Its February. The weather patterns are changing and bringing the storms.
Posted on 02/09/2013 5:12:55 AM PST by CharlesThe Hammer
BOSTON (CBS) – Gov. Deval Patrick declared a state of emergency in Massachusetts Friday afternoon for the blizzard that could bring up to 3 feet of snow.
He also announced he has signed an executive order to ban all travel on all roads in the state starting at 4 p.m. Friday.
There are some exceptions to the ban, including emergency workers, those who work in hospitals and media, and others required to be at their jobs.
The governor said rapid snowfall of 2-3 inches per hour will make for, “extremely dangerous conditions,” and will “make safe travel nearly impossible.”
This is the first time that a Massachusetts governor has issued an executive order like this since the Blizzard of 1978.
But back then it was put in place after the storm.
Patrick did not say when this ban would be lifted.
If you don’t have an exemption and you’re caught on the road, the penalty could be as steep as a $500 fine or, at worst, a year in jail.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.cbslocal.com ...
Great words and absolutely true, HOWEVER not an equal comparison simply because of the numbers involved. Both the raw population numbers and the economic impact are orders of magnitude larger here. There are more people without power right now in Southern New England than live in the entire UP (and could probably include everything north of Bay City) at the peak of summer. Where is the official line between “downstate” and “up north” these days?
Back in about 95 when I was living up north there was a storm that dumped 6 feet in the area of the Mackinaw straits area north to Sault Ste Marie. The bridge was shut down and the National Guard were fueling tractor trailers along the road so they could keep running for heat.
Fortunately it wasn’t quite as bad where I was but I got caught walking in that storm. I had taken a bus north from down near Jackson and my girlfriend was going to pick me up at Claire but she ended up snowed in. Fortunately the NG found me wading through 2 and a half feet of snow on the interstate. They took me the 20 odd miles right to my front door.
Did they charge you for your rescue?
No, I was right on the way to where they were headed.
The snow doesn’t bother me much. Ice storms on the other hand, suck big time.
“It actually is a big deal”
No it’s not, it is well within the power of the office of governor of Mass to declare a state of emergency, close bridges, evacuate flood areas, declare travel bans.
That’s the law. Again the law.
Do I think it was silly since 95% of the people were and are still at home by their own choice, yes.
In Arkansas we leave work to hunker down if snow flakes or ice starts falling. lol...you don’t want us driving in any of it!
We owned a pair of Yamaha snowmobiles during our Minnesota years. When we got a really big snow, everyone in our Prior Lake neighborhood made a beeline to the grocery store or bar on their sleds. The sheriff never objected to snowmobiles on the road during these big snow events.
A year in prison. Let that soak into you little imagination. One complete year of your life for defying the edict of your ruler.
This represents yet another crossing of a line and people, even people who consider themselves libertarian, have no problem with it.
The inversion of power is pretty much complete and it’s clear, and our rulers make clear all the time now, that we are on the bottom.
As long as “it’s for your own good” there seems to be no limit to their power now.
My dad was an early adapter to the new snowmobile technology. Got his first Skidoo in 62 I think.
Now people parade machines 10 years older in antique machine rides.
Get plenty of that here. Fairly miserable, power fails, cable fails, trees start snapping. No need for edict, you can’t really even walk outside, let alone get a car or truck to stay pointed in the right direction. The wild ones are the flash freezes, merely wet roads one minute, all heck breaks loose the next. Got stuck in traffic on a banked interstate exchange in one of those once. Everybody just slid down to the curb on the inside, cars wouldn’t even stay put at a standstill.
“However have Yoopers survived all these years without media and government telling them what to do?”
The UP county road crews are pros and keep the main highways like US41 and M-26 open, come hell or high water. If the blizzard lasts three days, people living in the bush might not get roads plowed for three or four days and will need to wait, but that’s what God made whiskey and pasties for. And if you run low, the neighbor will hop on his snowmobile to make a delivery of beer and bread that will see you through.
I spent winter 87-88 living and working in Williamsburg, VA. It’s almost comical to see how people in the sunnier climes drive in snow. Four inches is a major event, we call it Halloween.
Luckily my cousin had a fridge full of beer, he loaded up his snowmobile with odds and ends, drove across town and save me. (I've gotten sober since then, but still am grateful for Tom W's heroics brining me beer)
Let me get this straight-- come the blizzard, you drink the whiskey then put on your pasties and dance? And that helps?
That “report” has been circulating around the internet for years (as far vack as 2005), well before 2010, and often attributed to places other than Michigan. The point it makes is a good one, but it’s likely not factually true.
No mail delivery in Red Hampshire...locals in their 70's and 80's can't remember the USPS EVER taking the day off for the weather...the sun is out, the roads are plowed, there are no power outages to speak of...WTF?
Maybe they moved up from Mass and still take their marching orders from Boston network news.
I like those stories!
I don't have a story like that to tell for this current storm. We received about 24 inches that I just got done shoveling out of the driveway. After I came in, I had oatmeal and raisins for lunch. Breakfast was pancakes and yogurt with granola and blueberries swirled in. I will shortly be switching over to beer and pretzels but there is no football, so I guess I will have to read a book and light a fire in the fireplace.
