Snowstorm Photos

The snow began falling gently around 10am Friday. We had blizzard warnings from 10pm Friday to 10am Saturday: high winds with blowing snow. As I write this, it's 11:30am on Saturday, the snow is still coming down and will until about 10pm tonight. Oy.

No plow has been down our street, which is not a surprise: ours is definitely a secondary or tertiary street and should not be a priority for the county.


The huge magnolia tree in our front yard is officially not happy. The broad leaves catch a great deal of snow and the warmer air in the early part of the snow storm made it stick to everything. Huge branches are sagging low to the ground and a half-dozen have snapped off completely. In this photo, branches that offer a six foot clearance above our front walkway have sagged to ground level. Not good.


Our biggest worry is that the branches will weigh down on the telephone and power lines to both our home and our elderly neighbour's. We went out last night at midnight to clear the snow from the branches nearest the wires and repeated that again this morning. I have no idea if it will really help, but there's little else we can do. Here's cuyahogarvr working to clear the branches of snow as best we can:


This white fluffy nightmare is supposed to continue for about 10 more hours. We've kept shovelling out the walkway, sidewalk and driveway but it's an uphill battle: it fills in again nearly as fast as we can clear them.

So much for a weekend of relaxing.

Snowstorm Photos

The snow began falling gently around 10am Friday. We had blizzard warnings from 10pm Friday to 10am Saturday: high winds with blowing snow. As I write this, it's 11:30am on Saturday, the snow is still coming down and will until about 10pm tonight. Oy.

No plow has been down our street, which is not a surprise: ours is definitely a secondary or tertiary street and should not be a priority for the county.


The huge magnolia tree in our front yard is officially not happy. The broad leaves catch a great deal of snow and the warmer air in the early part of the snow storm made it stick to everything. Huge branches are sagging low to the ground and a half-dozen have snapped off completely. In this photo, branches that offer a six foot clearance above our front walkway have sagged to ground level. Not good.


Our biggest worry is that the branches will weigh down on the telephone and power lines to both our home and our elderly neighbour's. We went out last night at midnight to clear the snow from the branches nearest the wires and repeated that again this morning. I have no idea if it will really help, but there's little else we can do. Here's cuyahogarvr working to clear the branches of snow as best we can:


This white fluffy nightmare is supposed to continue for about 10 more hours. We've kept shovelling out the walkway, sidewalk and driveway but it's an uphill battle: it fills in again nearly as fast as we can clear them.

So much for a weekend of relaxing.

DC Snow Report

We lost electricity at our home around 1:30pm today. So far, it's getting cool indoors but we're doing OK. We can still cook thanks as we have a gas range and we have plenty of hot water since our gas heater uses a pilot light rather than an electric sparker.

Our DSL is down but my wireless broadband and laptop are working well. I'm going to minimize usage to save the battery as long as possible but we could use the inverter to recharge them from one of the cards as needed.

cuyahogarvr and I have dug out my car as it was nearest the street. However, since the street has not yet been plowed and the snow is deep enough to nearly reach the hood of my car, we're not going anywhere.

At the moment, we have no idea how long it will be before our power is restored or our street plowed but we'll be fine. Heaven knows we have plenty of food and supplies. Our only worry is the lack of heat but we'll bundle up and tough it out as long as needed.

I'm a little concerned about our elderly neighbours on one side of the house and the neighbour with a heart condition on the other side. At least the elderly neighbours are in touch with our across-the-street neighbours so we know they'll be OK until we get a chance to dig out their walkways and driveway tomorrow.

Regionally, more than 100,000 customers in our county are without power, twice that number across the region. The Dulles, Washington National and Baltimore-Washington airports are all closed today and tomorrow. The Metro subway system is closing early --11pm instead of 3am-- for lack of passengers and because of the possibility of staff being trapped away from home. Nearly every major rood and highway has traffic issues, including a complete blockage of I95 southbound near Baltimore-Washington airport. Power failures have taken out traffic lights making life even more exciting for drivers. Schools are closed, naturally; they might open in time for Tuesday but don't bet money on that. One skating arena, a Dulles-area hangar and a north-west DC have had roof collapses from the weight of snow.

Dulles, VA, reported 32.1" of snow; I think we got something less than that but not by much. According to the weather reports, DC had more snow in the past 24 hours than in the prior three years.

The skies are clear currently but the temperature will drop to the single digits. Tomorrow will bring more clear skies but we're supposed to get more snow and wintery mix next Tuesday.

DC Snow Report

We lost electricity at our home around 1:30pm today. So far, it's getting cool indoors but we're doing OK. We can still cook thanks as we have a gas range and we have plenty of hot water since our gas heater uses a pilot light rather than an electric sparker.

Our DSL is down but my wireless broadband and laptop are working well. I'm going to minimize usage to save the battery as long as possible but we could use the inverter to recharge them from one of the cards as needed.

cuyahogarvr and I have dug out my car as it was nearest the street. However, since the street has not yet been plowed and the snow is deep enough to nearly reach the hood of my car, we're not going anywhere.

At the moment, we have no idea how long it will be before our power is restored or our street plowed but we'll be fine. Heaven knows we have plenty of food and supplies. Our only worry is the lack of heat but we'll bundle up and tough it out as long as needed.

I'm a little concerned about our elderly neighbours on one side of the house and the neighbour with a heart condition on the other side. At least the elderly neighbours are in touch with our across-the-street neighbours so we know they'll be OK until we get a chance to dig out their walkways and driveway tomorrow.

Regionally, more than 100,000 customers in our county are without power, twice that number across the region. The Dulles, Washington National and Baltimore-Washington airports are all closed today and tomorrow. The Metro subway system is closing early --11pm instead of 3am-- for lack of passengers and because of the possibility of staff being trapped away from home. Nearly every major rood and highway has traffic issues, including a complete blockage of I95 southbound near Baltimore-Washington airport. Power failures have taken out traffic lights making life even more exciting for drivers. Schools are closed, naturally; they might open in time for Tuesday but don't bet money on that. One skating arena, a Dulles-area hangar and a north-west DC have had roof collapses from the weight of snow.

Dulles, VA, reported 32.1" of snow; I think we got something less than that but not by much. According to the weather reports, DC had more snow in the past 24 hours than in the prior three years.

The skies are clear currently but the temperature will drop to the single digits. Tomorrow will bring more clear skies but we're supposed to get more snow and wintery mix next Tuesday.