Major winter storm forces closures, cancellations in much of D.C. region
Major winter storm forces closures, cancellations in much of D.C. region
(about 3 hours later)
The biggest storm of the season dumped a thick snow blanket on the Washington area overnight, shutting down the federal government; local schools, courts and government offices; airports and Metro’s bus service.
Finally — a regionwide wallop.
Highway officials in Maryland and Virginia asked drivers to stay off the roads if possible on Thursday, saying their trucks were steadily plowing and putting down salt and brine but were having a tough time keeping up.
Snow blanketed Washington and its suburbs Wednesday night and Thursday morning, shuttering local schools, government offices and airports and leaving roadways treacherous for the few who dared to venture onto them.
“As soon as we go through and do a route, it’s covered up again,” said Charlie Gischlar, a spokesman with the Maryland Department of Transportation. Flakes fell thick and fast in the early morning hours, but changed to sleet and freezing rain in some areas as the skies lightened and the temperatures rose above freezing.
Snow totals varied considerably, but most residents reported significantly more of the white stuff — between eight and 15 inches — than they had seen since the Snowmageddon winter four years ago. The National Weather Service reported 11 inches of snow in Rockville and 12 in Kensington as of 6 a.m. There were about six inches of snow at Ronald Reagan National Airport, 9.5 inches in Arlington, 11 inches in Herndon, 14 inches at Fairfax Station and 12.5 inches in Rockville.
[Latest reports from the Capital Weather Gang.]
Precipitation had slowed down and, in some areas, turned to sleet and freezing rain by mid-morning, but The Washington Post’s Capital Weather Gang said more snow was possible late Thursday afternoon and evening.
A Virginia Department of Transportation contract worker was killed while clearing snow on Belmont Ridge Road in Ashburn, state police said. The man had pulled his truck onto the shoulder of the roadway shortly before 6 a.m. and was standing near the vehicle’s rear spreader when he was struck by a VDOT dump truck, police said.
[Latest Weather Gang updates.]
The worker was transported to a local hospital, where he died. The cause of the crash remains under investigation. Police were waiting to release the man’s name until next of kin are notified.
The storm system swept into the Washington area from the Deep South, where it has had a crippling effect. More than 4,000 flights were canceled across the country; many of them would have passed through Atlanta. At least 13 deaths were reported in the South, and hundreds of thousands of homes were without power. Cities north of Washington, from Philadelphia to New York to Boston, were also seeing significant snow, with totals of eight inches or more expected.
In Loudoun County, a Virginia Department of Transportation contract worker was killed while clearing snow on Belmont Ridge Road in Ashburn, state police said. The man had pulled his truck onto the shoulder of the roadway shortly before 6 a.m. and was standing near the vehicle’s rear spreader when he was struck by a VDOT dump truck, police said.
Three accidents involving tractor-trailers were reported on the Capital Beltway in the early morning. There were no serious injuries, officials said, and because many people seemed to be heeding warnings to stay off roads, there were no major backups as a result of the disabled or overturned vehicles.
Authorities said they also responded to a number of incidents on major and secondary roads where cars slid off the road or became stuck.
Police in Prince George’s County helped rescue a horse that became stranded in a Springdale barn because of heavy snow. The horse became so tired trying to free itself, it collapsed. The animal was being treated by a veterinarian.
[See the latest storm updates.]
[See the latest storm updates.]
Metro trains were running on a normal schedule, which helped keep snow from accumulating on above-ground tracks. But the agency suspended all bus service and warned that snow depths of 8 inches or more on the tracks could halt above-ground service.
The foot or more that fell in many parts of the Washington area surprised some residents, who had become used to warnings of bad weather that — often this winter — did not pan out.
Police officials said they had responded to a number of incidents where cars slid off the road or become stuck. Three accidents were reported on the Capital Beltway around 7 a.m., all involving trucks. There were no serious injuries, officials said.
“Yeah, THIS feels like a real snow,” said Keith French, as he headed from his home in Takoma Park to his job as a technician at Atlantic Machinery in Silver Spring.
A tractor trailer carrying frozen food overturned on the inner loop of the Beltway near Andrews Air Force Base at Branch Avenue, blocking three of the four lanes. Another overturned tractor trailer on the Beltway at Interstate 295, near National Harbor, left the local lanes of the Beltway blocked. And an overturned dump truck at Route 1 in College Park blocked one lane. Authorities said that because so many people had stayed off the road there were no major backups as a result of the accidents.
