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Rescued my wife at the entrance to the neighborhood 3 blocks from my house 10 minutes ago - 13.5 hours after she left work(normally takes 15-20 minutes). Kids still at school.

Me! I'm in Huntsville.

I am in Peru... 83 degrees. If we ever had ANY precipitation in Lima it would be bad.

Count me among the arctic marooned. Stuck at my workplace, did try to leave for home, to no avail, roads just too icy and dangerous. Skidded 3 or 4 times and just chose to turn back and eat the loss. No money, toiletries or food. Wife and child made it home alright, though. So, I'll endeavor to perservere.

marooned 150 mi east of Hotlanta

(01-29-2014 08:56 AM)Matrix Wrote:  Count me among the arctic marooned. Stuck at my workplace, did try to leave for home, to no avail, roads just too icy and dangerous. Skidded 3 or 4 times and just chose to turn back and eat the loss. No money, toiletries or food. Wife and child made it home alright, though. So, I'll endeavor to perservere.

Where are you, Matrix?

I would put terrain near the top of the list. Charlotte is higher in elevation than BHM but the Piedmont is nearly flat as a tabletop...you can just see the first hills of the Appalachians to the Northwest. We don't have much more equipment than BHM, but we don't have the situation of places you just plain cannot get to or get out of.

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(01-29-2014 01:39 AM)uab blazer 01 Wrote:  I left downtown at 11am haven't made a detour or stop and I'm not at Alfred avenue exit yet. Piss poor planning. People responsible for this should lose their jobs.

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You went to school/work knowing what the weather forecast was. It sucks for anybody who is stuck in this, but it's not like this thing just popped up out of nowhere. I don't know what exactly you would like the "people responsible for this" to have done. Once the disaster is in place, there is no good way to fix it.

I live in Huntsville, and it's bizarre to me that all of this happened 80 miles south of us.

(01-29-2014 11:04 AM)blazers9911 Wrote:  

(01-29-2014 01:39 AM)uab blazer 01 Wrote:  I left downtown at 11am haven't made a detour or stop and I'm not at Alfred avenue exit yet. Piss poor planning. People responsible for this should lose their jobs.

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You went to school/work knowing what the weather forecast was. It sucks for anybody who is stuck in this, but it's not like this thing just popped up out of nowhere. I don't know what exactly you would like the "people responsible for this" to have done. Once the disaster is in place, there is no good way to fix it.

I live in Huntsville, and it's bizarre to me that all of this happened 80 miles south of us.

How stupid are you? That's EXACTLY what happened to Birmingham. As of 10 a.m. -- one hour before this went down -- James Spann was tweeting that there were no problems in Birmingham -- AND THAT HE DIDN'T ANTICIPATE ANY. He then got in his car and began driving to a school he was scheduled to speak at, only to get trapped like everyone else.

Clearly, you haven't paid a bit of attention to how this unfolded. I live in Iowa, and I have a better grasp of what's going on down there than you do.

I get that the weather forecast was wrong, but it isn't like this huge front just popped up in Birmingham out of nowhere. A couple of inches of unexpected snow causes exactly what happened.

People are always quick to ***** when we delay and/or close schools in advance of this stuff, but it is done to prevent exactly this type of situation.

If nothing else good comes out of this it will be a reminder of why we are cautious to the point of northerners thinking we're idiots about snow. If you get out on these hills when they are icy you're screwed in short order.

We forget sometimes, and we're used to having more accurate weather predictions.

(01-29-2014 11:29 AM)UAB Band Dad Wrote:  If nothing else good comes out of this it will be a reminder of why we are cautious to the point of northerners thinking we're idiots about snow. If you get out on these hills when they are icy you're screwed in short order.

We forget sometimes, and we're used to having more accurate weather predictions.

Agree 100%. I wasn't trying to make it out like people were morons for going to school or work, we are just not equipped to handle this type of situation at all. When we have a massive storm like this move into the area, it's probably better to be safe than sorry.

Mostly it was two things - it was unexpected, the weather was not at all what was predicted. Then the timing, everyone had their kids at school and was settled at work when it started to go to hell fast. If it had been overnight we all would have stayed home, no big deal. At ten am when no one had a clue it was coming... by the time we figured it out and got moving it was too late, multiplied by the whole damn town trying to drive home at once in crappy conditions.

