Weird Weather Stupidity

[Sapphire Silk]

I drove up to Maryland today to do some things at Mom's house over the weekend, not realizing the weather was about to turn suck on me.

I knew it was supposed to snow north of Baltimore, but it wasn't supposed to stick to the roads, and Brother thought it would be fine for me to come on up.

As I'm leaving the Peidmont Triad, I see snow flurries. Bit surprising, since they were not in the forecast, but didn't worry too much since it was in the mid-40's still.

Get into Virginia and am driving along on the interstate when I see this grey mass up ahead on the road. I literally see the raindrops individually as they start to slam into my front windshield; the wind picked up and the rain was literally falling sideways to come directly into the windshield Worse yet, visibility immediately went to zero!

I cut on the headlights and slow down (I'd been cruising at about 75).

Do the other asshats slow down?

Hell no! They start blowing by me like rockets in spite of the fact you literally could not see tail lights ahead of you. Worse yet, some of these guys weren't turning their own headlights on.

Shortly thereafter the rain turns to heavy heavy snow. None of it sticking, but my windshield starts to freeze up. Visibility improves a bit, but I remain cautious fearing ice.

By the time I get to the Richmond area things have slacked off a bit, but it's still drizzling. Now I come up on another guy driving so slowly, he is impeding traffic, and people are impatiently whipping around him; one guy cuts me off and just misses my front bumper.

Why I did not see a string of cars in the ditch I do not understand since we haven't had much snow this year. But somehow I managed not to pass any accidents along the way, and to avoid being in one myself.

I'm not looking forward to the drive to see Mom tomorrow; here's hoping the weather report is right and there's no accumulation.

[bhskittykatt]

I remember once we got caught in a freak blizzard going through Manning Park. We'd checked the pass reports before we left, and they said they were crystal clear. Almost as soon as we started climbing, the flakes began to fall...

Our driver had checked that there were chains available before we left. Between her checking and us leaving, though, her son had taken the chains out. Why I have no clue.

It was a blizzard. We actually stopped at two accident scenes that night (driver is a lifeguard, two passengers were junior search-and-rescue, so we're gonna be stopping...I was just there). At the second scene (the first one didn't have a victim...they'd apparently busted the windows out, climbed out, and left), I was manning the first aid kit for my friend who was tending to the victim, and the snow was up to to middle of my thighs. Clear passes? My ass!

[Andara Bledin]

I had something similar happen to me, once, going through Grapevine on the way back to the LA area from San Jose. It had been a bit drizzly heading up out of the desert, and halfway up, the rain started blowing sideways, straight onto my windshield, turning visibility to utter crap. By the time I hit the top of the climb, it had turned from rain to snow and as often as not was falling up from my bumper region to go over my car.

And this was my first time ever driving in falling snow of any sort, too. Thankfully, I didn't have to deal with crazy drivers, too. They seem to reserve insane driving for pea-soup fog, instead. >_<

^-.-^

[Shalom]

I hate when it snows sideways.

Years back, before I owned a cell phone, I was driving home from Buffalo, coming east on the 17 near Bath. I come around a curve and suddenly it's like someone threw a sheet over my windshield. I literally could not see past the edge of my hood; in fact, I couldn't even see the edge of the hood itself.

I wound up wandering all over the road, panicking, until I hid the rumble strip that signifies the edge of the roadway. Good, sez I, I know at least where I am on the road. I ease left a bit to get back into the lane.

O shit. It was the rumble strip on the fracking left edge of the road.

So now I'm in the (50-foot-wide) ditch between the two carriageways, with my lights pointing at the westbound lanes. I shut them off when I started hearing truckers on the CB freaking out, thinking there was a car coming head-on at them... eventually a cop showed up, and drove my car out of the ditch for me. I thanked him effusively, got back in the car and left. Last thing I saw in my rear-view mirror was the cop promptly getting his cruiser stuck in the same ditch he'd just bailed me out of.

I got off the next exit and found a motel. Hell with that noise, I wasn't driving another inch that night.

I eventually figured out that if I'd shut my headlights, I probably could have seen a lot better. I think it was my lights reflecting off the snow back into my eyes that was giving me that white-out effect. Don't remember if I had the high beams on or not; if I did, it would have been worse. Trucks going west weren't having any trouble seeing, but I was the only traffic going east.

[blas]

I absolutely loathe blowing and sideways snow. It gets all over my porch and is impossible to judge how much there actually is. Not to mention, wind seems to get a good grasp on my car and try to force it into the ditch. I love driving with white knuckles.

[Jetfire]

I eventually figured out that if I'd shut my headlights, I probably could have seen a lot better. I think it was my lights reflecting off the snow back into my eyes that was giving me that white-out effect. Don't remember if I had the high beams on or not; if I did, it would have been worse. Trucks going west weren't having any trouble seeing, but I was the only traffic going east.

Yeah in pretty much any sort of snow/sleet and even some types of rain, lights are good, but high beams are NOT good. If your car has Fog lights though those are usually good.

I think I mentioned this before, but New Years Eve night, we were driving back to my parents from Freddy after getting my sister at the airport. It was snowing/sleeting, and everything was covered in a layer of ice. Luckily the highways were pretty clear of traffic, but it was a long slow drive. Normally you can go 120+ on it; we were crawling along at 50-60 or even slower. (kph not mph)

The next day, we checked the other vehicle, and it had a good quarter to half an inch of ice on it from the storm.

[Pixilated]

Yeah, I hate driving in blowing snow. Last time I had to do that it was on rural highways and the combination of headlights and the blowing snow was really doing a nice job of creating that "hypnotic" effect drivers are always warned about. I ended up turning off my headlights and driving with just my "running" lights, which is not advised -- and may also be illegal, I'm not sure, but I had a fair distance to go and it was the the only way I felt I could lower my chances of ending up in a ditch.

And I've never been able to figure out why some people don't slow down in bad weather.

[dalesys]

And I've never been able to figure out why some people don't slow down in bad weather.

Step on it Magoo, so we can get home before it gets any worse!