City, region hit with snow followed by falling temps
As snow fell over the region Sunday, with near single-digit temperatures not far behind, city crews took to the roads to apply “nothing but the blue salt” to head off a potentially messy Monday morning commute.
Most of the snow — two to four inches on average — fell over the region before 9:30 p.m. Sunday, with less than an inch of additional accumulation expected overnight, said Bill Modzelewski, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Pittsburgh.
But frigid air is expected until Wednesday, with highs in the mid-20s Monday and Tuesday. Nighttime lows are expected to dip to 10 degrees, and average highs for this time of year are usually in the 40s, said Lee Hendricks, a meteorologist for the service.
“It will be abnormally cold for this time of year,” Mr. Hendricks said.
In areas across Allegheny County, the snowfall led to poor road conditions that caused several reported car crashes Sunday evening.
To get ahead of the storm, Pittsburgh Public Works deployed 55 trucks just after noon Sunday, scheduling day and night crews for double shifts, city Public Works Director Mike Gable said.
“I feel that we’ll have everything under control, especially with the magnesium chloride salt that [is effective] at a very low temperature, and that’s what the crews are using [Sunday],” Mr. Gable said. “We just want to get as much [salt] down before it does start to accumulate.”
The city’s supply of magnesium chloride rock salt has a “blue tint.”
Because salt is still on the roads from as recently as Friday’s snowfall, Mr. Gable said early in the afternoon that crews would spend Sunday addressing secondary roads before heading back to major thoroughfares.
“There’s less traffic on them, and the material will stay on the road rather than being pushed to the curb,” he said. “Once the snow starts to lay, though, we will move onto the primary [roads].”
According to a news release, the city has activated its real-time plow tracker that allows residents to follow the fleet’s location.
Public works were also expected to send crews out by 4 a.m. to clear sidewalks, bridge pedestrian walkways and steps, Mr. Gable said.
The storm that moved over Southwestern Pennsylvania came from the south, according to the weather service forecast. Mr. Hendricks predicted that areas north of Allegheny County would not see as much snow because the system was working its way up the Appalachian Mountains toward the East Coast.
“Everybody is always used to the system coming down from the north or northwest,” he said.
Though the snowstorm came from the south, the air that will follow it will be coming from the north, hence the coming Arcticlike temperatures.
“Thursday, we finally hit the 30s,” Mr. Hendricks said.
With the warmer temperatures, however, comes another round of snow.