LOGAN, W.Va. — As snow piled up across southern areas of West Virginia during Monday’s winter storm, Logan County received some of the highest accumulation totals.
Dave Maynard, director of Logan County Office of Emergency Services, said more than 10 crews were working to clear roads.
“It’s hard when traffic mashes that snow down. It turns into ice,” he said. “It’s hard and difficult with temperatures to get the salt to take care of that ice.”
There’s a lot of snow to remove. The National Weather said Logan measured 15 inches, Mallory 14 and Chapmanville 10 inches.
Most people have stayed indoors and off the roads to allow for work to be done. Maynard said crews will be working through the weekend to ensure safety on the roads.
“The main roads have a little bit of ice, but basically they are passable,” he said, “We’ll keep running extra crews, we have four-wheel drive ambulances, but it takes a long time when the roads are bad.”
The state Division of Highways use 24-hour crews to plow through the continuous snowfall. DOH spokesperson Carrie Bly said some areas remain treacherous. “We still have a lot of our major roadways including the Interstate, especially in the mountain counties and the southern part of the state.”
She referred travelers to the DOH’s 511 website for updates on hazardous, difficult, or fair conditions for specific routes.
Bly said road salting the roads loses its potency when temperatures drop below 20 degrees.
“We’re concentrating on plowing at this point. Salt isn’t the most effective, so if we get some sun and we have higher traffic, we may start to use salt,” she said.
A combination of the heavy snow that hit Logan, the way it traveled so quickly, and extremely low temperatures made street cleanup more challenging. The Fayette County train derailment forced a diversion of crews in that area to concentrate on keeping state Route 61 clear.
“We want to make sure that emergency crews can get in there,” Bly said, “There are certain areas that may not see treatment until later in the day or even into tomorrow.”
Bly said their “priority routes” were mostly clear, with the DOH plowing second- and third- priority routes by the end of Tuesday.