Every Friday, FreightWaves takes a look at the past week or so in social media, highlighting images in trucking, transportation and weather. This week features truckers stuck in a Sierra snowstorm, a vehicle tossed by a tornado, a California highway blocked by landslides and more.
Slamming Sierra snow
A powerful storm last weekend dumped 36 to 42 inches of snow in parts of the Sierra Nevada, including Mammoth Lakes and Mount Rose Summit. The storm lasted into Monday, with nearly 30 inches piling up in Donner Pass on Interstate 80. Several truckers got stuck on the highway. Winds were howling, with gusts of 40 mph at road level producing blowing snow and occasional whiteout conditions.
This area of I-80 was closed from time to time during the storm, according to the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans). The National Weather Service in Reno, Nevada, told FreightWaves that the highest wind gust from the storm was a staggering 159 mph at Mammoth Mountain, 11,027 feet in elevation in the southern part of the Sierra.
Terrible tornadoes
Severe storms hit communities from the Plains to the Southeast this week. The worst storms were Wednesday, when several tornadoes touched down in parts of the Gulf Coast. A video of a tornado crossing Interstate 10 in Orange, Texas, went viral.
Even scarier was the all-terrain vehicle tossed like a toy by the twister. Thankfully, as of late Friday morning, there have been no reports of injuries or fatalities from this tornado. The National Weather service has preliminarily rated it as an EF-2 with estimated peak winds of 130 mph.
Road-blocking landslides
The same storm that buried the Sierra Nevada in snow flooded lower elevations in the region. Some areas were drenched with 5 to 8.5 inches of rain Saturday through Monday. Some of the heavy rain hit the Dixie fire burn scar, leading to multiple landslides on California state Route 70.
As of late Friday morning, a 45-mile stretch of the highway was still closed between Jarbo Gap and California state Route 89, just east of Paxton. Crews continue to clean up debris, according to Caltrans.
Nasty nor’easter
A nasty nor’easter slammed parts of New England Tuesday and Wednesday with rain and powerful hurricane-force winds. The highest gust reported to the NWS during the storm was a whopping 94 mph at Edgartown, Massachusetts, on the island of Martha’s Vineyard.
The winds blew down trees and power lines in many communities. At one point, more than 300,000 customers in Massachusetts, mostly south of Boston, had no electricity. That number stood at about 157,000 as of late Friday morning. Rain will move back into the region Friday night and Saturday, possibly slowing down the recovery process.
Beauty shot
This week’s beauty shot takes us across the pond where a beautiful rainbow appeared above a truck Friday morning in Cambridgeshire in eastern England.
Click here for more FreightWaves articles by Nick Austin.
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