Summary
A historic winter storm swept through southern U.S. cities, bringing record-breaking snowfall and widespread disruptions.
Memphis, Tennessee, experienced 7.5 inches (19 cm) of snow, the city’s largest single-day snowfall in 40 years. Atlanta, Georgia, recorded 2.1 inches (5.3 cm), the most in seven years. Other areas were hit even harder, with Arkansas receiving up to 14 inches (35.6 cm), Oklahoma up to 12 inches (30.5 cm), Texas up to 10 inches (25.4 cm), and northern Alabama around 5 inches (12.7 cm).
The storm caused significant travel chaos, with over 300 flight cancellations in Georgia and icy road warnings issued in Tennessee, Texas, and other states.
As the storm moves northward, sub-zero wind chills are expected to grip parts of the U.S. next week.
I used to live in the south. Even in an area heavily populated by northerners, folks DID NOT know how to drive in the slightest bit of snow. I just left home early and laughed.
I also found it amusing when I first heard “snowflake” used as an insult, and have chucked internally each time since. In the south, snowflakes are hated, but more than that, they’re feared, and bringers of “chaos” if you refuse to learn how to interact harmoniously with them. Using “snowflake” as an insult says much more about the speaker than it does about you. I am proud to be a snowflake!
A lot of the problem here isn’t snow, or people not knowing how to drive in it. It’s that when it does snow, the temperature tends to barely be freezing. Then the snow starts to melt the next day only for all of the melt to become ice that night.
This is why we need an Earth week not just a day. Also, I live in Minnesota and it is the same here every year without fail the first snow just highlights how quickly people forget how to drive in snow.
I’m guessing virtually no one has a set of snow tires down south, which make a huge difference in drivability. They’re essentially mandatory up north.
I grew up in Illinois where we regularly had heavy snowfall, sometimes more than a foot. One year, we had an especially heavy fall, almost three feet, and the local university closed for a single day so they could shovel the paths. Otherwise, the city operated as it normally would.
I moved to Fort Worth, Texas for a job in my early twenties and my first year there they had an unusual snowfall. About two inches and it stuck around for a week and the entire time the whole city was in crisis. Things were cancelled/postponed, business were closed, etc. I got the whole week off of work due to the storm and went out to get food/groceries or visit friends a few times and was pretty amused by all the roads that were absolutely littered with bumpers, mirrors and shrapnel from countless wrecks.