It may be a rough ride to grandmother’s house this Thanksgiving

Staff report

youngstown

It may be a rough ride to grandmother’s house this Thanksgiving as a low pressure system moves up the East Coast starting today and could dump 5 to 10 inches on parts of the Mahoning Valley late tonight and into Wednesday.

Much of northern Ohio, including Mahoning and Trumbull counties, is under a winter storm warning.

Eric Wilhelm, 21 WFMJ-TV chief meteorologist, said in an email that light snow will start around midday today and pick up in intensity toward sundown.

“By the end of the workday [for many], untreated surfaces will be slick,” he said. “The heaviest snow is coming from early [this] evening through early Wednesday morning. Snow will taper to flurries Wednesday.”

Wilhelm said 5 to 10 inches will be the average total accumulation across the area.

“On Wednesday, gusty winds will cause additional blowing and drifting snow,” he said.

Kristen Schepel, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Cleveland, said a low pressure system moving up the East Coast is going to bring periods of moderate to heavy snow to eastern Ohio including Mahoning County.

Current forecasts show the snow tapering off Wednesday, although lake effect snow could linger into Thursday, she said.

“This is a constantly evolving situation, so it’s important to visit our website for the latest information,” Schepel said.

But Thanksgiving travelers should exercise caution, she said.

Winds also are expected to kick up Tuesday night into Wednesday, possibly reaching 15 to 25 mph with gusts up to 35 mph near Lake Erie, and temperatures will hover between the upper 20s and lower 30s.

Gregg Alberini, highway superintendent for Trumbull County Engineer Randy Smith, said he’s expecting only a couple of inches of snow Wednesday in Trumbull, but Saturday evening’s icy conditions show how easily that much precipitation can wreak havoc.

On Saturday, for example, the department sent a couple of trucks out to pretreat roads starting around 4:30 p.m., he said.

One plus this year is that the engineer’s office has a large new salt dome at its facilities on North River Road that keeps the rain and snow off of the salt, so it stays drier and works more effectively than before.

Other good tools are live updates from traffic cameras available throughout the U.S. to monitor what is happening at various locations.

For example, Alberini said he will monitor cameras from Cincinnati on Buckeye Traffic on the Internet to track the movement of a storm heading northeast from the Gulf of Mexico.

More typical would be storms arriving here from the northwest, so a camera in the Sandusky area is frequently helpful, he said.

Brent Kovacs — spokesman for the Ohio Department of Transportation’s District 4, which encompasses Mahoning, Trumbull, Ashtabula, Portage, Summit and Stark counties — said about 40 crews, split equally between Mahoning and Trumbull counties, began working in 12-hour shifts at 1 a.m. today.

They’ll stop only when the snow does, he added.

“As long as there’s snow, our guys will be plowing,” Kovacs said. “They’re the unsung heroes of the snow and ice season, putting their families on the back burner to keep the roads safe and clear.”

Kovacs also cautioned drivers to “take it slow,” leaving extra time to reach a destination, and to avoid crowding snowplows, giving them “plenty of room” to do their work.

Patrick T. Ginnetti, Mahoning County engineer, said the department’s 20 trucks, which cover 20 routes, were preloaded to be able to leave whenever the snow hits.

“They can move into action a lot quicker,” he said. “We get them ready to get out there as soon as possible.”