I think it's pretty common knowledge in NYC that this was due to Union labor disputes. There are stories, videos and pictures aplenty of plow drivers acting out of sorts (ramming cars).

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/sanit_filthy_snow_slow_mo_qH57MZwC53QKOJlekSSDJK

This is a lesson that I periodically relearn.



Nor I. If they'd been driving at a reasonable speed or more closely together it would have been a lot safer for everyone. It also would have been nice if they'd kept at it. These were not the NYC plows but the NJDOT plows.

i guess that answers the question i ask myself when i see the shots on the evening news of snowbound cars and massive pile ups,some people will do anything to get where their going.

I'm glad everyone made it.

A big issue is that such events tend to have a point-of-no-return followed by a long lead up to the comeuppance and then a tragic end. After the first stop there were fewer and fewer points where you could change your tactics, stop, or turn around. Off ramps were closed. Places to stop nonexistent. You ended up in a line of cars and trucks getting deeper into it with every passing minute and no way to take a break or reconsider. The highway to hell has many on-ramps but few off-ramps.

I suspect that the people taking risks to get to the head of the line were just this side of panic. Even as they would all likely tell you they were perfectly calm. They see themselves moving too slow to beat the snow and see themselves getting trapped. The 'need' to go faster takes priority. Even as getting to the head of the line does no good. But they feel the need to 'do something'. What they are missing is that they are one blown tire, or unseen road hazard away from triggering a pileup.

A multi-car, flaming pileup on a highway in a blizzard is not how I want to go. The crashing, the fire, the mangled bodies, then the cold, and silent punctuated by crying because nobody is on their way any time soon. After a while, silence.

I'm always a bit skittish about situations where I have to repeatedly double-down to make it. In this case it worked out.

A few years ago, we were in a similar situation and I decided to stop driving and stay at a fleabag motel, and if they didn't have room, we would have stayed in the parking lot of the motel. It turns BAD fast in snow.

like Martin we pulled off in a storm.on the way back from a spring trip to the Mammoth Caves we were hit by a heavy snow storm near Chicago.for nice retired Minnesota folks it was strange to be at a motel where the office was behind a small glass window with a tray to pass money thru---but the point is that with fast cars and interstates you can go from spring to winter in a couple hours and find yourself unprepared.

Probably also related to the tendency of people to start walking faster and faster when they first suspect that they are lost out on the trail, and a major reason behind the "hug a tree" instructions many kids get about getting lost out in the woods.

The hypothetical scenario you described reminds me of the 100-car "pileup" (well, "only" about 25 cars actually collided in the whiteout conditions, from what I read) in North Dakota last week. Not a good situation to be in.

Actually, this story sort of reminds me of the subway riders stuck on the A train in Queens in that they were also basically stuck because they had no options. They could've left the train, since it was at a station, but there was nowhere really to go. So, they just kept doing what they were doing, which in their case meant sitting on the train, while on this case, it meant creeping along into the blizzard with all the other cars.

Glad things turned out OK.

I hit this storm on both ends. Was out in Idaho at a family funeral. Had to leave the day after it started snowing there. In the 250 odd mile drive from Idaho to SLC we hit snow, freezing rain, sleet, rain, fog, more snow and more rain. The next day our flight was slightly delayed as they had to deice the plane. Got home ok. Traffic was actually worse in Raleigh than it was in SLC even with the weather.

Then it hit here the day after Christmas, started about 11pm Christmas night actually. We got 9 inches of snow more or less. Of course, being the South, everything closed. Better news was that it mainly melted during the next three days.

Both DW and I can drive in snow, having learned as kids. It's not her or my abilities I worry about, it's the natives lack of abilities. Watched one guy do three 360s as he decided to pass on a bridge - at least he hit no one else, tho his car was totalled once he stopped.

I can prepare and be ready, it's the morons who will kill ya.

Been there and done that, said I would never set out out a family trip in bad weather again! Like you I am often pressured by family/friends to travel long distances during poor conditions (weather or sometimes just lack of rest) to attend an important function. I have lately been successful in convincing people to postpone the trip and have hopefully educated my teenaged kids of the danger.

Glad your family arrived safe and nice to hear of your preparations if things got worse.

Mike

Driving is very much a cooperative exercise. You don't set the lights, maintain the roads, enforce, or fail to enforce, the rules, or drive the other cars. What others do or don't do can get you hurt or set you up to hurt yourself.

I wouldn't be too emphatic about your own skill set, not that I doubt your abilities, I'm sure you both are both skilled and experienced, but everyone claims to have special abilities. To the point that an assumption of exceptional skill or ability is, in it self, a sign of impending doom. On the other hand there are times when it can be assumed the very non-exceptional will be out on the road in great numbers. New years eve is widely considered 'amateur night' for drunk driving. Other times may share that distinction.