Major Storm Buries Southeastern Michigan

The first major snowfall of this winter hit Michigan hard! It began to fall around 9pm on Saturday night. By 11 pm, the road were already dreadful. Travel times were already doubled. By Sunday morning, nearly 8 inches had fallen in St. Clair County, about a half hour north of Detroit. Everything came to a stand still. No church could take place because the parking lots were not plowed. People were stuck in their homes until they dug themselves out. With winds as high as 30 mph, drifts accumulated to 2 feet high in some spots. The snow finally quit falling around 5pm Sunday night. By then, all school districts in the county had already canceled classes for Monday. Although the main roads may have been plowed, side streets and back roads were quite dangerous.

When people ventured out to shovel, that's when the hard work and danger began. At least 7 reported deaths in the Metro Detroit area have been attributed to snow shoveling according to Channel 4 news station, WDIV. This is mostly caused by heavy snow removal which then leads to heart attacks. It's not just the very elderly either that this happened too. There was a 46 year old woman in Clinton Township, 55 year old woman from Port Huron, a 47 years old woman from Southfield, 7 year old man in Canton Township and an 80 year old man from Belleville, all passing away yesterday, according to www.clickondetroit.com. The Times Herald paper from Port Huron also reported that a 71 year old man from Fort Gratiot collapsed and died while shoveling snow this morning outside his home.

The bright side is, forecasters originally anticipated the Port Huron area getting a foot of snow or more. Totals only added up to 6-8 inches across most of the area. The lake effect didn't have as much of an effect as originally thought.

On my way into work this morning, I saw many instances where the snow had effected drivers in their travels. Fist of all, I got stuck in my drive after I even shoveled in for an hour yesterday. There were 3 cars in the ditches on my drive in as well. The expressways were clear this morning though. By the time I got out of work, most of the side roads had at least been plowed, but were still slippery when you turned the corner. I also once again got stuck in my driveway as I tried to move. I too live on a side street and the plows must have went through while I was at work because there was a sludge of snow and dirt that caused me to get stuck this time. It was so bad, I had to get help from my neighbor to get my car out. That's what neighbors are for.

I encourage everyone to help those in your neighborhood when storms like this come though, especially the elderly and sick. Have you kids get out there and make a little extra money helping others in the neighborhood shovel. Make sure you always have plenty of salt stocked up to put on your stairs and driveways and sidewalks. Keep the path to you mailbox cleared as well or else the post office doesn't have to deliver your mail. My mailbox did not have a clear path made to it and my mailman left me a note on one of my letters asking to clear the walkway,. Luckily he still delivered today's mail for me.