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SNOWContinued From Page 1merged and whipped together by high winds.By late afternoon Wednesday, streets and highwayswere slushy, the ground was covered with snow, and visibility was extremely low.Bv 5 o’clockByafternoonitWednesday was estimatedhad fallen. A lot of it hadmelted but the covering on the ground was almost threeinches deep.It snowed all Wednesdaythat about five inches of snow night and was still snowingI #ufKT -TOADS were treacherous last Thursday, but traffic moved u on ESS** «d. north of lonront. (GRAP H.C Photo by StevePotter)and blowing Thursday forenoon. By noon of Thur-dav reports in the southwest suburbs has estimated thetotal snowfall at around !6 inches and anyone out battling the elements would not dispute it, other than to argue that perhaps it was on the lowside.When Thursday morning dawned little traffic, otherthan snowplows, wasmoving. All of the principal highways were blocked and the interstate highways, while open in part, were shut off at entry and exit ramp bypacked, wet snow that carsand trucks failed to negotiate. They remained stuck, practically sealing the rampsshut.Schools, most schools, had planned to dismiss late on Thursday or early on Friday for the Easter vacation but this holiday began a dayearly. Radio and TV programs directed to South Cook. Will and DuPage counties carried long lists of schools that were closed because the snow had highways blocked.Lemont, Lockport, NewLenox, Mokena, Frankfort, Tinley Park. Orland Park, the Palos area and all other schools in the area called off classes for the day. Gradeschools, high schools, public schools, parochial schools and junior colleges were all out of business because ofthe storm.And what made it worsefor a lot of people was disruption of electrical power.Some in the village of Mokena were complaining that the power kept going off and going on Wednesday night but to the west and north of Mokena some people were without electricity from 11 o’clock Wednesday night until around noon on Thursday. This meant that most of them were without heat andwater, too.Power was off at NewLenox but was restored forthe most part Thursday forenoon, but in the Lincon-wood area and south of New Lenox, Frankfort and in the Prestwick area it was later inthe day before there was anypower.Commonwealth Edison had crews out all night and allday but they were having difficulty in getting their trucks thru the snowfilled roads. Crews were finally dispatched to the Prestwick section on snowmobiles.These repair crews, as well as those who manned the state, county, township andvillage snowplows are deserving of a lot of credit for staying with a difficult andeeming!y endless task.Sure, there were complaints, but then there are always complaint as therewill always be complaintswhen the going is rough, but the men working can dismissthese — they were doing thebest they could under exceptionally difficult circumstances.By Thursday noon most otthe ramps on 1-80, 1-55 and 1-57 had been cleared and those highways were carrying traffic as usual, exceptthat 1-80 west of Joliet wastied up until late Thursday afternoon.U.S. 30 was open in spotsThursday noon but cars werestill getting stuck. U.S. 45 was open from Rt. 30 to 1-80by noon of Thursday but itwas later in the day before U.S. 45 was cleared to 159th St. It was also okay through Orland Park and 143d St. was open from Rt. 45 to W oifRd.There is always a section west of Wolf Rd. that isaclosed whenever there is a heavy snow or a heavy rain. Also by noon Wolf Rd. wasopen from 159th to U.S. 30and later it was opened to the north. Rock Island east bound trains Thursday morning were normal exceptDcriDf PTHESOUTHWEST GRAPHIC April 1,1970 P*«* I*the one leaving Joliet at 8:30 a.m. It didn’t run because it didn’t get to Joliet. Switches were frozen for a while, holding traffic to one track.All of the villages in thesouthwest area had dug themselves out by Thursday afternoon and everytime someradio station gave a weather report that predicted more snow, everyone shuddered and even the non-super-stitious kept their fingers crossed..Mokena Police Chief Wayne Ryder had to take a patient into Silver Cross hospital at Joliet around U o’clock Wednesday nightand it was about 12:15 p.m. Thursday when he was ableto get back.There were a lot of cars offthe road, some in ditches but no serious injuries were reported The cars that were off the road, of course, were a problem to their operators but the cars that were the real problem were those that conked out crosswise on thehighways.Someone called to say that the Farmers’ Almanac had predicted a heavy snowfallbefore the end of March, around the 25th. They also said that the Farmers Almanac says there’s awhooper-dooper snow due inApril.Shucks! Those almanacs don’t mean anything. Howcan they? They must be printed a year in advance, or almost a year, and everyone knows that the weatherman usually has his hands full trying to forecast what the next day’s weather will be. So a fig for that almanac stuff. . . still, it might not be a bad idea to leave thosesnowtires on untii next month sometime, say, aroundMemorial Day.THE NEWS
Newspaper Details
Lemont Southwest Graphic
Lemont, Illinois, US
Wed, Apr 01, 1970
Page 19
Full Page
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MO, USA 02 Jun 2021
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