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Valley digs out, more snow comes
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Robert Reed and his daughter Natalee Reed, 2, build a snowman in the front yard of their Arden Blvd. home in Youngstown Sunday, February 1, 2015.
Winter Weather
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A strong winter storm left several inches of snow on The Valley. Here are some snowy scenes from downtown Youngstown.
InFocus: Winter wonderland
Gallery
By jeanne starmack
Youngstown
The snow started at 4:15 a.m. Sunday, and though it was predicted to be light at that time, Samantha Bailey said it wasn’t so.
Bailey, the mother of Brooklyn, 3, is often up early finishing work and taking care of her daughter. She watched the snowstorm, anticipated for days here, begin.
“It just started,” she said. “And it hasn’t let up at all.”
By 4:30 p.m., she and her family were in their driveway and almost finished with shoveling and salting.
“I shoveled the walkway, and [the snow] reappeared an hour later,” said her 13-year-old son, Logan.
The family, who moved to Boardman from Canton a year ago, is not used to seeing this much snow, they said — the Youngstown area definitely gets more.
Their neighborhood, on Newport Drive, was the image of a winter wonderland, with snow outlining tree branches and layering cars and houses like cake icing.
And as they worked, they made sure to mix in a little fun.
“I haven’t moved this much in years,” Samantha said as she ran down the drive while towing Brooklyn on a plastic sled.
Kyle Few, a friend of the family’s who lives with them, was the official snowball-thrower, taking aim at Chris Bailey and Chrissy Dicicco, the Baileys’ son and his girlfriend.
Brian Bailey, Samantha’s husband, said he was looking forward to today, when he would have a day off work.
“It’s the first time in a long while I took off, but well worth it,” he said.
With his shoveling done for the day, he was looking forward to a Super Bowl party with his family.
As people settled in and munched contentedly on their Super Bowl snacks when the game began at 6:30 p.m., they had snow or sleet coming down outside, depending on where they live. In Trumbull County, under a winter storm warning, precipitation was expected to remain snow throughout the evening, overnight and this morning.
In Mahoning County, under a winter weather advisory, it turned to sleet and rain and was expected to turn back into snow overnight, said 21 WFMJ-TV meteorologist Andrew DiPaolo. In Columbiana County, it was turning to sleet and rain, changing back to snow around 6 this morning.
The whole area was getting more snow this morning, and it is expected to taper off by 3 p.m., DiPaolo said. It’s expected to be colder today, with a high of 20 degrees and a low of 12, with a wind chill of minus 5, he said.
Snow totals from the storm will be around 6 inches, he said.
Police reported being busy Sunday with a lot of minor accidents. A three-car accident at 1:30 p.m. on U.S. Route 224 sent six people to the hospital with minor injuries and closed the road for about an hour, the Ohio State Highway Patrol said.
For those looking at long-range forecasts, today is Groundhog Day. Punxsutawney Phil was expected to emerge from his hole at 7:20 a.m. Some fear the snow forecast for the region may hinder Phil’s abilities to maneuver. Most hope he does not see his shadow, which means an early spring should be on the horizon.