
directions and in 3 feet of of the white stuff.
More recently, most of us remember
the great blizzard from 1978 when County Clay actually did
receive 3 feet of snow. Keep in mind. last year we received just
a couple dustings. This year, our
record setting load was a foot of the stuff in most of the
state and in mountainous neighborhoods like Clay, the slicky
crap amounted to over 15 inches with a quarter inch of ice in
the middle.
Weathercasters hit the numbers well ahead of time sending
frenzied parents to grocery stores and gas stations well ahead
of the Jan 5th entrance of fluffs. On the 5th by noon, there was
not one loaf of bread left in the Clay Go Mart. Even the most
expensive loaves, yelp all gone.
Having school during the challenge, well, it really
didn't happen. Leadership came up with "non traditional"
learning days. That means kids don't have to attend and still
get counted as an in school day. Two hour delays amount to,
heck, no reason to come out either.
The snow didn't come and go on the 5th. Truth is for the
next two weeks, the roads were ice covered on the 15th followed
by another 6 inches of snow on top of the ice.
That ice thing made travel very difficult... impossible
for those that live in hilly sections.
Then the cold temps set in. Main roads were passable but
with morning temps below zero, two hour delays were the norm for
kids and parents.
We didn't actually see any ape shirt crazy parents running
down the roads screaming at the top of their lungs but after a
two week Christmas break followed by 2 more weeks of no school,
parents had their hands full staying sane.
Relief came around Jan 19th when sunshine started the
melt down.
Custom accessories were employed... orange and green
ratchet straps! Around the county motorists were using the
straps to hold crumpled hoods, fenders, and bumpers in place.
Headlights? Those were the first to go during encounters with
large ice balls along each roadway.
This blizzard was a big one. Sadly we report, unlike
years of old where kids played in the outdoors, this time, we
never saw one kids out playing. Snowmen? That's just about
unheard of these days.
As a note: According to the National
Weather Service, the most snow ever recorded in West
Virginia in 24 hours was in Flat Top, Mercer County. On Jan.
27-28, 1998, the community experienced 35 inches of snowfall.
However, the state’s biggest recorded snowstorm lasted from Nov.
24-29 in 1950 and dumped 57 inches of snow on Pickens, Randolph
County.
That same 1950 snowstorm is the biggest snow to ever hit most
of West Virginia’s biggest cities: Charleston (25.7 inches),
Parkersburg (34.6 inches), Clarksburg (33.0 inches) and Elkins
(34.7 inches). According to NWS data, some parts of central West
Virginia got up to 63 inches during that storm.
