#snowpacolypse2014

So, Atlanta (where I live) is CRAZY right now. Last night was ridiculous. Everyone tried to leave the city at once when they realized the snow was starting to make the road conditions bad. At 12:15 noon, the interstate was completely clear, but at 12:35 it was bumper to bumper traffic throughout the ENTIRE Atlanta and metro area. This is a pretty huge city too. 5.5 million people trying to leave one of the worst places when it comes to traffic (rush hour here is serious business) People sat in their cars for hours and hours. Most people had to completely abandon their cars on the roads and find shelter in fire stations, churches, basically anywhere that was letting people in. My friend's mom drove for 12 hours and then got stuck trying to come up a hill. My dad drove 8 miles in 4 hours and finally ditched his car and walked the last 5 miles. KEEP IN MIND THIS IS USUALLY A 20 MINUTE COMMUTE. Our neighbors and friends got home anywhere from 7:30 pm to 1:00 in the morning-some just got home today!! And they all left at the same time, around 12:45 yesterday. The schools were a disaster. We dismissed early and the seniors were allowed to leave right away because we drive to school, but those who relied on the buses were screwed. Elementary school kids whose parents normally take them home were stuck in traffic, so they had they spent the night at the school. By the time the buses got to the high schools, the weather was so bad that the buses couldn't drive in it. It took one of my friends three hours to get home via bus (he lives 2 miles from school!) and many of the buses got stranded and never made it to the middle schools. There were three buses clustered on one road by my house that waited from 2pm to 7pm before a mechanic could come. Some kids in other parts of Atlanta got home from the buses at 1:30 in the morning! Cars were sliding off the roads and couldn't get up steep hills because the roads were completely iced over. We live in the south- it was only two inches but we're not accustomed to driving on ice. We don't have tire tracks or bags of salt in our trunks, and a ton of people didn't know to drive in their first gear or that hey, if you slow down to try to be cautious, you're not gonna make it up that hill. Basically the entire city has been freaking out, we even had to bring in the national guard. Everyone's trying to figure out what went wrong, because it's a little ridiculous that two inches of snow could bring a whole city down. Trying to shove 5.5 million people all at once through a city that already has traffic issues onto icy roads that no one is used to driving in = no thank you, not again please. Good news is the main roads have cleared up enough that the trucks have been able to get through and salt the roads. The city's starting to recover, but everyone is still bewildered that this actually just happened

Raleigh is expected to get 3-5 in of snow and Gov. Pat McCrory declared a state of emergency. Raleigh is gonna shut down.