While some were hopeful that a mid-month January thaw would set-up over the Eastern United States, Old Man Winter brought more snow to the eastern United States and deep south again yesterday. Building onto heavy snow that fell over northern and northwestern New England over the weekend from the first and second parts of a three-part wintry mess, the mid-week system was responsible for dumping many more inches of snow, with the heaviest amounts over North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Maine.
Durham County in North Carolina saw about a foot of snow from the latest storm. “This is an extraordinary event to have this much snow all across the state. We aren’t used to that. We’re working as hard as we can,” said North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper. In North Carolina alone, State Troopers reported over 2,300 car crashes due to the snow.
Atlanta, home to the busiest airport in the world, also dealt with snow and ice from this storm. Due to the inch of snow and ice that accumulated there, Metro Atlanta’s commuter rail system, known as MARTA, was operating on a limited schedule. Flight delays added up at Hartsfield Airport because many TSA screeners couldn’t get to work with the ice and snow there. For today, airlines cancelled more than 200 flights out of Atlanta’s airport so that employees and aircraft could recover from the winter weather operations there.
The death toll from this latest wintry weather mess is up to 15, mainly from weather-related car crashes. However, some perished in the bitter cold that arrived with the frontal system responsible for the snow.