Spot on. I left BOS yesterday at 9:50 am. I wanted to stay and witness this snowmageddon but I had to be in FL on Sunday. I have traveled in the NE for 25 years on business. These people have become wussified no doubt. 25 years ago this storm would have been a big deal but everyone would have been putting on chains, getting back up power and heat sources ready, and checking on their other emergency supplies, and making sure there was plenty to drink. They bragged about never closing things down.
Back then when I bailed on a trip to beat a storm they made fun of me. Now they insist I leave before it hits.
Having some homemade beef vegetable soup. Cleaned about 300 feet long, 31” deep of global warming off my driveway.
Sam Adams, Alpine Spring in hand.
Cripplecreek is correct. When something happens in the northeast, their local news becomes our national news. I’m giving them a pass on this huge snowstorm, but I’ve seen traffic jams on bridges make national news.
So, given that propensity on the part of the northeast media, I’m comfortable in saying that half of the news we’ll get will be BS. I’m sure Obama will tour this week either with skis, snowshoes, or hockey stick....the global warming hockey stick????
Yes...heaven forbid we’d have winter storms in the dead of winter.
LOL!
It was being reported that the snowplows wouldn't be able to keep up with the predicted snowfall, and would lose the battle against the storm. The MassRATs tend to just abandon their stranded cars on the turnpike, so it becomes an impassible, unplowable mess.
Now they should be able to get out there and clear the clogged roadway, unfettered by bumper to bumper traffic, braindead morons, and buried cars.
Besides, if you've ever experienced a M@$$h0Le driver, you might want to see them banned from the roads yourself.
When we got ready to move, both were sold to the police chief of Shakopee...
“Let me get this straight— come the blizzard, you drink the whiskey then put on your pasties and dance? And that helps?”
Oh, boy. Another flatlander. :-)
The venerable pasty is a Cornish baked pastry with a filling of beef, potatoes, turnips and onions. The copper miners ate these for lunch because the pasty stayed warm in their pails and provided the energy for hard-rock mining.
But I like your idea of drinking whiskey and pasties, provided the latter are on the right women.
Forgive me, but I’m at the end of giving even one more inch. It’s true that some folks will behave stupidly and go where they shouldn’t when they shouldn’t. Those cars abandoned on the highway should suffer whatever dings a ten wheel salt truck w/plow might effect.
This was hyped as the “End of the World” part II, and it was just another snow storm. Honestly, didn’t the vast majority of people wait until the storm passed, dig out, and go about their affairs in good order? We are a level headed and resourceful people. Look at the number of posts describing many trying weather events. Manufactured crises are the means to distract and subsequently usurp. The populace gets accustomed to such directives. It becomes more and more commonplace to restrict freedom of movement. Obedience becomes paramount. Some claim that it’s the law and they’re correct. But the Stamp Act was law as well. So were the codes of Jim Crow. Law that is outside the constitution and violates Natural Rights is invalid. When a Governor bans me from visiting my elderly mother at my discretion or going to church because he believes I can’t judge the road conditions, we have a problem.
The problem as I see it is that he and his ilk have forgotten; they work for me. I pay for the highways and the crews that clear the drifts. I pay for the troopers who pull stranded motorists from the storm. I am a free man. Do not impinge on my Liberty.
No, no, yes and yes.
No, I don't think cc was right about deriding this story.
No, the press doesn't just cover the northeast. This winter I've seen them cover cold weather in the midwest, plains snow, and west coast mountain snow and rain.
Yes, I think the national news sucks in almost every way. They are destroying our country.
Yes, this was a big snow in a populated area worthy of coverage as even you seem to agree with.
When it comes to weather, the events I think don't get covered are the tornados that destroy the lives of largely freedom loving, fly over people who work hard and who love their country. And I would also add that the media, before the election didn't cover what really was going on after Sandy and they did it for political reasons of course.
I'm pretty sure that when your talking Massachusetts, that group includes practically every man, woman and child.
Those cars abandoned on the highway should suffer whatever dings a ten wheel salt truck w/plow might effect.
In this case, those cars would amount to several narrow parking lots, hundreds of miles long. Personally, I'd like to see them callously shoved into the ditches.
It looks like Connecticut is also having a travel ban and may take up to ten days to restore the roads. They are using front-loader based fork-lifts to pick up the cars and set them out of the way.
CT’s Gov. Malloy is a liiberal clone of Patrick, Cuomo, Bloomberg, et al. I was out on CT roads yesterday, along with others who were going cautiously about the businessof “living.” There was some snow on the road...NEWs FLASH...it’s CT in Feb! It was really not the crippling crisis that the media make it out as.
Your description of some traffic apocalypse with blockages hundreds of miles long is not accurate and that’s exactly my point. People are not as foolish as the state would have us believe. We do not need their agents to convince us that it’s not fun to be stuck in a snow bank in 20 degree weather. For heaven’s sake, how did we ever manage to climb, stone by stone from the paleolithic cave fire, to the computer age, without some bureaucratic Nanny scolding us, “Put on your hat and gloves when going out to shovel snow.” My response is now “Shut up fool!”
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