Six inches of snow nearly paralyzed the New York area. What went wrong?

[Crow BarKeymaster]

http://www.watertowndailytimes.com/national/six-inches-of-snow-nearly-paralyzed-the-new-york-area-what-went-wrong-20181117

[Anonymous]

Very worrisome that an entire area that has dealt with snow, cold, blizzards and all the other winter weather fun can get caught so off guard and at the beginning of the season too.

I am going to be adding extra things on top of what we already have because I seen that the weather is supposed to be colder than normal now, when I read a few weeks ago it was going to be average.  I’m taking that just in case, worst case scenario idea and prepping for arctic chills and shut down state days.

If the weather can flip the New England states what the heck is it going to do to the south east?

[James MitchnerParticipant]

Good time to add a GHB to your vehicle(s) as well.  Some drivers in NY spent the night in their cars!

[Jade JasmineParticipant]

This was pretty bad. I’ve been seeing the outrage in the news feeds and such. I think every area has at some point been forecasted to have a light snow and then got dumped on. It happened here in Tennessee back in the 90’s. The forecast called for 4 inches of snow, we got 4.5 feet. It shut the city down for a week. At my house, we were without power for 9 days.

The outrage that folks have is silly. Assuming city officials have some sort of control over such changing weather conditions is ludicrous. We’re always looking for someone to blame, but the blame really lies with us. We’re comfortable and our routines are set and if anything, including a forecast for a dusting that intensifies and turns into inches, upsets those routines, we want to lay blame at someone because we had to.. what? get in our cars or not and deal with a situation that is out of the control of everyone involved? Bleh.

Do they think Atlanta expected to have the issues they had when the snow hit them? Do they think that folks in the pan handle of Florida ever considered that a hurricane of huge proportions was going to come bearing down on them after being safe from such things since recorded history? We cannot control the planet, only what we do to it. We cannot control the weather, only brace for impact whatever that may be. Mother nature can still surprise us and that becomes more and more apparently with each natural disaster we face and each increase in storm intensity we experience.

[OldMt WomanParticipant]

“Brace for Impact” is right, JadeJ!  We’re playing catch-up.  It was Oct when I left to stay with our elderlies.  It was November when I returned…too fatigued to do much.  It’s now heading for Thanksgiving and I’m still …..wait!  What happened to autumn and all the things we do to Get Ready For Winter????

I could list about 10 heavy labor chores that NEED to get done right now so that we CAN get thru winter.  And yet we cannot do them yet.  Our driveway is getting packed snow/ice cuz it snowed 4 more inches later during the night….after our snowplow guy did the driveway.  We’ve got a collapsing [leaking] tarp that I’m about to get after with a machete…to let out the snow/ice so it doesn’t damage the rest of the structure.  It’s supposed to be DOWN already.  And all I can physically do right now is say….wait, I’m not READY FOR THIS WINTER YET!!!  I need a rewind of late autumn, please?  Note to self:  Make SURE we can get to the end of the elect. cord that’s underground for the horse water tank. Ya only make THAT mistake once!

Fall is always our most HURRRY-BUSY time of year but this one got interrupted!  Not sure how a whole CITY can claim personal issues for not being prepare tho…

OldMtWoman …aiiiieee

• This reply was modified 1 year, 7 months ago by  OldMt Woman.

[Crow BarKeymaster]

Around here, we assume snow can start starting at Halloween.

Flipside, 7 years ago at Thanksgiving my daughter was wearing a tee-shirt and shorts.

In mid-October I busted out the cold weather gear, took inventory, noted what I was short on or needed replaced.

When that storm came through, we had to snow throw the drive, shovel the walkways.  Drive a little slower.  It was not bad really.

[Jade JasmineParticipant]

@oldmtwoman Ha! If only we could rewind the clock, hmm? Snow is devastating here, we (the city as a whole) tend to not do well in it. They start closing the schools when they call for flurries because we never know if its actually going to be just flurries. Trying to keep up with the crazy around here is like trying to catch water with a fishing net! But it sounds like you had a pretty important situation come up preventing you from getting prepared for winter. I hope it worked out and that you can get back on track.

[OldMt WomanParticipant]

Yeah…around here weather is an hourly topic.  Frosty beautiful pine trees this morning.  Sunny and nearly 50* now.  🙂  Honestly, we’re high enough to get snow in August [doesn’t last but neither do tomatoes] and wear T-shirts during the “January Thaw”.  What was different this year was the overnite low getting down to ZERO in early October.  That locks up the ground a lot sooner than normal.  Cuts off the fresh grass and we begin to pay for hay early too.  🙁  That hurts.  We’ve been subzero at nite several times now.  SubZero used to be a rare thing all winter!  {sigh…I hate subzero – too dangerous}

BUT….most things can still be handled during the sunny days we’ll have.  Not liking the icy, steep driveway tho.  Mebbe call my friend back to take a couple swipes with his plow to get it down to gravel again?  Hate to…he won’t take any payment..

So how do you who live in city deal with municipal decisions affecting your preparedness?  Besides catching water in a net?  😉   If your kids are home ….if you have a private business to run…if you have an unreasonable employer who wants you at work anyway….  Yikes.

OldMtWoman

 

• This reply was modified 1 year, 6 months ago by  OldMt Woman.
• This reply was modified 1 year, 6 months ago by  OldMt Woman.

[WhirlibirdParticipant]

Depending upon what happens, most things end up a null issue.

We got 5′ of snow in a week, two years ago. School was delayed, and the busses didn’t run out of town, but our plow crews pretty much had all the main arteries open by noon the first day and not only kept them open but got all the secondary streets and most of the residential a by mid-week.

My advantage is I do work for the municipality and between the doctors and LEO’s in the neighborhood, ours is one of the first streets plowed.

Having seen a number of emergency situations around here, our city actually has it better than most, but that also comes from all the oil and gas professionals who retire and take up city offices or committee positions.

And I can actually close our building for various reasons and have done so, power and water outages, ice storms, etc., if it’s not safe for our people or the public, the doors stay locked.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 6 months ago by  Whirlibird.

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