As Doug Turnbull, the PM drive Skycopter anchor for Triple Team Traffic on 95.5 WSB and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Gridlock Guy, recounted in a past column, it’s “a day that will live in Atlanta infamy.”
Turnbull noted: “Metro Atlanta awakened to what we thought was an average Tuesday and some overblown, distant threat. People went to work and school like normal, though the winter storm warning actually went to effect in the 3 a.m. hour. …
“The commute in Cherokee, Bartow, and Cobb counties went from outstanding to outlandish in the 10 a.m. hour, as drizzle turned to ice and snow. The rest of the metro became a glazy ice rink in the next two or three hours, ensnaring tens of thousands as they attempted to go home early.”
Here is the story of that winter storm, referred to memorably by such somber nicknames as Snowpocalypse, Snow Jam and Snowmageddon, by the numbers.
More than 1,000: Traffic accidents reported.
5: Hours after the first snow fall that Gov. Nathan Deal declared a state of emergency
6 (or more): Hours it could take to drive 10 miles. For those heading from downtown to the burbs, it was even worse.
2.6: Inches of snow that fell.
18: Hours before traffic returned to normal
Over 500: Cars one wrecking service said it towed following the storm
And it wasn’t just motorists affected. Another significant number:
At least $10 million: Value of the property losses, including damaged cars and burst pipes
Amid the wrecks and stranded vehicles, some folks abandoned their cars and headed for cover. More than a few vehicles were stuck on interstates for days. Some students had to spend the nights or long hours at their schools when the buses couldn’t reach their intended destinations on the clogged roads.
The aftermath?
We’ll give our traffic-and-weather-combination expert Turnbull the final word: Metro Atlanta learned to take winter weather threats very seriously.