This is far from normal for around here. It's sleeting a little right now, cars are frozen over, and its supposed to switch to all SNOW by 3 AM.

Be safe everyone.

(and those used to this, you can stop laughing...... )



It's eerily quiet right now.........

Dallas is enjoying 4-5 inches of snow right now. Very unusual for this area.

And ironically here in the Ohio snow belt, we got nothing.

Hard to measure how deep it is out here, probably 4-6", wind is blowing it into small drifts 12-16" high, temp is at 7, wind chill @-14, haven't fired up the heater in the shop yet, just have a patio propane heater, yesterday it raised the temp from 18 to 40 in about 4 hours

As of 5 AM, it’s more ice than snow Currently 20 degrees out......

33 here in New Jersey

You all have some work to do down there...

<--- I should have made one with a cowboy hat

There is a deep cold front across most of US. I think it was 2014 when we had snow accumulation in all 48 contiguous states. Doesn't happen often, but happens. I remember when I was in Fairfield AL for work and it snowed. Fortunately my rental had all season tires but most cars were just sliding around like curling stones, complete with bumping into other cars and guardrails. My Buffalo driving skills came in handy. The next day on the ride in, I think I counted something like 30 bumper covers laying along the road. And it was only a five mile drive to the plant from the hotel.

Be safe and stay in if your vehicle isn't equipped for snow.

Ice is far worse than snow. I saw the weather maps and noticed snow as far south as Houston, which I'm sure rarely happens.

Here it is -9° with a -29° wind chill.

Artic blast here .. 33 below

we're getting it now in Jefferson County. 1-3 of snow, then more snow then a bunch of ice this afternoon.

I'm about 35 miles SE of Houston. I'm real close to Johnson Space Center. ("Houston, we have a problem").

The temp is actually dropping. Now it's 16 and with the wind chill, feels like -4......

To add to the 'fun', the power grid for this area is overwhelmed right now, so they're having rolling blackouts. They're trying to do them for less than an hour, but in some areas, the blackouts are happening every couple of hours, so the home has no time to warm back up.

And by Saturday, it's supposed to be in the 70's.

90 Degrees yesterday here in Palm Beach

My daughter sent me this picture this morning from her hospital in Austin Texas that she could not leave after her shift.

it's 3, three degrees here. We've got 3~ 4" of dry powder snow. At least it's a cakewalk to drive on. HIH far south do you have to go to get away from precipitation that won't go down the drain?

Tijuana or Cuba?

NEVER had one of those to use. Now we've got ~ 16,000 sq ft of driveway, I think I need a .

Yesterday it was nice we went out to feed our babies some lunch. They were all sun bathing!!

Space invader in the shop and his bigger brother getting pushed into the driveway by the wind

Damn Dude. You look like you live on the Moon!! Do you guys even have any Grass?

Damn Dude. You look like you live on the Moon!! Do you guys even have any Grass?
LOL....priorities...moved further out of the city, grass is still in work, shop came first

OR, if gas is too much.......

Your leaf blower will work fine on a dry snow. You'll be done in minutes.

I tried using a leaf blower this weekend, this is the model, its incredible ..

Shocked the crap out of me, so I won't try that again


https://www.acehardware.com/departm...fwpqEAQYAiABEgKvBfD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

Save these pics so they can be used in 20-30 yrs for a 'when they were just cars' thread............






Took a walk to the front of the complex, I thought we had snow, its all ice.

As I was skating back, i realized I'm the age now where I could easily break a hip...........

And, come to find out, we're not having rolling black outs, we're losing power, PERIOD. Some areas not far from me have been without power for over 8 hrs. Where my Mother lives, the power has been on and off all day.

While watching an interview on FB with local officials concerning the power outages, a number of people chimed in and asked how the grid is going to handle electric cars charging if it can't handle the load of a heater...........

Get a mister buddy heater

Thank you, that never occurred to me. I don't remember ever getting one snow of nothing but powder.

Since we're both working from home I'm going to let Mr. Sun do the work. As well as being too busy working to fool with it, the power delivery company wants us to conserve. MANY of my neighbors have been without power for an extended period, some more than 12 hours now.

Oncor outage map and message linky

In my area, they just came on and basically told us there's nothing they can do about the power outages, the grid is simply overloaded.

