Winter Storm Jonas came through the Triangle and Wake Forest Friday, Jan. 22, before pushing north to dump record amounts of snow from Virginia to New York. Here it began with a dusting of snow Friday followed by below freezing temperatures with freezing rain and some sleet that night. Saturday a bit more snow arrived, leaving the area with a heavily iced snow that resisted shovels and plows.
Town Manager Kip Padgett explained that a change in the local weather forecast led to a nimble redirection in the town’s plans. “With the change in forecast during the evening/night of January 20 from an event that was going to start as a rain event but changed to a snow event, we had to change our stance on the storm as well.
“With that said, we brined what roads we felt were most important to get our residents safely to their destinations on Thursday and then went into spreading salt/sand and plowing operations when the storm hit us on Friday morning. Street crews worked continuously from 7 a.m. Friday thru 9 p.m. Saturday until roads were frozen to the point we couldn’t improve them. They started back at 7 a.m. on Sunday and worked all day. They went back out yesterday (Monday) to get more streets cleared. The public’s assistance on moving parked vehicles from the street and the public remaining off the streets to allow our crews to perform their work was greatly appreciated.”
There were six town plows ready to clear 78 miles of road with stockpiles of 28 tons of sand and salt mix and 175 tons of salt.
It was a great relief that most of the town experienced no power outages. “Wake Forest Power had only one outage, and that was caused by a tree that fell due to high winds from 30 feet outside of our right of way,” Padgett said. It is a great testament to the job our tree trimming crew has performed for us over the years.”
That outage occurred about 5 p.m. Friday as ice was clinging to trees. A tree fell across a power line along Capital Boulevard and affected about 550 customers in Caveness Farms Apartments, Woodfield Creek Apartments, Forest Links Drive and South Forest Industrial Park. Power was restored by 6:30 p.m.
If you wonder how a power outage near Caveness Farms Apartments can also affect the industrial park off Burlington Mills Road, Public Works Director Mike Barton explained. “Forest Links Drive is off Ligon Mill Road, which is served by the same circuit that serves the South Forest Industrial Park off One World Way. The circuit is 3South out of the N.C. 98 Substation, and it runs down Capital to the crossover at Golden Corral and then down Wake Drive to the sewer easement behind Chris Leith [and thence down to the park].”
A break in a 12-inch City of Raleigh waterline on Durham Road on Tuesday morning has also been attributed to the storm, but the rupture in the new section of pipe very early Wednesday morning had to be for a different reason.
It took most of the day into the early evening to repair the initial break, and the second pipe failure was repaired by 7:30 a.m. Wednesday. In both cases, there was one-way traffic on Durham Road from Capital Boulevard to Tyler Run while the repairs were made. Residents in the 700 block of the road along with people living in Magnolia Forest Court, Oakwood Estates, Hope Street and Richland Drive were without water in both instances.
Traffic was very light, almost nonexistent Friday and Saturday, and Wake Forest Fire Department Chief Ron Early said, “Our responses did not significantly change because of the storm. I think we were pretty lucky that we didn’t get as many problems as other areas of the county. Our men and women are pretty good at being prepared for these types of weather patterns.”
When asked about a report in the Raleigh News & Observer about a fire truck and an ambulance stuck at the same time, Early said, “The N&O had it all wrong; our truck did not get stuck. The incident occurred on a road (Charles Forest Road, a short street in the Heritage Garden Apartments complex on Rogers Road) that caused the ambulance some traction issues. When they were getting ready to leave the scene the truck starting sliding and both crews decided to stay on scene and contact the town to get a sand truck out there to spread sand on the road to keep from causing any possible damages. The fire truck could have gotten out but they didn’t want to leave the ambulance on scene by themselves with a patient. They chose to stay on scene and wait to make sure they got out with the patient. The incident occurred during shift change so the oncoming crew came out and relieved them so the previous crews could get out. The tow truck did assist the ambulance but did not assist the fire truck.”
There were a few traffic accidents or mishaps over the weekend but none involved serious injuries. Because of icy roads in Durham, Republic Industries could not get to Wake Forest until Monday to collect on the usual Friday route. Both bus services were running their regular routes on Monday.
One Response
With the layers of ice being laid down in Wake Forest, it is truly amazing that there were no outages or serious wrecks here in Wake Forest. We are very lucky to live in such a well maintained town. Kip is doing a great job.