So starting Monday afternoon, we got pelted with the highly interesting "freezing rain" which covered the area in a nice sheen of ice. However, driving to work yesterday morning was no problem at all, though a little on the slick side (but fortunately school was canceled, so it was just me risking his life). My biggest fear in driving to work is the hill at 61st and Sheridan in Tulsa. Now while this certainly can't compete with the hills of, say, Colorado Springs, they're still quite enough to be scary in their own way if you hit the wrong patch of ice.
Fortunately, I have about the best car there is for driving on ice and snow. I have a 2002 Chevy Impala. There are about a thousand of these cars driving around Tulsa and the 02's look a lot like the other years as well, but mine has two features that make it a juggernaut when it comes to snow and ice driving: traction control and anti-lock brakes. Both of these features hate it when the wheels connected to the engine spin out of control.
Traction control works when you press on the gas and the wheels spin; it works its magic by hiccuping the wheel spin to help the car get some momentum without spinning out the tires. It's made for things like gravel and such -- the anti-peel-out feature.
Anti-lock brakes are one of the best known features since they prevent you from squealing to a halt on a sunny day. When you press the brake pedal and the wheels lock, the ABS takes over by stuttering the brake pads allowing the wheels to spin and brake rapidly. It would mimic you rapidly pressing and then removing your foot from the brake pedal.
Throw both of these features on ice and snow and you have a vehicle that doesn't like to slide if it can help it. I saw the traction control light come on a couple times on my way in yesterday and the anti-lock brakes kicked in on that hill at 61st and Sheridan (no surprise there, and I was grateful).
However, yesterday morning held no candle to the horror of yesterday evening. During the day, it started to snow. Ice is dangerous, but it's a smooth surface. Cars are made to drive on smooth surfaces. Snow isn't smooth. When snow piles up, it creates drifts that you have to barge your way through, and when you deal with ice, you have no traction to barge with. While open roads were generally ok, intersections turned into snow-made sandboxes with cars spinning their wheels desperately trying to cross them and barge through the drifts created by the cars that cross from other directions. Side streets and businesses became inaccessible from the snow thrown into them by traffic from the road.
But again, my trusty car was able to navigate all of this without any issues whatsoever. Now, this is not to say that anyone would be able to hop in my car and navigate it. I haven't had an accident on snow since 1994 and I lived in Colorado. I've navigated several vehicles on this stuff and survived without a problem, which is why I know my current is the best one yet to drive on it. Let me throw out a third item that helps immensely when driving on ice and snow. Front wheel drive.
Now, I know the sports car enthusiasts will swear by rear wheel and the spoilers and such fal on the back of the car, but when it comes to snow, especially, the front wheel drive is the best thing to have. Why? Well, pick ups are rear wheel and I saw plenty of them sliding around without any traction at all. I saw a Camaro yesterday desperately trying to get home with their rear wheels fishtailing back and forth looking for a connection. I've got an engine sitting on my traction wheels and I moved along dragged my tail behind me. It worked well.
The only time I had any fun was after leaving Quik Trip. Yeah, I was low enough on gas that I had to stop in the snow on the way home and fill up. Remember what I said about the businesses having problems due to snow buildup? Well, QT was no different. It is well traveled anough to not be a serious issue, but I still took a driving start to get out. I blasted through the snow at an angle to make sure I was right enough to get into the street. My rear wheels fishtailed out behind me, threatening to put me into a spin, but I righted it easily enough, and I was off home again.
Then I hit my neighborhood.
Oh dear Lord, this is the reason they cancel school when it gets bad. I had to drive two blocks at the most from the road to my house, and it was the hardest two blocks I've ever driven. The car was fishtailing at every turn and even trying to go straight. The wheels were fine. Traction control was active almost constantly despite my control on the gas. I trudged through the piles of snow hoping again hope that I could get into my driveway.
For some reason, people like to park in the road even when they have space in the driveway. I don't get it, and on my street, two of them park directly across from one another giving me barely a lane on this snow to zip between them. Now they do this nearly in front of my house, so once past them, I had to get to the far lane away from my driveway, speed up, and hope I have enough momentum to drive uphill into my driveway.
I did have enough, and got far enough into my drive to be out of the street.
It snowed until about ten last night, and I was concerned about the drive in this morning, but the city crews had all night to focus on their problem areas (such as hills), and getting out of the neighborhood was the worst I had to deal with, and since it had a night to settle, it was pretty easy to get out. I did fishtail around one turn (ironically, at 61st and Sheridan) since the intersections are still a mess, but turning into the spin always fixes that.
Today, it's supposed to get above freezing, though my thermometer still says it's only 11 outside, so this should be the end of the nightmare drive until the next time assuming that the weather people know what they're talking about, and it gets above freezing long enough to do some damage to this mess before it drops below freezing again.
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