Wow.

But, we're all supposed to be driving electric cars in 30 yrs or less.

Putting the cart before the horse?

Speaking of electric cars........IF we were driving electric cars and this situation happened, how would you get anywhere? What if you had an emergency and you HAD to get out? "Suck it up, the battery's dead"

You would call 911 and wait for the electric powered ambulance.......no wait.....

Well what would happen if the power was out and your car's out of gas ?!?! Gas or electric - if you let go to "E" you're screwed either way!

If you've got a little energy you can get to a charging station, IF it has power, an hour or two later you've got a couple hundred miles of range, less if you run the heater strips on high. If you've got a little gas you've probably got 25 miles to find a station with power, in 5 minutes you can drive hundreds of miles, WITH full heat.

Report from the town just north of us. If you get out, a good shot there's not much place to go.

I may be the minority, but, when I know bad weather is coming, I top off the tanks. I might even fill up an extra 5 gallon can or two. How do you prepare ahead with an electric car? Hand cranked generator?

No power and freezing would be bad. Hopefully that gets fixed for everyone asap.

I can still see the landscaping and curbs? You calling that snow, buddy?
.

The wind turbines are frozen.

Same way. Tell it to charge to top itself off. They can also be charged from a generator, if you have the right cables, usually getting the equivalent of 20-30mpg.

Gas stations have trouble pumping gas without power too

Or, if you have solar panels and the correct set up, just plug in to that and wait. Want to be a strong independent household and not depend on the grid? Go off grid

No thanks on the offgrid, going to be near -30 tonight, windmills are frozen, maybe 2 hours of sun. I have to laugh, I have some California folks staying with me right now......their offgrid [censored] went right out the window with 4 days of never getting above zero. They have a new outlook, we keep the house at 59, they are really happy.

Sure looks different the the 22" we got in a day a couple of weeks ago...


Stock pic for reference

Well, crap. Lost power here about 30 minutes ago. I have a feeling it’s going to be off until tomorrow. The power never even flickered since this mess started, so I was hoping I’d’make it’ without issue.

Guess not.

And the inside temp has dropped 5 degrees already.

No more posts until the power comes back on.

People here invert their wiper arms straight up when it starts showing hard so they don't get frozen to the windshield. At some point it does not matter, like your picture for example.

My neighbors do that - to me it makes it harder to broom the car off.

I took that pic in 2006, we actually got 4" more than that in the recent storm. I still drive that Saturn buried on the right every day, it just turns 333,333 miles

I see it as egging mother nature on - as in can you snow deep enough to bury these here wiper blades?

Kinda surprised it took as long as it did to suggest roof top solar for charging yer EV. What's the plan if ya live in an apartment or condo? Slight tangent: years ago I had some window replacement company calling me on the phone persistently. Finally gave up and invited them to come give me an estimate because my windows sucked. Yes, was living in an apartment and no, never heard from them again.

A winter related reason to hate new cars: Apparently if you buy almost anything built this century with frameless side windows (aka hard top), it's tiny little brain also controls the window. Ya know the bit how it cracks the window when you grab the door handle, then closes it when ya shut the door. It's all great and entirely pointless until ya get a thin coating of ice similar to the OP. It really doesn't take that much ice between glass and door felt to glue the window shut. This also prevents the door from opening because the top of the glass is stuck in the weather strip. Ya know, the reason for the trick power window motor in the first place. First few times I encountered this, the internal debate was just how hard can I yank on this door handle with breaking the glass or something else. Ya know, stupid snap together cars. The bonus fun is when you finally get the door open, it won't close again until ya heat up the car enough to melt the ice. As for the whole objective of creating a better window to door seal: my 75 hardtop with the original weather strip seals just fine. Her 2012 has a annoying whistle at speed.

This was 2014. I think it was April before I got my truck out of that garage.

Yup, solar is just about useless in the winter as the sun is so far away you get almost nothing out of it. Saw a guy on youtube get rid of it and went with a dc to dc charger so the alternator charges the big lithium battery between trips, said you'd need so much solar it would weigh too much and defeat the purpose. No idea what you're supposed to do with a solar set up for a house aside from a generator that would be running all winter lol

Oh man!!! LOL!

