County digs out from heavy snow
Just as Butler County residents are digging out of the weekend snow storm, weather forecasters are predicting several more inches of snow by Wednesday morning.
The forecast is for snow to start about noon Tuesday.
But even before the next snowfall has an impact on the area, at least nine municipalities in the county have declared weather emergencies.
Along with Evans City, Harmony, Saxonburg and Zelienople, four townships — Cranberry, Jackson, Middlesex and Penn — reported their declarations to the county communications center. Saxonburg has since withdrawn its declaration. The declarations in Evans City and Cranberry Township were to expire at 11 p.m. today.
Butler also announced its emergency status Saturday morning.
"That really just encourages people to stay off the roads until they are cleared and safe," Butler Mayor Maggie Stock said.
The state of emergency also means municipalities can direct additional municipal employees and funds toward the cleanup.
Frank Matis, director of county emergency services, said this morning the declarations allows municipalities to buy equipment and hire contractors to help clear snow and provide other assistance without delay.
"The idea is that it allows municipalities to circumvent bidding," he said.
Under normal circumstances, municipalities must bid out work above a minimal cost.
Emergency declarations also enable municipalities to seek state and federal reimbursement for costs during the emergency period.Stock said the city hired Wiest Asphalt Products-Paving to clear snow from Main Streets parking lots and sidewalks starting Sunday night.Kenmac Rentals & Sales in Butler spent Saturday morning digging its own equipment out before it could be rented."We've had a lot of calls on (Bobcat tractors and back-loaders) this morning. We're digging out first, then we can rent them out. We need to get things cleaned up here so we can do business," said Larry Oskin, a manager at Kenmac.Since preliminary weather reports predicted only 8 inches of snow, Oskin said few people rented the equipment early. Ski rentals, though, have glided along."I have not had any calls on generators, but we haven't had any power outages around here, as far as I know," Oskin said.Following the storm, Allegheny Power reported fewer than 5,000 people without power in Butler County, but more than 87,000 were affected by outages across its service area.As of this morning, no power outages were reported.John Malinski, owner of John Malinski Towing in Butler, described the storm with a single word: "Hectic.""At about 4 o'clock in the morning we shut it down. The snow was so deep our trucks couldn't even move. Calls were taking too long," he said."We had to take our plow truck out a few times just to get the (tow) trucks where they were going."
Malinski said his four trucks responded to vehicle rollovers, cars which had slid off the road and minor crashes."What made it tough was a layer of ice that was under the snow. We had tractor trailers getting hung up on hills (in Chicora) and even municipal vehicles getting stuck," Malinski said.He said towing services started again by 7:30 a.m. Saturday, and continued through Sunday, pulling vehicles out of ditches and snowdrifts.The business on Palmer Road had to plow its own way to major routes, as state road crews were overwhelmed just keeping the main roads clear."Between about 9 p.m. Friday and 3 a.m. (Saturday), it was coming down so fast it was tough to keep up. The last time I saw anything like this was the blizzard of 1993," Malinski said.According to the National Weather Service, the storm on March 12 and 13, 1993, dropped 25 inches of snow on Western Pennsylvania in less than 12 hours.Many restaurants, including Wendy's and Chili's on New Castle Road, did not open Saturday because of the storm.The Clearview Mall in Center Township closed Saturday, although a few stores such as Dick's Sporting Goods and J.C. Penney gutted out the weather by opening their doors, said one Dick's employee.Linda Allison, owner of Linda's South Side Restaurant on Center Avenue, said business was surprisingly good Saturday morning."It's a lot better than I had predicted. We've had quite a few customers and the phone has been ringing to see if we were open," she said."Although the restaurant opened about a half-hour late at 5:30 a.m., two dedicated cooks walked to work and Allison, along with her granddaughter, waited tables until another server could trudge to the restaurant."We're not nearly as packed as we usually are, but we're doing a fairly decent business. I guess I should be happy we have anyone," Allison said.She said she planned to close by 4 p.m. Saturday, so her afternoon crew would not have to worry about a dangerous trip home after their shifts.There were no major wrecks reported, but over a 24-hour period beginning midnight Saturday, 36 accidents were reported.Matis said only one of the 36 accidents required an ambulance. He said most of the crashes occurred on highways."It's spread throughout the county," Matis said.While only one accident was reported to have happened on Interstate 79, that might have been due to traffic restrictions.The highway was closed in the northern part of the county for part of Saturday.And roads that remained opened didn't have much traffic."It was like a ghost town," Matis said about driving down Main Street in Butler on Saturday.
Saturday's snowfall is the most in Butler records that go back to 1967, according to data from the National Weather Service in Pittsburgh.The 17.1 inches Saturday bested March 14, 1993, when 13 inches were measured. Two storms, one on Dec. 11, 1992, and another on March 17, 1973, tie for the third largest snowfall with 10 inches each.Snowfall is measured from noon to noon.An additional 0.3 inches of snow was recorded Sunday.Butler has had nearly 18 inches of snow in February. The average snow for the month is 7.7 inches.
