Heavy snow falls across Virginia's Tidewater region

Snow came down rapidly on the evening of Feb. 19, covering roadways throughout eastern Virginia.

Transcript

00:00You can see the snowfall. It's not necessarily sideways, but it's getting pretty close.

00:04Yeah, we're definitely seeing the wind at play there. Rocky Weathers, Allie Reed

00:08has an update for us. Has anything with the road conditions especially changed, Allie?

00:16Well, guys, we've been giving you kind of the tour of the Hampton Roads region, right? We were

00:20over in Norfolk for the last couple of hours. Now we're in Portsmouth. This gives you a good

00:25perspective of what the entire area looks like. And I want to show you the roadways here. This

00:30has been a big factor. Tunnels, drawbridges in this area. For some of these smaller vehicles,

00:36as they've been making their way through, a lot of them, we've seen it time and time again over

00:41the last couple of hours. You'll see the hazards on. Yeah, that's because a lot of the cars have

00:45been getting stuck going through here. In fact, some of the drawbridges that go in and around the

00:50Hampton Roads areas have either closed down or had to shut down for some periods of time

00:56because of situations that have been out on these roadways. At last check, we are now crossing into

01:02about three and a half inches of accumulated snowfall here in this area. That is a lot of

01:08snow to be dumping down in this region as quickly as it has. And it's only been snowing for a few

01:14hours. Take a look at the snow just on the ground here. This gives you kind of a good perspective

01:19again, excuse me, of what it's really looking like here. If we can take this some video on

01:24your screen. This was two hours ago, so it gives you kind of a different perspective of what it

01:28looked like out on those roadways. This was as we were roving about the area again, just moving from

01:35Norfolk to Portsmouth to Suffolk earlier today. Crashes everywhere on the roadway,

01:41really difficult to see. And again, we've been talking about this type of snowfall only happens

01:47here really once every 10 years. So you don't see this a ton in this area, meaning a lot of people,

01:53drivers, residents in this area are not used to this type of snowfall accumulation. Again,

01:59showing you the roads right now, some of the major roadways here. We know that a lot of crews have

02:03been working to try and get ahead. We spoke to VDOT earlier today who had mentioned they had

02:08been brining the roads, really making sure that they were salting ahead of the snowfall here. But

02:13as you know, when you have this much snowfall coming down as quickly as it is, there's only so

02:18much they can really do here. Again, okay, let's also talk about the type of snow that's coming

02:23down right here. It's really wonderful. Look at this. Hold on. Ready? It's the type of snow

02:29that's really packable. You know, it's just a great type of snow. And I think what's going to

02:34be awesome for people that live in this area ahead of tomorrow, there's going to be a lot

02:39of sledding happening here. So again, the fun side of this, you know, what a lot of kids look

02:44forward to, obviously there's no school in this area. My photographer, Andy, he's in the North

02:48Carolina area. They don't have school tomorrow. So again, a lot of people in and around this

02:54region have no school tomorrow. That means a lot of sledding, a lot of snowball making

02:58is going to be happening. I have friends that are news reporters in this area. They tell me

03:02the place to be is Mount Trashmore. If you live in this area, you might know it's a landfill

03:08that became an area that was very popular for sledders. I'm sure that's going to be a popular

03:12place for people to go tomorrow. Again, we're going to be checking in on the roadways. We'll

03:15check in with you in the next hour to let you know where things are at. But guys, right now,

03:19three and a half inches of snowfall here in Virginia. And that is certainly going to pick

03:25up as the evening progresses. All right. Three and a half inches. That's a lot.

03:30That is a lot. Thank you so much for that update, Allie.