Trees outside the Oval Office at the White House are covered in snow today, with as much as 30 inches predicted in the region, a modern record. (Photo by Brendan Hoffman / Getty Images)
by Mark Silva and updated
Buried by a blizzard that has left hundreds of thousands of homes in the snow-blanketed Washington area without electrical power today, the nation's capital crawled to a near standstill.
President Barack Obama, whose motorcade of SUVs was able to navigate a snow-bound three blocks from the White House to a hotel ballroom winter meeting of the Democratic National Committee, officially embraced the shorthand for the mid-Atlantic storm that has shuttered the capital: "Snowmageddon.''
The president praised his party's delegates for braving the blizzard. DNC Chairman Tim Kaine, whose state of Virginia had declared a state of emergency before the snow even started, called the day "like an April day in Chicago'' - Obama's hometown.
On a more serious note, the president pledged to continue his fight for health-care reform and drew a standing ovation when he voiced his commitment to repeal "Don't Ask, Don't Tell,'' the policy that prevents gays from openly serving in the military.
"Let me be clear: I am not going to walk away from health reform," Obama told his audience. "We can't return to the dereliction of duty. "America can't afford to wait, and we can't look backward."
But outside, pedestrians who braved a continuing pounding of wet snow outnumbered motor vehicles in the capital's streets.
As much as 30 inches of snow, which would set a new modern-day record, was predicted for Washington, with a blizzard warning in effect until 10 pm EST today. Parts of Maryland and West Virginia already were buried under more than 20 inches, with forecasters measuring a snowfall of two inches per hour this morning.
With the region's airports closed, hundreds of flights were cancelled. And downed trees and power lines were contributing to power outages for hundreds of thousands of homes in the region.
Tonight's game in downtown Washington between the Washington Wizards and Atlanta Hawks was cancelled.
On 16th Street NW, a vital north-south artery that spans much of the District of Columbia, people outnumbered cars by four to one today. With sidewalks impassible, people walked up and down the middle of the street. The cars that attempted to make it up and down a large hill that rises along Meridian Hill Park in Adams Morgan largely were four-wheel drives. No buses were running. Plows struggled.
In their place, snowboarders and even skiers plied the hill.
The snow appeared to be over two feet, with drifts piled as high as four. And as of late morning, it was still dropping relentlessly, swirling amid bursts of wind. Visibility was a limited to a few blocks. And a new concern was developing: underneath the snow, a layer of ice.
"D.C. traditionally panics when it comes to snow. This time, it may be more justifiable than most times," said Becky Shipp, who was out power-walking in Arlington, Va., on Friday. "I am trying to get a walk in before I am stuck with just the exercise machine in my condo."
Authorities blamed the storm for hundreds of roadway accidents, including a tractor-trailer wreck that killed a father and son who had stopped to help someone in Virginia. Some area hospitals asked people with four-wheel-drive vehicles to volunteer to pick up doctors and nurses to take them to work.
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The Washington Area Metro, a train line which not only the city but also surrounding suburbs depend upon for transportation, was closed above ground, and bus service was suspended. Amtrak also canceled several of its Northeast Corridor trains today.
The storm in a city unaccustomed to such snow follows a Dec. 19 storm that dropped more than 16 inches on the area. Washington has gotten more than a foot of snow only 13 times since 1870, according to the National Weather Service, predicting up to 30 inches today.
The record was 28 inches measured in January 1922. The biggest snowfall for the Washington-Baltimore area is believed to have been in 1772, before official records were kept, when as much as 3 feet fell, as recorded by George Washington and Thomas Jefferson in diaries.
James Oliphant of the Tribune Washington bureau contributed from Washington. and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
Comments
Actually, "Snowmageddon" was used by Fox News early Friday morning weather forecasters. Obama stole and used the term without any attribution. Big surprise!
Posted by: Karen | February 6, 2010 2:06 PM
Did obama invite Al Gore for a update on global warming?
Posted by: jskant | February 6, 2010 2:09 PM
The Myth of Global Warming is dead.