The only really *good* thing about this snow event was that it wasn't a typical southern ice storm. If we had added in widespread power outages, this would have been an absolute nightmare, and I'm very thankful for that not happening.

(01-28-2014 11:20 PM)UAB Band Dad Wrote:  Bottom line - One, few drivers here have experience driving in this, and their judgement is suspect. Two, the cars themselves are not winterized in the same way. Kitty litter for traction would not occur to 1 in 100 of the people on the road, myself included, nor do we travel with blankets and winter gear just in case. Three, things like snow tires, studded snow tires, and snow chains are not a factor, and they would have been very helpful today.

Most of all, I don't care if you're from Chicago, once the roads over these hills are coated with glaze ice with snow on top, you're screwed.

This. I don't care if you're Mario Andretti. The best driver in the world cannot overcome the laws of physics and a inch layer of ice covering every road over Red and Shades Mountain. The problem was the forecast, because if we knew this was going to happen no one would have gone to school or work. That's how we prepare since we're too chintzy to actually get prepared with road equipment such as deicing solution and salt.

(01-29-2014 11:32 AM)blazers9911 Wrote:  

(01-29-2014 11:29 AM)UAB Band Dad Wrote:  If nothing else good comes out of this it will be a reminder of why we are cautious to the point of northerners thinking we're idiots about snow. If you get out on these hills when they are icy you're screwed in short order.

We forget sometimes, and we're used to having more accurate weather predictions.

Agree 100%. I wasn't trying to make it out like people were morons for going to school or work, we are just not equipped to handle this type of situation at all. When we have a massive storm like this move into the area, it's probably better to be safe than sorry.

This is just bizarre. People have to go to work, and if school is in session they have to go to school. It's their fault the forecast was wrong? Everything is always the person's fault when something bad happens in your world. This was a failure of both the forecast and emergency management officials to be prepared. The forecasters should not have said with such certainty what was going to happen in Birmingham, and the emergency responders and transportation officials should be prepared for this type of event.

(01-29-2014 11:45 AM)mixduptransistor Wrote:  

(01-29-2014 11:32 AM)blazers9911 Wrote:  

(01-29-2014 11:29 AM)UAB Band Dad Wrote:  If nothing else good comes out of this it will be a reminder of why we are cautious to the point of northerners thinking we're idiots about snow. If you get out on these hills when they are icy you're screwed in short order.

We forget sometimes, and we're used to having more accurate weather predictions.

Agree 100%. I wasn't trying to make it out like people were morons for going to school or work, we are just not equipped to handle this type of situation at all. When we have a massive storm like this move into the area, it's probably better to be safe than sorry.

This is just bizarre. People have to go to work, and if school is in session they have to go to school. It's their fault the forecast was wrong? Everything is always the person's fault when something bad happens in your world. This was a failure of both the forecast and emergency management officials to be prepared. The forecasters should not have said with such certainty what was going to happen in Birmingham, and the emergency responders and transportation officials should be prepared for this type of event.

First off, you don't "have to" do either of those things. I'm not saying people should have stayed home, and I would have went to work too.(I did, and if that storm was 80 miles north I would have likely been in the same boat.) The forecast was wrong, it happens. My point was more that we have cancelled schools for less threatening storms in the past, and because those have missed, we got a bit complacent in our thinking. If you cancel schools ahead of time, you avoid some of the congestion out there.(schools all let out at once, whereas people would likely leave work at different times)

This is not any individual's fault, but it sure as **** isn't the weathermen and emergency management's fault either. This is like the people who thought emergency management should have handled Katrina better. The city was underwater there, the city was filled with cars here. What were the forecaster's supposed to do? They had their data, and it was wrong. That's why it is called a forecast, and not a definitive indication of what the weather will be. To me, this was just a giant series of unfortunate events.

(01-29-2014 11:56 AM)blazers9911 Wrote:  My point was more that we have cancelled schools for less threatening storms in the past, and because those have missed, we got a bit complacent in our thinking. If you cancel schools ahead of time, you avoid some of the congestion out there.(schools all let out at once, whereas people would likely leave work at different times)

That's the point that's being made. Weather forecasting is a helluva lot more accurate then when I was a kid, but it is still at best an inexact science. Based on what *was known* to all of us, bosses, workers, parents, school and government leaders making decisions, everybody, there was no reason to expect this to happen. Then when it did we all had to react and make the best decisions we could based on what was going on around us.

