February 2nd surprise snowfall was a disaster for many motorists!

Right on schedule and as predicted by the National Weather Service, snow began to fall in the Forsyth area at around 9:30 AM. And with the ground cold and temperatures that hovered in the upper twenties, accumulation began to occur almost immediately! Such that by 11 AM, the side roads had become covered with about a quarter of an inch of the white stuff with more to come! It's too bad this happened on Super bowl Sunday when a lot of folks may have made plans to go to friends homes to watch the

game.

At half past eleven in the morning, my police scanner was reporting numerous slide offs all over the area. The NWS was also now predicting 2 inches in the Taney County area with up to six falling north of the I-44 corridor!

By noontime, a report came over the police scanner informing me that they had shut down Hey 76 pending the removal of a ton of slide offs  with some vehicles completely overturned!

Time lapse of entire event

anyone who has been to Branson can testify to just how hilly the area is - I can just picture how terrified some of the motorists must be to find themselves basically trapped on these hills. Locations like Bee Creek road were reported to have as many as 30 vehicles off the road and in a jumble! And the snow continues to fall... If you have a scanner, be sure to tune to 460.300 to listen in as the local police dispatch tries to work their way through a big mess of stranded motorists. I'm always flabbergasted that people don't do a better job of planning whenever the weather service puts out a winter advisory as they had done in this case.

Being the weather watcher that I am, I made sure to get out early and get my grocery shopping done before the nine o'clock hour. I bought enough for a few days, just in case. (Another winter storm is shaping up for next weekend). Most concerning to me is the possibility of freezing rain or sleet on this coming Monday night. Down here in the hills of the Ozarks, it's just not worth the risk when the weather gets like that.

Late note: From the stories that have been filtering in on Facebook and the scanner, I'm sure this storm will be talked about for some time to come. It appears as though hundreds of motorists were involved in slide off and accidents due to the unexpected heavy snowfall.