By Holly Nine
Over the end of last week and the weekend, residents on the east coast, including the majority of the whole state of West Virginia prepared for a big snow storm. For those of us here in Clay County and the surrounding areas, the expected storm was going to be our first significant snowfall of the winter. Christmas was warm weather and brought floods to our region, so many we’re excited for the snow that was heading our way since we are half way through January already with no snow accumulations.
Wednesday brought snow that caused the roads to cover quickly and get slick. School let out early, which started the stretch of snow days the students/teachers would get from this snow storm. Friday morning arrived and Winter Storm Jonas started earlier than expected in our area. Snow fell fast and the ground and roads quickly turned white. Travel became difficult for many vehicles. A citizen of the area who wishes to remain anonymous said “the roads are horrible, a normal hour and 15 minute drive to get from Charleston to home has taken from 9am and it’s almost 2pm.”
With a total of 18.6” in Charleston, totals in our area were different depending on where you were. A measurement before the sun started shining on Sunday was 22” in the Lizemores area.
Winter Storm Jonas dumped a bunch of snow, luckily the powdery kind so there were very few power outages, and the majority of West Virginia got a couple snow days, other than the emergency personnel, road crews and hospital staff to name a few.
Families enjoyed down time with each other, playing card games and board games, cooking and spending time together, building snowmen and forts, sometimes everyone just needs some time to slow down and enjoy family and time with each other. Hopefully we have no more major snow storms this winter, bring on spring!!