The biggest problem with the grid is this a perfect storm. First record cold across entire area. Everybody and their brother are finding out their heat pumps aren't up to the task and use much more amps than ac in extreme weather. Most pumps can't do much under 20 and even the northern units can only go to 0. People are buying and using portable heaters to try and help both exceeding the grids capacity. Ice and wind has taken down lines and other circuits are overloaded so they can't add any load.

I've worked as a lineman for over 40 years all over the country and it doesn't matter source of fuel used to generate the lines have to big enough to handle it. The strain caused by this storm would be like trying to run a 572 on a factory 5/16 fuel line. It just won't provide the needed volume.

Just for fun.... You transplants that are new to Texas, are about to experience “Texas Winter”. This is 6 or 7 days of cold, maybe some ice and snow. The weatherman will threaten snow. It may snow, it may not and if the weatherman says 2 inches it could be 10 or it could be 1/2”. It doesn’t matter how much snow it is, we’ll all freak out because we don’t see snow often.

The threat of snow (or ice) from the weatherman is your prompt to head to the grocery store and buy milk, eggs and bread. It doesn’t matter if you need these items. It’s just what we do. Everyone in town will be there.

You’ll also need to make a mad dash for faucet covers and finding them and getting out of the store will be like an episode of the hunger games. You’re in the redneck district.

Don’t look for a sled. You won’t find one. In the rare chance we get enough ice or snow to sled grab some cardboard or a trash can lid and go find the nearest hill. Yes, we know it’s not a hill. You live in the flatland, just go with it. You’ll be alarmed by the fact that you’re “sledding” towards a bar ditch, fence or maybe into a farm to market road. Just go with it. You’ll be fine.

We don’t have equipment to handle the winter and weather. The roads will be a mess and even though the state has been telling you for a week they’re ready, they’re not and it won’t work. Just stay home if you can and if you can’t just come to terms with the fact that nobody here knows how to drive in snow and ice.

Whatever you do, DO NOT talk about snow tires.

If you happen to slide off the road or get stuck, turn your flashers on, take a deep breath and wait. Two guys in a four wheel drive truck will be along in no time to offer assistance. Don’t try to help them, they live for this stuff, and will do what they can to get you back on the road. If either one of them screams “hey y’all watch this” just get back and get your phone out and start recording, you’ll probably have a viral video. Also of note, when they offer you beer and deer sticks, don’t be rude, take them and smile.

No matter what you do, don’t talk about how they did it back home in any of these scenarios. Nobody cares. You live in Texas now, Texans know they live in the greatest state in the country and it’s our way or the highway.

When we act like we’re going to die and start to complain about the 7 days of winter just shut up, we’re serious and we don’t care how much you love it. We don’t.

You’ll be back in shorts and flip flops in a week to ten days and it’ll be nice until right around Easter.

Texas “second winter” will be 2 or 3 days and will hit right around Easter, usually the week before or the week after. This will hit right around the time you plant flowers and a garden. We know you’re not from around here when we see you’ve planted flowers before Easter and before the “second winter” has hit.

This is why all the people at the nursery don’t sound like us when you’re shopping for plants. We know better.

During second winter it’ll go from 70 to 25 and you’ll experience all four seasons in one day. This too shall pass, get used to it and when second winter is over you can enjoy the 3-4 weeks of “spring” before summer gets here and it’ll be melt your face off hot until sometime around Halloween.

God bless Texas!

that's a fun read and pretty accurate, I lived in Amarillo for 5 years where the weather is WAY worse than it is in DFW and I saw some Crazy "S" up there

Power outage from space

https://twitter.com/i/status/1362125392883167234

Just did a transport to Florence, AL and through Nashville, TN on the way home and it was insane! On the way south it was dicey until I got over the TN line to AL and then it was truly nuts, no plows, salt, lr anything on the roads! Snow, then ice, then snow again probably 5-6 inches. Thanks goodness I have lived north most of my life, and it was still intense for me. Never seen that many cars, trucks, and semi's in the ditches! Luckily most people stayed home or it would have been armegeddon. After the drop-off in AL I came out a country road and there was a nice early 90's short bed Power Wagon down in a ditch with it's rear wheels completely in the air!

Welcome to California ....or is it like a homecoming for those who moved to Texas from California?