Tuesday, January 16, 2007

Snow Storm


The past week saw cold spells in the NW causing temperatures to drop at or below freezing. Where I live and work in the Beaverton/Tigard area, temperatures got as low as the teens (Fahrenheit) at night; the day didn't get much warmer. The one good thing about the cold spell was that it was pretty sunny during the day with very little wind.

That all changed today. Around 5:00 AM, the Portland-metro area woke up to a blanket of white snow. It snowed pretty heavily for most of the day and afternoon - some places saw around 3-5" of snow. It was the most snow I saw in the metro area since I moved here 6 years ago.

The roads were pretty bad, so I decided to skip work and stay home (I doubt my Z would have made it through all that snow). For the better part of the day, ODOT even required all vehicles to be equipped with chains or traction tires. All schools in Washington Co. were closed, along with other schools in the surrounding area. There were countless fender-benders across the area, many road closures, abandoned automobiles, and minor injuries caused by this snow storm. The worst part of all this will be when the snow starts to melt in the next day, but then refreeze at night, causing dangerous black ice.

You can take a look at the pictures I took around my apartment in my album.