Winter Storm — Berks, Pennsylvania

2008-02-12 to 2008-02-13 · Berks, Pennsylvania

Wider weather episode

A protracted winter storm of snow, sleet and freezing rain affected Eastern Pennsylvania from the late morning of the 12th into the morning of the 13th. More snow fell across the Poconos, while more freezing rain and sleet fell from the Lehigh Valley south through Philadelphia. This led to a very slippery and protracted commute home from school and work. Many schools dismissed children early and cancelled after school activities. Slippery travel persisted through the morning of the 13th in Berks County, the Lehigh Valley and the Poconos. Numerous accidents occurred including a few fatal ones in Berks, Monroe and Montgomery Counties. The winter weather led to power outages as ice laden trees, tree limbs and wires were knocked down. About 50,000 homes and businesses lost power.

Precipitation started as snow during the late morning and around Noon EST on the 12th. Precipitation changed to sleet and freezing rain during the late afternoon in and around Philadelphia. This transition spread north and reached Berks County and the Lehigh Valley during the early evening and the Poconos during the late evening on the 12th. The transition to plain rain took a long time to go north from Philadelphia (around Midnight EST on the 13th) to the Poconos (around 8 a.m. EST on the 13th). Snow and sleet accumulations ranged from two to five inches in the Lehigh Valley and the Poconos to two inches or less elsewhere. Ice accretions averaged between one-quarter and half an inch with the highest amounts in and around the Lehigh Valley.

In Philadelphia, traffic came to a standstill on Interstate 95 Southbound at Penn's Landing due to the icy conditions along with accidents that blocked lanes. Accidents and a fallen pole closed traffic in both directions on Martin Luther Kind Drive and ice brought traffic on the Platt Bridge to a halt. An accident involving a school bus closed the Passyunk Avenue Bridge in Southwest Philadelphia. Multiple accidents jammed numerous exits on northbound Interstate 95, with a portion of Interstate 95 being closed for nearly two hours because of an accident. A number of exits from the Schuylkill Expressway westbound were closed after a tractor-trailer accident spilled hazardous materials on the highway. Traffic on the Roosevelt Boulevard was stalled when a fallen tree blocked lanes in both directions about 7:00 PM EST near St. Vincent Street and Ryan Avenue. The icy conditions contributed to a pileup on the Walt Whitman Bridge, and the Commodore Barry Bridge was closed for a time. At the Philadelphia International Airport between 5:00 PM EST and 6:00 PM EST, there were 22 departure cancellations; 17 departure delays; 6 arrival cancellations; and 3 arrival delays.

In Chester County, on the Pennsylvania Turnpike, a jackknifed tractor-trailer caused stop and go traffic eastbound near the Downingtown exit. Traffic problems persisted into the next morning as a downed tree on Pennsylvania State Route 422 blocked one lane in the eastbound direction near the Route 100 interchange. In the other Philadelphia suburbs, police reported numerous minor accidents due to the icy conditions. In Bryn Athyn (Montgomery County), one person was killed and four others injured in a two-car accident at 9:30 PM EST on the 12th. Because of the icy weather conditions, West Norrinton (Montgomery County) officials cancelled their monthly commissioners' and rescheduled it for later in the month. Some suburban roads were closed while crews worked to clear the accidents. Nearly 4,000 residents in the Buckingham Springs (Bucks County) community on Route 413 lost power for about one hour after a tree downed a wire on Stony Hill Road.

In Berks County, icy conditions closed Pennsylvania State Route 183 in Bethel Township (Berks County) at about 5:00 PM EST until plows and salt trucks were able to clear it. PPL reported that 11,442 customers lost power in the Sinking Spring area, and service was restored to all but two by 9:00 PM EST on the 13th. In Blandon at about 5:30 AM EST on the 13th, a large ice-covered pear tree split in half, with half of the tree rested against a home at Walnut and Troy Drives. Other trees in the area had snapped limbs. An Indiana man died and his passenger was severely injured on Interstate 78 in Greenwich Township in a crash due to slippery conditions on the morning of the 13th. This accident closed the westbound lanes for 39 miles, between the Reading and Harrisburg east exits, for about five hours. Multiple other accidents were reported on Interstate 78.

In the Lehigh Valley, several people were injured in an accident just before 3:00 PM EST on the 12th along Pennsylvania State Route 309 in Heidelberg Township (Lehigh County), near the intersection with Peters Road. A van slid out on a snow covered roadway and crossed the center line, being struck broadside by another car. Several ambulances transported the injured to the Lehigh Valley Hospital Trauma Center in Allentown. Many school districts cancelled school on the 13th. Those that were open, had a 2-hour delay. A large ice-covered tree in the 200 block of Fifth Street in Whitehall Township (Lehigh County) fell on the 13th, which caused some damage to a nearby parked vehicle. The Lehigh Valley and into the Poconos had about 7,500 PPL customers without power during the storm. Of those, nearly 5,000 were in the immediate Allentown area and about 1,000 in the Bethlehem area. Met-Ed reported 2,068 customers lost power in Northampton County.

In the Poconos, in Monroe County, a female from Stroudsburg was killed and her passenger badly hurt on February 13th when their car flipped several times on Pennsylvania State Route 33 near U.S. Route 209. An ice-coated tree fell onto a portion of a home in Bartonsville. The home was tangled in some power lines. An ice covered tree fell during the early morning of the 13th on Dreher Avenue in Stroudsburg, landing on power lines, which then caught on fire. The road was closed between Katz Drive and Glenview for several hours. Ice downed power lines throughout the county, left some 17,000 Met-Ed customers without power on the morning of the 13th. In Carbon County, a 59-year old man from Northampton was involved in an accident on Pennsylvania State Route 93 in Packer Township just before 8:00 AM EST on the 13th. His car slid off the road and hit two trees. He died from his injuries on February 26th.

Snow and sleet accumulations included 5.0 inches in Bossardsville (Monroe County), 4.5 inches in Walnutport (Northampton County), 4.0 inches in Albrightsville (Carbon County), 3.4 inches in Easton (Northampton County), 3.0 inches in Stroudsburg (Monroe County), 2.3 inches at the Lehigh Valley International Airport, 2.0 inches in Boyertown (Berks County and Jim Thorpe (Carbon County), 1.4 inches in Trappe (Montgomery County), 1.3 inches in East Nantmeal (Chester County), 1.0 inch in Morgantown (Berks County), Royersford (Montgomery County) and Fricks (Bucks County), 0.3 inches at the Philadelphia International Airport and 0.2 inches in Exton (Chester County).

The wintry mix was caused by a low pressure system that emerged from northern Texas late in the day on the 11th. The low pressure system moved northeast into the lower Ohio Valley on the morning of the 12th and reached into Ohio by the early evening on the 12th. A secondary low pressure system formed on its warm frontal boundary over Delmarva on the evening of the 12th. This low pressure system tracked northeast toward New York City before dissipating overnight. Other low pressure systems continued to track north along this stalled frontal boundary which started to move east again later in the day on the 13th. These low pressure systems brought in sufficient warm air from the nearby Atlantic Ocean to raise surface temperatures above freezing by the morning of the 13th. The cold surface air was supplied by a fresh high pressure system that moved across nearby Canada and the New England States on the 12th before it exited to the east later that night.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 82530. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.