James Beaner, a manager at a Washington pizza restaurant, said he was “shocked” that as much snow fell as was forecast, for what seemed like the first time all winter. And he expressed surprise that the entire region seemed to have come to a standstill
Northbound lanes of the George Washington Memorial Parkway were closed early Thursday from the Key Bridge to the Beltway but re-opened just before 9 a.m., U.S. Park Police said. Rock Creek Parkway was closed between Ohio and Beach drives.
“I never really believed it,” said Beaner, who needed more time than usual to drive from his home in St. Mary’s County to the Branch Avenue Metro station, where he was waiting for a train. “I didn’t think it was going to stop anyone from doing anything.”
All runways were closed at Ronald Reagan National Airport and Washington Dulles International Airport. More than 300 flights were canceled at Reagan, along with 123 at Baltimore-Washington International Airport, according to FlightAware. At Dulles, 201 flights were canceled.VRE shut down. Amtrak was running reduced service in the Northeast.
Metro shut down 250 bus routes throughout the area, and officials said they won’t know when bus service will resume until more streets in the area are plowed.
The best advice, many police and highway officials warned: Stay home if you can. And if you must go out, allow extra time - and extra space between vehicles.
The rail system’s normally bustling ridership was “anemic” during the morning commute, with only 6 percent as many riders as last Thursday. But trains continued to come every six to 10 minutes, and those passengers who did hop on for the most part reported smooth commutes.
“You have to drive waaayyyy below the speed limit,” said Sgt. Mark Cummings of the Maryland State Police.
All runways were closed at Reagan National and Washington Dulles International airport, with hundreds of flights canceled. VRE shut down. Amtrak was running reduced service in the Northeast.
As the snow was intensifying about 3 a.m., it was time to go in and make the donuts. Victor Aldana, manager of a Dunkin’ Donuts in Olney, decided to borrow his parents’ Toyota Sienna minivan and pick up two other employees. Leaving Aspen Hill, he found the side streets treacherous. He retrieved the first employee just fine, but got stuck heading to the second. “I had to shovel my way out,” he said.
But not everything was shut down or canceled. In Annapolis, one Maryland Senate committee on judicial proceedings said it planned to hold a hearing Thursday afternoon and stream the event online. Montgomery County highway officials said they hoped to have 900 lane-miles on main roads passable by late afternoon. And officials at National Airport said their runways were clear, they were plowing the taxiways, and they hoped to take advantage of the relatively lighter snowfall at the airport and resume operations sometime after noon.
Customers showed up once the shop was open, through far fewer than usual — and ordering far more donuts than the norm, Aldana said. “The ones that do make it in are getting enough for everybody.”
Those who had to make it to their jobs struggled if they did not live and work near a Metro line or have the luxury of four-wheel drive.
The National Weather Service reported 11 inches of snow in Rockville and 12 in Kensington as of 6 a.m. There were six inches of snow at National airport, eight inches in Arlington and a foot or more in Herndon, Oakton and other parts of Fairfax County.
Joel Ramos, 33, tried to catch a bus from his Fort Totten apartment, but found out when he got to the stop that Metro had canceled its service. So he walked to a rail station to catch a train that would get him within three miles of the restaurant where he works in Glover Park.
Those who did venture out to drive moved at a snail’s pace on the Capital Beltway, Interstate 66 in Virginia and Route 50 in Maryland. Many secondary roads and back streets were virtually impassable. Virginia highway officials said there were a number of disabled vehicles on Interstate 95.
He and a co-worker called their boss and asked for a ride from the station so they wouldn’t have to walk the whole way. Missing work wasn’t an option, he said. “There is no choice. We need to make it to work. We have to be responsible.”
Pepco, which serves the District and much of the Maryland suburbs, said it had about 600 linemen ready to react to the storm. Dominion Virginia Power warned customers to be prepared for prolonged power outages should ice or wet, heavy snow down lines. The utility said it was working through the Southeastern Electric Exchange to make sure additional resources were available. About 700 non-Dominion line crews from states as far away as Michigan, Louisiana and Oklahoma were scheduled to be in the region through Friday, according to the Dominion Web site.
Contract lawyer J.E. McNeil, 62, also tried to get to her office at 14th and K streets NW. She walked from her Garrison Street NW home to the Friendship Heights Metro, five long and snowy blocks away. The normal five-minute walk turned into 20 minutes. But McNeil had appointments she couldn’t miss.
In Maryland, Metro stations and trains were mostly empty along the Green Line, except for platform workers in bright orange outfits shoveling and snowblowing.
“I am tired,” she said when she arrived at the Metro stop. Then “Thank you, Metro!” as she waited seven minutes for a train. “For a lot of people, it is so important to get to work, and Metro and their workers really make it happen,” McNeil said of the transit agency.
