Snow day: Suffolk sees six inches

Published 10:45 pm Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Heavenly: Five-year-old Julia Pollard creates a snow angel Wednesday afternoon on Queen Anne's Court off of King's Fork Road. (Titus Mohler/Suffolk News-Herald)

Heavenly: Five-year-old Julia Pollard creates a snow angel Wednesday afternoon on Queen Anne’s Court off of King’s Fork Road. (Titus Mohler/Suffolk News-Herald)

With more than six inches of soft, fluffy snow on the ground when they woke up Wednesday morning, folks in Suffolk whiled away the day outside.

Activities included making snowmen, having snowball fights and eating snow cream. Folks improvised sleds and used four-wheelers to pull them, created snow angels and relished the sound of their feet in the snow.

Plenty of people used rulers to measure the amount of snow they got. The number of inches ranged from less than six inches measured by Gail Taylor on Kingsdale Road to 19 inches in a snowdrift on Dawn Nobles’ back porch on Schooner Cove, but the average seemed to be about six to eight inches based on Facebook reports and emailed photos.

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Catherine Douglas reported on Facebook that eight inches of snow fell in her yard on Carolina Road. The kids were playing in it and eating snow cream, she said.

Crystal Wiedenhoeft said her family, the dog and her neighbors had been sledding on the hills of the spillway on Turlington Road near Lake Speight.

Out in Carrsville, Kenny Edwards was one of those using his four-wheeler to pull the kids in a sled.

Not everyone was having fun in the snow, though. As of Wednesday morning, eight weather-related accidents had been reported in the city, with none of them being major, city spokeswoman Diana Klink said.

Public Works crews worked 12-hour shifts and spread more than 300 tons of salt and sand through the morning, Klink said. As of noon, all primary roadways were considered treated, and crews were moving on to secondary roadways.

Klink said later the crews had cleared 400 lane miles of primary roadways and 184 lane miles of secondary roadways. As of Wednesday evening, they were focusing on turn lanes and expected to begin treating residential streets on Thursday, she said.

Citizens are requested to move their parked vehicles from the roadways in residential neighborhoods where possible.

The city and its courts, Suffolk Public Schools and Nansemond-Suffolk Academy all remain closed Thursday.

“We’re still encouraging if you don’t need to go out, stay off the roadways because they are still treacherous,” Klink said. She later reported Suffolk police said many people had heeded the warnings to stay off the roads, resulting in a limited number of accidents. Suffolk Fire and Rescue advised they responded to a number of emergency calls ranging from falls to chest pains and asthma issues.

Trash pickup has been delayed another day, with Friday’s trash being collected on Monday, unless the landfill closes again on Friday. Suffolk Transit also will be closed Thursday.

James Foster of the National Weather Service in Wakefield said field reports from Suffolk listed depths of six, seven and 10 inches.

“The six to 10 inches looks like it was a pretty good forecast,” he said.

Unlike last week’s snow, which could still be seen in spots when this week’s started falling, it won’t stick around very long.

“If we get sun tomorrow, with temperatures in the lower 30s, you’ll probably see decent melting going on tomorrow (Thursday),” Foster said. “Then whatever’s left on the ground Friday should be gone after Friday.”

Temperatures in the mid-40s are expected for Friday, with temperatures in the 50s by the weekend.