So proud of my fellow Alabamans!

byLuvnlife

110 followers

10 years ago

I just have to tell y'all about our amazing community here in the Birmingham area. As most of you know we have had a really freak snow storm come thru this past Tuesday. It was supposed to have been 100 miles to the south of us.

Tuesday started bright and sunny. Everyone had gone to work, school and about their days activities. Quickly it clouded up and About 10:30 the snow started to fall. I called my daughters school at 11 and asked if school was going to let out early due to the snow. The receptionist said she hadn't heard anything about it yet. In 10 minutes I received an automated call from the school that they were being let out at 11:30. The only way I can describe what happened after that is, is went to heck in a big hurry!

The roads froze in the first 15-30 minutes of the snow falling. My husband said he was using wrenches outside at work when he saw the snow start to fall. Said it looked like dust falling everywhere it was so dry. When he reached to pick one of the wrenches up it felt like it had barbs all over it. His hand stuck to the wrench immediately. He had never seen anything like it before.

By the time we knew we had a problem the roads had already started to ice over. It happened so fast. All at once everyone was heading for home and schools to get their kids. Every main road was gridlocked with cars sliding all over the place. There were accidents everywhere from the ice. Trucks and cars were trying to get up some hills and sliding back down. Many school buses had to try to make it back to the schools because the roads had become Impassable so fast.

My 17 year old daughter started driving home from school with 2 friends who were going to be stranded at school. My husband had tried to call her to tell her not to come the back way because she wasn't going to be able to make a sharp right turn coming down a steep hill coming home that way. Many cars had tried and slid down the hill or into the ditch. He was waiting by the road to stop her before she got that far. The cell phones were not working well in the area. I finally got a text from her that she had gotten the message and would come home another route.

She got about 4 miles from home and called telling me the cars in front of her were sliding back down the hill in front of her. She turned around and went to the closest friends home about a quarter mile from there to stay.

My husband made it home several hours later without incident. He told me how bad it was on the roads and about the many accidents. I was thankful my family were all safe and without any accidents.

I watched the news and kept up with the storm and everyone on my Facebook. There were people on four wheelers getting word of people stranded, old, sick etc. who needed help and going to them and getting them to where they needed to be. Some people had picked up close to 100 people. People were leaving their cars stranded on the roads and walking to their homes or as close as they could get. I've never seen anything like it before.

Many businesses along roads that had become gridlocked were opening their doors to people stranded and offering them warmth, food and water to sit out the storm. Whatever they had they were sharing. One doctor from a day clinic, walked in the below freezing temperatures almost 3 miles in his suit to buy food to bring back to his stranded patients, staff and people off the street seeking shelter there. Also there were so many that took strangers stranded into their homes for a night or two. Many teachers and kids were stranded at their schools, some till Friday.

The love and care that has been shown in our community this past week has strengthened my waning faith in our countries ability to stick together as a people. I'm proud of my daughter for keeping a cool head and getting her friends and herself to a safe place without incident. My family, friends and neighbors for their courageous and loving acts of kindness to others in need, many who they didn't know.

The national news anchors you have heard reporting on this didn't do any justice to the great acts that took place here and across the nearby areas of the Storm of 2014, as they have named it. They focused on why the broke government agencies hadn't prepared for the chance that in the Deep South we may have a freak snow storm that would strand us within 30 minutes. One that people who have lived in areas of blizzards and freezing weather in the winter have never before seen. They seem to think lots of money should have been spent for snow equipment to keep our roads safe. We had national guardsmen in the back of trucks loaded with sand, armed with shovels, throwing shovel after shovel over the roads to combat the ice. Now that's good ole southern thinking at work. When do they think we would ever need that expensive equipment again????? It would sit and rust before we would. Not a good way to spend a broke countries money.

I shake my head to even try to understand such thinking....

Sure, our water froze. We had to melt snow to have water for a couple days. We were ok. It's all good.

There are just too many stories to share with you. I feel so grateful for all I have and my family and friends.

Blessings to everyone,

Rebecca