As he walked on to the College Park U.-of-Md. platform shorty after 8 a.m., Matt Townsend, 26, said he saw no reason to batter down the hatches and stay home from his job at a church in Washington.
More than 300 flights were canceled at Reagan, along with 123 at Baltimore-Washington International Airport, according to FlightAware, a Houston-based flight tracking company. At Dulles, 201 flights were canceled.
“This type of weather doesn’t scare me,” said Townsend, who lives in College Park. “Ten inches isn’t anything to be freaking out about, to be honest.”
The few businesses that were open Thursday found that they were quickly becoming popular.
A lifelong resident of the D.C. area, Townsend said he knows the region tends to overreact to winter storms. But he trusts the area’s transportation agencies can handle the challenge, especially Metro, he said.
“The phone is ringing off the hook with people asking, ‘Are you open? Are you open?’ ” said Beth Cox, manager of the Tastee Diner in Bethesda, which is open 24 hours a day and had a plan in place since Tuesday night to get workers into the restaurant.
“They make sure everybody gets home,” Townsend said.
“There are people who have to be out in this weather — firefighters, police officers, anyone who needs to work 24 hours — and they need a place to eat,” Cox said. “And they know we’re always here.”
The storm system swept into the Washington area from the Deep South, where it has had a crippling effect. More than 4,000 flights were canceled across the country , many of them flights that would have traveled through Atlanta.
Michael Rosenwald, Michael Ruane, T. Rees Shapiro, Donna St. George, Jenna Johnson, Bill Turque, Justin Jouvenal, Katherine Shaver, Caitlin Gibson, Steve Hendrix, Patrick Svitek, Dan Morse, Emma Brown, Patricia Sullivan, Martin Weil, Susan Svrluga, Antonio Olivo, John Kelly, Michael A. Chandler, Lynh Bui, Luz Lazo, Lori Aratani, Mike DeBonis, Mary Pat Flaherty, Mark Berman, Donna St. George, Laura Vozzella, John Wagner, Kathy Orton, Lisa Bolton, Theresa Vargas, Paul Duggan, Ovetta Wiggins and Clarence Williams contributed to this report.
With plenty of warning ahead of the storm, Washington and its surrounding suburbs appeared to be relatively ready when the white stuff started coming down. Late Wednesday, snowplows and salt trucks were poised, states of emergency had been declared. And grocery stores and hardware stores were swamped as people stocked up on shovels, sleds, bread and milk.
The federal government decided at about 10 p.m. Wednesday to close on Thursday. With snow emergencies in place in Virginia, Maryland and the District, vehicles were barred from parking on designated snow emergency routes to clear the way for plows.
“We are ready, our equipment is ready, and we have plenty of salt,” William O. Howland Jr., director of the District’s Department of Public Works said on Wednesday.
Howland said that under the snow emergency, vehicles parked on those routes would be towed and their owners would face a $250 fine plus towing fees. “We’re going to impound every snow-emergency vehicle,” he said.
But for those who were helping to clear and monitor roads, there was a sense of exhaustion Thursday morning.
Steve Shannon, residency maintenance administrator for Virginia’s Department of Transportation in Loudoun County had been working since the previous morning, straight through the night.
“We’re in plow mode,” he said, “treating the roads and plowing. Unfortunately we’ve got over 13, 14 inches in parts of Loudoun already, and it’s still coming down hard. So we’re in plow mode, concentrating on the primary roads and the high-volume secondary roads.”
The District and state agencies in Maryland and Virginia said they had plenty of salt despite a winter that has consumed thousands of tons of it. But many area governments have blown through the snow removal budgets this winter.
In Virginia, the Department of Transportation’s storm budget is $63 million but it has already spent $83 million. The Montgomery Department of Transportation has spent $13 million on snow removal, of which $3 million went for salt, spokeswoman Esther Bowring said. In Prince George’s, where $2.8 million was allocated for snow removal this year, the county has spent $7.4 million, officials said.
In Southern Maryland’s Charles County, $1.1 million had been spent through the most recent snowfall last week, far exceeding the $782,100 that was approved for this year’s snow-removal efforts.
“It has definitely been busier than other years,” said Steve Staples, chief of the road division in Charles County. “We are on storm number nine. In years past, we have had two or three storms.”
Michael Rosenwald, Steve Hendrix, Patrick Svitek, Emma Brown, Patricia Sullivan, Martin Weil, Susan Svrluga, Antonio Olivo, Michael A. Chandler, Lynh Bui, Luz Lazo, Lori Aratani, Mike DeBonis, Mark Berman, Donna St. George, Laura Vozzella, John Wagner, Ovetta Wiggins and Clarence Williams contributed to this report.