You can't just close schools every time there *might* be some bad weather. Can't. You try staying home from work every time that you consider the weather "threatening" and see how long you remain employed there.

Everyone involved based their actions and decisions on what they knew at the time. Bad info meant poor decisions made. It happens. Sometimes things just aren't somebody's fault.

I mean, really, who are you going to blame here? Mayor Bell? The school principals? The highway department? You can't pay overtime and materials costs to sand and salt every hill in town when the forecast calls for a "dusting" of snow. Hell, I'd have a fit about the waste of paying for that, and I wouldn't be alone.

You can make a case for the Governor pulling the trigger on sending state employees too late, but it looked to me like basically as soon as people realized just how bad this was going to be schools started closing, businesses sent employees home, etc.

Unfortunately, 90% of them reached that conclusiion within about an hour of each other, and icy traffic chaos ensued.

Fortunately for me, I got stuck at home as by the time I got up for work UAB had closed so I didn't have to go in. Only bad thing for me is that water was off for a good bit of day so no warm shower. Who says there's not benefits to working nights

(01-28-2014 11:53 PM)blazinrunner Wrote:  Walked home down 280 to find no water at my place. Warmed up and headed out to get some water at the Winn Dixie. Lost my keys on the trek over. Was finally able to get maintenance to get me in about 2 1/2 hours later. Rough day.

Lakes at Inverness???

Gov. Bentley announced that about 4,000 students have been stranded with their teachers at schools across Alabama. One thing I would like for parents and other citizens to keep in mind is that all school staff who are working to keep children safe and fed overnight and today are (under teacher's contracts) "off payroll" until schools are officially declared "open" later this week. At whatever time of day on Tuesday the schools were officially "closed", all staff (teachers and support staff) pay ended. Those who stayed for whatever reason are essentially "volunteer childcare providers".

Since the state legislature is still in session, they can make some effort to compensate these workers by state action. If they don't, the PTA / PTO organizations can make some local effort to do so no matter what the state's Ethics Commission says..

(01-29-2014 12:30 PM)UAB Band Dad Wrote:  

(01-29-2014 11:56 AM)blazers9911 Wrote:  My point was more that we have cancelled schools for less threatening storms in the past, and because those have missed, we got a bit complacent in our thinking. If you cancel schools ahead of time, you avoid some of the congestion out there.(schools all let out at once, whereas people would likely leave work at different times)

That's the point that's being made. Weather forecasting is a helluva lot more accurate then when I was a kid, but it is still at best an inexact science. Based on what *was known* to all of us, bosses, workers, parents, school and government leaders making decisions, everybody, there was no reason to expect this to happen. Then when it did we all had to react and make the best decisions we could based on what was going on around us.

You can't just close schools every time there *might* be some bad weather. Can't. You try staying home from work every time that you consider the weather "threatening" and see how long you remain employed there.

Everyone involved based their actions and decisions on what they knew at the time. Bad info meant poor decisions made. It happens. Sometimes things just aren't somebody's fault.

I mean, really, who are you going to blame here? Mayor Bell? The school principals? The highway department? You can't pay overtime and materials costs to sand and salt every hill in town when the forecast calls for a "dusting" of snow. Hell, I'd have a fit about the waste of paying for that, and I wouldn't be alone.

You can make a case for the Governor pulling the trigger on sending state employees too late, but it looked to me like basically as soon as people realized just how bad this was going to be schools started closing, businesses sent employees home, etc.

Unfortunately, 90% of them reached that conclusiion within about an hour of each other, and icy traffic chaos ensued.

I agree there is really nobody to blame. In the past, these decisions have generally been made the night before.(regarding schools) I don't know who makes the decisions, and I don't know what criteria they need to make them. This has also been an unusually cold winter, even though this was really the first threat of snow we've had this season. I've always been of the opinion you don't shut schools down the night before because you look stupid when you miss, but this mess has kind of made me rethink that.

This was definitely a freak once in a decade incident. The odds of nothing showing up on radar and then it just coming down like it did are very low. To me, there is no answer as to who is to blame here, because based off of everything available at the time, nobody made a poor decision.