Posted by: tom0942 | February 6, 2010 2:34 PM
Did obama invite Al Gore for a update on global warming?
Posted by: jskant | February 6, 2010 2:09 PM
The Myth of Global Warming is dead.
Posted by: tom0942 | February 6, 2010 2:34 PM
You people are idiots! It snows and you declare Global Warming a myth! Try reading the news about the Arctic some day. With the estimated global cost of the northern melt at 2.4 trillion by 2050! Oh, right, you dont care because you wont be here. Selfish people. All you care about are tax cuts so you can buy another SUV and flat screen TV. Who cares if the whole northern ecosystem is in danger. I hate you people more and more with each passing day!
Posted by: Tim Green, Fairfield CT | February 6, 2010 3:48 PM
Fox News didn't coin the term "snowmaggedon." It's been in common use since at least last year -- just search the Washington Post archives if you don't believe me.
Maybe this was just a blizzard. Maybe partisan politics has nothing to do with it. Though if this proves to you that "the myth of global warming is dead" then you didn't know anything about global warming to begin with.
Posted by: truther | February 6, 2010 3:56 PM
Wow! That is a pretty big word for a commander in chief who cannot pronounce "corps", but refers to them as the "Marine Corpse".
Posted by: BDD | February 6, 2010 4:00 PM
Barack "NICHOLAE CARPATHIA" Obama is certainly an expert on snow. He's been snowing the American people for two or three years. And now we are buried by an avalanche of his socialist policies and our children and grandchildren will need major global warming to be rescued.
Posted by: NAVYFLYER09 | February 6, 2010 4:21 PM
The term shows a sense of humor. Hence, Obama stole it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJuMvgWYe7E
Posted by: Snerf Johnson | February 6, 2010 4:42 PM
Gosh, Tim. It's amazing that you managed to conflate tax cuts and global warming. Tell me, were you ALSO shouting words of hatred at the idiots who point at every hurricane as evidence FOR global warming?
Posted by: Craig | February 6, 2010 5:04 PM
Timmy,
Is that estimated $2.4 Trillion cost (which really isn't that much over 40 years) done by the same "scientists" that have been cooking the weather data?
Some simple math for year - 30 years of global warming on a planet that is 300,000,000 years old. Statistically insignificant.
Ever hear of Leif Ericson? How about the "Medieval Climate Optimum "? Because of the latter, you heard of the former.
Just for you Timmy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEiLgbBGKVk
Posted by: Terry | February 6, 2010 5:20 PM
2 feet of "Global Warming" hit D.C.!
Posted by: Bruce | February 6, 2010 5:30 PM
Tiny Timmy, all winter long it has been anywhere from -10 to -70 in the Arctic. Happens every winter. Where do you think the cold air c0omes from that this country, Europe and Asia have been getting?
Posted by: John D | February 6, 2010 6:51 PM
It was the snow-job by the Republican-Libertarians, in our Senate, that has paralyzed our government. " Do-nothing " Republican-Libertarians in our Senate have obstructed a Democratic majority, blocking them from doing their job. They figured if they could prevent the Democratic majority from succeeding in repairing the disaster of the Republican-Libertarian, Bush&Cheney Regime, America would reward them, by returning them to their elected offices. I don't think the American electorate is that stupid, in spite of what happened in Massachusetts. The electorate will send these incompetent ideologues packing, they have ill-served America and their constituents. If they don't, these constituents are delinquent in their duties as an American citizen. We all know what that results in, another Bush&Cheney disaster and America is back in the toilet and Corporate America is laughing at us, again !!
SUPPORT OUR TROOPS, BRING THEM HOME, ALIVE AND WHOLE. NOW.
Posted by: Don Fitzgerald, IL | February 6, 2010 6:52 PM
"Snowmageddon' was coined by a Canadian meteorologist 2 years ago.
