Saturday, December 8, 2018

Freezing Snow Aborts Wichita Falls Library Trek

Well.

The predicted possible snow snowing in the Wichita Falls zone turned way more snowy than what usually happens.

As in predicted snow usually seems to make no appearance, or maybe just a few flakes.

An hour before noon, give or take a minute or two, even though big flakes were falling, and appeared to not be melting, I decided, since I saw many vehicles doing so, that the roads were okay to drive on.

And so I exited my abode.

Carefully.

Holding on to the railing descending the stairs to ground level.

As soon as I was rolling north on Taft Boulevard I tapped the brakes to see if any slipping was noted.

None was.

As I headed north, towards the downtown Wichita Falls library, the snow seemed to be falling far more copiously.

I looked at my vehicle's temperature measuring monitor to see that which said it was 33 degrees upon departure now indicated it was freezing, as in 32 degrees.

By the time my location on Taft Boulevard was in the Midwestern State University zone, only about a half mile from my abode, near the Fantasy of Lights, the road suddenly turned slippery. A red light stopped me at Hempstead. When the light turned green it was quickly obvious the road was now icing up.

I took the first opportunity to turn around and head back to my abode. The side street by which I made the turnaround quickly confirmed, via its slipperiness, that turning around was the right thing to do, what with me not wanting anything remotely resembling my last ice storm driving nightmare a few winters back in Fort Worth.

That photo you see at the top is post turnaround, back at the stoplight at Hempstead, heading south, past the aforementioned Fantasy of Lights, back to the relative safety of my home zone.

Below is video I took whilst still feeling slip-free, as I approached the Fantasy of Lights, before realizing the road had become too slippery for my driving requirements...

No comments: