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SOUTHEAST ARKANSAS BLANKETED BY SNOW

BY THE COMMERCIAL STAFF
Friday, March 7, 2008 7:43 PM CST

It was a winter wonderland here Friday afternoon, complete with cars meshing with telephone poles, tractor-trailer trucks diving off overpasses and snow plows trudging through the slush and ice.

Snow storms blanketed the state just before noon Friday, dumping snow across Southeast Arkansas and piling up at least seven inches in Pine Bluff. White Hall got at least six inches of the white stuff.

Traffic calls

Emergency dispatchers were barely able to handle the call volume, all reporting numerous vehicle accidents — none with serious injuries reported.

“People need to understand that when we get this kind of weather, they need to slow down,” Lt. Bob Rawlinson said. “You can be driving along doing just fine and all of a sudden wind up in a ditch.”

County sheriffs reported widespread traffic accidents in a number of areas, with all deputies called to duty.

“We’ve got wrecks everywhere. There was a bad one in front of the country store,” said Judy King, Cleveland County deputy radio operator and dispatcher. “We’re on the go and don’t have enough people. All of our deputies are out.”

A dispatcher in Grant County said drivers apparently didn’t realize just how slick the roads were.

“People just need to be cautious,” she emphasized.

Drew County Sheriff Mark Grober said his deputies responded to two accidents almost as soon as the snow started falling Friday.

“If traffic would just slow down, everybody would be OK,” said Grober.

Desha County Office of Emergency Management Coordinator Rickey Terry was stuck in Pine Bluff on Friday afternoon trying to make his way back to Dumas. The roads were icy on his trip and getting worse by the minute, he said.

In demand

Area wrecker service companies were in high demand Friday, fielding dozens of calls at one time.

Jessica Spadoni, a dispatcher at Billy’s Inc. Towing and Recovery on North Hutchinson, said that at about 2:30 p.m. she was unable to give anyone an estimate for the amount of the time it would take for a wrecker to get to them.

“We’re putting them on a list,” she said.

Nathan Edwards, a driver for Foster Towing and Recovery on West Barraque, said his phones were ringing off the hook.

Indeed, one woman who answered the phone at Insley’s Towing and Recovery on Dollarway said she was swamped.

“My calls are coming one after another,” she said.

Arkansas Highway and Transportation Department snow plows and chemical trucks were busy on the I-530 interchange, clearing the way for large trucks and passenger vehicles to make it up the overpass.

The city of Pine Bluff’s lone salt truck was busy all Friday and was scheduled to be out all night, said J.T. Golden, the acting supervisor for the city’s street department.

He said the truck was focusing on the main intersections and the roads leading to the hospital.

“That’s all we can do with it,” Golden said.

Jefferson County Judge Mike Holcomb said that it was hard to do too much while the snow was falling.

“We could put sand out but as long as it keeps snowing, it wouldn’t do much good,” he said. “It’s supposed to get really cold later tonight and that means the possibility of ice, so we’re going to watch and see what happens and if necessary put sand on the overpasses and bridges to try and cut down on some of the accidents.”

Power outages

Friday’s weather also caused power outages across the Pine Bluff area. Diane Tatum, Entergy spokeswoman, said about 1,000 of the utility’s customers were without power as a result of tree limbs breaking from the weight of snow and falling on transmission lines.

Statewide, an estimated 44,000 homes and businesses were without power by Friday afternoon. Additional Entergy line workers were called in from Mississippi — and more were on standby — to help with the outages.

Utility officials were saying power should be restored by Sunday, except in remote locations.

In a related matter, a few gas stations in the Pine Bluff area experienced pay at the pump problems Friday due to the weather.

Billy Logue, assistant manager at the Exxon Family Stop at 5600 Olive St., said for a while the station was unable to accept credit/debit cards inside or outside using the electronic card readers.

An attendant at the Valero station at 2202 S. Olive St. also reported similar trouble.

“We had to take down information the old fashioned way if someone wanted to pay with a card,” Logue said.

Closings

The Jefferson County Courthouse closed at 2 p.m. Friday, although some employees left earlier to try and beat the icy road conditions. Pine Bluff city offices also closed early.

Public schools across the region dismissed students about noon Friday. The University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff, Southeast Arkansas College and the University of Arkansas at Monticello canceled Friday classes as well.

Kaleybra Morehead, spokeswoman for SEARK, said classes were called off for Saturday as well. A spokesman for the UAPB police department said it had not been decided Friday if Saturday classes would be held.

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