Winter Storm

Along with a large area of the US, Cincinnati was hit with a large snow/sleet/ice storm. This was our first major snowfall of the season. There were a lot of closings and the roads were a mess.

Yesterday I decided to stay home and use a vacation day I carried over from last year to avoid the crazy drivers. Overnight we got about a half inch of ice. When I woke up and heard the weather forecast for several more inches of snow, I realized today was a work from home day. I spend most of my time on the computer and phone anyway, so it isn't difficult to work at home. It turned out to be the right decision as Hamilton county declared a level 3 snow emergency -- only emergency vehicles on the road -- to allow the plows and salt trucks space to do their thing.

It took Dianne and me about 45 minutes just to shovel our way out of the house and get to my car to clean it off for tomorrow. I heard on the news that in the last two days we received 7 inches of snow and a half inch of ice. I know that's not much to my Minnesota readers, but it causes a lot of problems in this area. At one point there were nearly 50,000 people without power -- mostly due to tree limbs covered with ice breaking off the tree and taking down power lines.

About an hour after the snow stopped today, the sun poked out from between the clouds and lit up the ice covered trees. I took a couple macro photos of the ice covered trees outside our place (per Erika's request). If the forecast holds, it might not be until Sunday before the ice melts off the trees.

Calm After the Storm

The snowstorm that hit the Cincinnati area ended late afternoon on Saturday. The official snowfall measurement at the airport beat the previous record from 1968 by a tenth of an inch -- just over 10 inches for the storm. But places on the East side of the area that were closer to the low pressure system got up to 15 inches.

The wind died down and I went out to take a couple photos last night. The lights reflecting off the fresh blanket of white snow made for some interesting subjects.

The black and white photo of the ridges formed in the snowdrift was illuminated by a low light that is one of many on the path around a nearby pond. Since it's only a couple feet off the ground, the grazing light brought out the ridges of the drift.



This photo was taken from our steps, looking down on the outside light between us and our neighbor. Dianne pointed out the interesting pile of snow on top of the light. It's an HDR image constructed from several exposures.



This HDR photo is one of the lakes in our complex. You can just see the lighted fountain in the distance.



This HDR photo is the entry drive into our complex. The snow plows hadn't visited us yet, so the snow just got packed solid by the cars coming in and out. You can see the tail lights of one car that came in while I was setting up for the photo. I like the way the reflected light illuminates the trees that overhang the drive.

Winter Storm

The Cincinnati area turned into a winter wonderland in the past 30 hours. We have had 10+ inches since the storm started yesterday. Both of us came home from work yesterday at lunch time. It was a good thing as the there were only a couple inches of snow on the ground then, but the roads were starting to get slippery. The snow just kept coming and the wind picked up last night so we had some drifting too. We woke up this morning to at least 10 inches and it is still coming down. It’s going to take awhile to get all the roads plowed. In the meantime, we’re enjoying the white blanket that we got.

Here is Dianne shoveling out around our cars.



Our neighbor’s steps don’t even look like steps anymore – just a ramp of snow.



Another couple in our neighborhood was out for their usual morning walk, even though the snow was still coming down. You can see some of the snow blowing off the roof of the garage.



The ruler on my car shows 8 inches of snow after I got home! You have to look at the large version on Flickr to read the ruler.



Finally, I saw this robin sitting in a tree when I was walking around taking pictures during the storm. It’s either a mixed up robin or a sign that even though we got hit hard, Spring is right around the corner.