Icy mix headed for area
By From staff reports
Published in News on January 13, 2015 1:46 PM
Most of Wayne County saw an inch to an inch and a half of rain late Sunday night and into Monday, causing localized flooding in some spots.
But it is what forecasters say is coming next that has many county residents more than a little concerned.
The National Weather Service in Raleigh said more precipitation is expected today, and to look for conditions to worsen as the rain starts to freeze after dark. A winter storm watch is in effect for Wayne County through midnight Wednesday.
"Some areas might have seen two or more inches of rain fall, causing minor flooding in small streams and creeks. And of course, as those streams empty into the Neuse River, we will see some swelling and the river begin to rise in that area," meteorologist Jonathan Blaes said.
Wayne County Office of Emergency Services emergency management and security director Mel Powers said his staff is monitoring the weather and working to get its game plan together.
"As you know, weather changes. Right now we are just looking at the weather system that is going to be moving through our area tonight. They have upped our (expected) accumulation up to a quarter of an inch of ice," he said.
City and county departments are bracing for the worst while hoping for the best.
Goldsboro Public Works Director Jose Martinez said the city does not have brine ready to lay down, but will be ready to spray the roads with salt and sand once they begin to get icy.
"Before we go home today, we're going to be looking at the hourly forecast to see when we need to come back tonight and begin working," Martinez said. "We're going to be working with the police force to have them call us if the roads begin to get icy before we thought they would, and if that happens, we'll come in when they call us."
Martinez said city pipes are not in danger of freezing, and that fire hydrants also will be safe in this weather.
"The city's pipes are under the frost line and safe from freezing," Martinez said. "Pipe joints might freeze if it gets cold enough, but the water in the pipes won't freeze."
Martinez said pipes would only be in danger of serious damage if temperatures reached zero degrees or below.
The rain also affected how State Department of Transportation work crews will be able to respond to the icy threat.
The work crews this morning were busy making the final grader hookups and mounting brine tanks, but will still have to wait until tonight to begin treating roads.
The rain Monday preceding Tuesday's ice made it fruitless to pre-treat the roads with the brine -- the rain would simply wash it away, said Luther Thompson, Wayne County DOT maintenance supervisor
Crews will be on duty overnight, and once the rain begins the transition to freezing rain, they will "hit" bridges and overpasses with salt.
That application will be followed by applying the brine solution, Thompson said.
Thompson said the most recent forecast he had seen called for the freezing rain to begin around 10 p.m., possibly continuing until 9 a.m. Wednesday.
The plows on the trucks would be used to push that off the road, he said.
"The temperature has dropped fast this morning since I came out of the house," he said. "I had thought that if we could get by February that maybe we would get a break (from icy weather) this year."
Monday's wet weather wreaked a good bit of havoc on Goldsboro and Wayne County first responders as well.
The Goldsboro Fire Department responded to 12 calls on one shift alone, including a car trapped in high water at West Grantham and Center streets. A family of three had to be pulled out of high water, and a Goldsboro police car had to be towed out of the mud following a traffic stop.
Blaes said some stronger cells also moved through the area later in the day causing winds to gust upwards of 40 miles per hour, knocking down tree limbs.
Martinez said danger areas in the city for standing water are any road that runs near Stoney Creek and several spots along Ash Street.
West Grantham, where the car was trapped in high water, is a North Carolina Department of Transportation road. The area is notorious for deep standing water in heavy rains.
"On that road when we see that water is flooding the area, we close it down and call DOT to come fix the problem," Martinez said. "West Grantham is not something we can fix, because it's downstream and water flows into the area and backs up. If you see standing water, don't think it's only a few inches deep. Please go around it."
Martinez said most of the flooding issues throughout the city are caused by various debris clogging up the storm drains.
"When it starts raining heavily, we'll hop in our trucks and look around for any areas that are backing up," Martinez said. "When we find them, we'll hop out and remove debris from the grates if there is any. If there's nothing in the grates, then it's probably a pipe, and we come back after the storm and fix the pipe."
And, as temperatures drop throughout the afternoon and tonight, freezing rain will become an issue, the National Weather Service said.
"In Goldsboro it will be well after dark, probably between 8 to 10 p.m.," Blaes said.
He warned that heavier freezing will likely take place in the north and west ends of the county, with less severe conditions to the south and east.
"Of course the worst of it will be after midnight when things will really getting dicey, roads freezing," he said.
It takes a quarter of an inch on power lines and trees, and we will be approaching the upper limit of that, Blaes said.