By Debbi Wilgoren and David A. Fahrenthold
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, March 8, 2007
12:58 PM
Patchy fog and melted snow froze on some roads in the Washington suburbs overnight, leading to cancellations and delayed openings for several public school systems.
State highway officials said main roadways were dry and clear after snowfall yesterday that measured only one to two easily sweepable inches throughout the region. But school officials said back roads -- and school parking facilities -- were slippery in spots.
As a result, public schools in Prince William and Fauquier counties closed for the day. Schools in Fairfax, Calvert, Charles and Washington counties, and Manassas City, opened two hours late, and Manassas Park City schools had a one-hour delay. Many private schools canceled classes or delayed their openings as well.
Calvert County "is a county of country roads," said Leon Langley, director of transportation and athletics for the schools there. Langley said he drove the roads from 1:30 a.m. to 4:30 a.m., and ordered a two-hour delay as a result of what he saw.
"There are patches of ice. There's also patchy fog," he said. "If I had just ridden the state roads, the numbered roads, no problem. But we don't just travel the main roads."
George Kisha, an associate superintendent in Prince William County, said the problem of ice on the side roads before dawn was compounded by icy school bus lots and parking lots at school buildings.
The school system's director of transportation toured the county at 2 a.m. and "said he was extremely concerned," Kisha said. They considered a two-hour delay, Kisha said, but "he said he couldn't guarantee that he could get all of our buses out of those lots in two hours."
The ice came from three different sources, meteorologists said: road salt, friction from traffic and "freezing fog."
Both the salt spread on asphalt to melt snow, and the heat generated by passing traffic, can turn even a light snowfall into moisture and slush that will freeze as temperatures dip.
Similarly, if it is foggy and very cold, as it was in Manassas, Southern Maryland and Frederick County overnight, fog can condense and turn to ice.
"When the surface is that cold, any moisture on it will freeze," said Sarah Rogowski, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service, which issued a "freezing fog advisory" until 7 a.m. for parts of the region.
"Anywhere that you had snow yesterday -- where the snow melted because of cars going over or because it was salted -- anything like that where there's still moisture, that could freeze as well," Rogowski said.
The icy patches did not seem likely to affect commuter routes, according to officials who monitor roads and traffic for state highway officials. While they cautioned that there could be problems they were unaware of on little-used back roads, they said early morning monitoring showed no difficulties.
"We have had very, very few calls for any icy complaints," said Cecile McCusker, a supervisor with the Virginia transportation department's Smart Traffic Center. "The roads are dry and we are doing fine. Citizens aren't calling in here."
Early this afternoon, temperatures in the region hovered in the low to mid 30s. But a high temperature of 44 degrees is expected this afternoon.
The warmer temperatures will help melt the ice, which is why school officials in many jurisdictions decided to push their opening times back by an hour or two. The decision also means school buses and carpools do not have to share the roadway with the bulk of the morning commute.
"Sunlight is our ally. Let's get the sun up," Langley, the Calvert official said. "It was about student safety and staff safety. That's what this decision was about."
Although the mercury will slide below freezing again tonight, forecasts for this weekend and next week are increasingly spring-like, with highs climbing into the 50s and -- by Tuesday -- the low 60s.
The actual snowfall was minimal in the Washington region yesterday, despite widespread predictions of a significant storm. The first flakes starting swirling at 5 a.m., then tapered off, only to return in the afternoon for several hours. In the metropolitan area, two inches fell in Vienna, 1.4 inches in Sterling, and 1.3 at Reagan National Airport.
David Manning, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service office in Sterling, said this was the typical pattern of an Alberta Clipper, a kind of low-snow snowstorm that forms over the prairie provinces of Canada.
"They bring us a quick shot of snow, and then they're out of here," he said.
Total accumulation was much larger outside the metropolitan area, in mountainous areas to the west and north. The weather service reported snowfall totals of eight inches in Cumberland, Md., and 10 inches in Frostburg, Md.
Throughout the region, temperatures stayed below freezing all day -- reaching highs of 30 degrees at Dulles International Airport and 28 at National. But in many places, snowflakes melted on contact with warmer surfaces such as roads and sidewalks. Around the White House, for instance, the grass of Lafayette Square had a powdered-sugar dusting, but surrounding streets were clear.
Some school systems, including those in Anne Arundel, Howard, Fauquier, Frederick and Loudoun counties, closed for the day in anticipation of the storm. Others, in Calvert, Charles and St. Mary's counties, closed early. But most Washington area schools kept to their normal schedules.
Staff writers Bill Brubaker and Eric Weiss contributed to this report.
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