Winter Storm Nika: Ice Cuts Power to More Than 720,000 in Pennsylvania

View image on TwitterThe Weather Channel

More than 720,000 customers are without power in eastern and central Pennsylvania on Wednesday morning as a messy mix of snow, sleet and freezing rain from Winter Storm Nika hit the state.

Freezing rain accumulated an estimated one-quarter to one-third of an inch in the Philadelphia and Trenton, N.J. metro areas. Driving conditions are bad in many areas. Ice weighted down power lines and caused branches to break.  

A half-inch accumulation of ice on power lines can add 500 pounds of extra weight. Ice can also increase the weight of branches by 30 times, significantly increasing the potential for breaking and falls.

“Remember, respect the snow, fear the ice,” said Gary Szatkowski, of the National Weather Service’s Philadelphia/Mt. Holly office told Philadelphia’s NBC 10.

PECO reported more than 579,500 customers without power Wednesday in the five-county Philadelphia region, most of them in suburban counties. More than 161,000 customers were without power in Chester County, more than 118,000 in Montgomery County and more than 102,000 in Bucks County. PPL reported more than 60,000 customers without power, most of them in Lancaster County.

The Pennsylvania Turnpike ordered speed limits reduced to 45 mph and banned empty tractor-trailers. State highway officials also dropped speed limits to 45 mph on many roads including a number of interstates. Amtrak announced suspension of Philadelphia to Harrisburg service due to downed trees on wires and along tracks.

An accident late Tuesday night involving three tractor-trailers killed one driver and closed both eastbound and westbound lanes of the turnpike between the Gettysburg Pike and Harrisburg West in central Pennsylvania, officials said. The turnpike also warned motorists to beware multiple fallen trees — some of them blocking lanes — on portions of the southeastern Pa. turnpike and the southern part of the Northeast Extension (I-476).

Some schools are opening late; others have declared Wednesday a washout.

http://www.weather.com/news/commuter-conditions/winter-storm-nika-ice-power-outages-pennsylvania-20140205?hootPostID=4ac56e41e91eb9b4a39ac8e8d8d2ef9b

11 thoughts on “Winter Storm Nika: Ice Cuts Power to More Than 720,000 in Pennsylvania”

  1. Lost some large limbs this morning and some other minor damage. Power was out a couple hours this morning but back on now. My back-up generator install is ALMOST finished but my house still isn’t a fully functional Death Star as of this moment;)

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    1. I hope everything is okay and the damage not too bad! Our prayers will be with everyone in this winter storm path. Stay safe.

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      1. Thank you, Missy. Much appreciated! P.S. Yesterday they chemtrailed the *%&# out of us. I am sure it was for our own good. PFFT!

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        1. Yeeaaahh right!! didn’t you know all those chemicals are for our own good, all those chemicals that cause cancer, and blot out the sun!! 🙂
          Don’t you notice when they chemtrail us, then all of a sudden we get bad weather! Nothing here to see, move along!!! 🙂
          Keep safe!!

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    1. Thank you, Paul! Had to chainsaw limbs and trees out of the driveway just to leave home and go in to work on my day off…so I could suck water out of my shop from the melting and freezing rain. Jeez, some days are better than others I guess?! Haha 😛

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  3. My Fellow Trenchers,

    As you know, I live up here in Nazi-Jersey, and so am in the thick of this.

    Yeah,.. its pretty bad,… we had a name for this when I was a kid,.. it was called Uhmmmm,… ummmm,… OH YEAH!,…. it was called,.. “Winter”,.. (Taaaa-Daaaaaa!!!!!,.. horns blaring,… people clapping…)

    We have had several fairly mild winters, so I think people has just kind of become accustomed to that, forgetting that sometimes,.. old man winter can still throw down some pretty nasty storms!

    Anyway,.. I’m sure all the lunatics in that Insane Asylum called Washington DC will say all this cold weather and snow/ice is due to Global Warming/Climate Change,.. and it explain it as thus: “…… well,.. you see,… the hotter the planet gets,… the more cold it gets!,… ahhhhh,.. yeah,… thats it,.. thats the ticket,.. so we REALLY need a Climate Change Tax,.. NOW,… before its gets so HOT,.. that the whole planet freezes!!!…”

    Its just like how the communist/traitors in this country say that as MORE people become unemployed,… the “official” unemployment number goes down! Yeah!,… so take that your stupid Americans!,.. riddle me that!

    JD – US Marines – Actually,.. we have had way worse winters,.. but this one is still shaping up to be a fairly nasty one!

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  4. So how come we are now giving snowstorms names? It’s a snowstorm and not a blizzard or a hurricane. Are they going to start naming rainstorms now too? “Oh my goodness, it’s raining cats and dogs. It’s so bad, we’ll name it rainstorm Albert!”. Seriously?

    Why are we afraid of snow and water all of a sudden? Especially people in the North like in Buffalo, NY where I grew up in. I ate snowstorms for breakfast when I lived there 10 years ago. The MSM and our government are trying to make everyone in this country a bunch of scaredy cats and dependent on them for everything. It’s truly pathetic.

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    1. Milk bread and eggs! Ruuuun! I hate it when the sheeples panic run interferes with my regularly scheduled grocery shopping schedule. I always end up forgetting there’s a “giant” storm coming and get caught in the middle of their BS meltdown mode. Ishould watch the evening news more often. Or not!

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