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/toronto/archive/2008/12/19/live-blogging-the-winter-storm-dubbed-snowmageddon-in-toronto-part-2.aspx
Posted by: jm | February 6, 2010 7:24 PM
- WWN (December 7th, 2009): BIBLE PREDICTS WORST WINTER EVER... Terrifying predictions from the Bible clearly indicate that the winter of 2010 will be the coldest and deadliest winter in history!... The ancient prophecies reveal that the entire country will feel the terrible effects of the cold spell...
- PENTAGON: GLOBAL WARMING might suddenly trigger a massive GLOBAL COOLING... CLIMATE CHANGE WILL BRING GLOBAL CATASTROPHE... Now the PENTAGON TELLS BUSH (Guardian.co.uk., 22 February 2004): climate change will destroy us... BRITAIN WILL BE 'SIBERIAN' in less than 20 years: http://cristiannegureanu.blogspot.com/2009/12/bible-predicts-worst-winter-ever.html
Posted by: Boby | February 6, 2010 11:25 PM
I can only say by reading these posts that if we get a lot of rain, there will be a whole bunch of people building an ark.
Posted by: bill r. | February 7, 2010 7:53 AM
SO "THE SCIENCE IS SETTLED", RIGHT?
*
RFK, Jr. 15 months ago: Global warming means no snow or cold in DC
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who flies around on private planes so as to tell larger numbers of people how they must live their lives in order to save the planet, wrote a column last year on the lack of winter weather in Washington, D.C.
--
"In Virginia, the weather also has changed dramatically. Recently arrived residents in the northern suburbs, accustomed to today's anemic winters, might find it astonishing to learn that there were once ski runs on Ballantrae Hill in McLean, with a rope tow and local ski club. Snow is so scarce today that most Virginia children probably don't own a sled. But neighbors came to our home at Hickory Hill nearly every winter weekend to ride saucers and Flexible Flyers.
In those days, I recall my uncle, President Kennedy, standing erect as he rode a toboggan in his top coat, never faltering until he slid into the boxwood at the bottom of the hill. Once, my father, Atty. Gen. Robert Kennedy, brought a delegation of visiting Eskimos home from the Justice Department for lunch at our house. They spent the afternoon building a great igloo in the deep snow in our backyard. My brothers and sisters played in the structure for several weeks before it began to melt. On weekend afternoons, we commonly joined hundreds of Georgetown residents for ice skating on Washington's C&O Canal, which these days rarely freezes enough to safely skate.
Meanwhile, Exxon Mobil and its carbon cronies continue to pour money into think tanks whose purpose is to deceive the American public into believing that global warming is a fantasy.
Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/RFK-79834057.html
Posted by: Bobby Mobbie | February 7, 2010 9:37 AM
BillyR,
And a lot of people claiming the rain was caused by climate change.
On an unrelated note - got to hand it to you - you are retired and have the wife working? Congrats!!!
Posted by: Terry | February 7, 2010 12:15 PM
Oh relax, people. Of either side of the global warming issue that is.
One snow or cold wave and the right shouts, "Global Warming is Over".
One big heat wave and the left screams, "See, It must be Global Warming".
There will always be weather patterns, whether Global Warming exists or not.
This issue just shows how we seem to choose "extremes" so often nowadays. On one side they'll say "OMG, we better throw alot of money at this". The other side, "It doen't exist, ignore it". With neither caring about the data, or both sides "skewing" the data to fit their agenda.
When, like every issue, there is a happy medium somewhere we should all be able to agree on.
Posted by: Steve34 | February 7, 2010 12:30 PM
In response to truther(cough cough) If it was a word made and used by the post, than that would also confirm it wasnt something Obama came up with by himself.
I heard it used by Meagan Kelly on Friday, before the storm..I wouldnt doubt someone in the WH heard it as well...even though we were told not to watch Fox News
Posted by: Elliedee | February 7, 2010 1:49 PM
Now, of all the authorities that the Republican-Libertarians would not want to reveal, their, the Republican-Libertarians' hoax, is our military, but it has declared the reality of climate change. WOW, boys and girls of the Ridiculous Right, you can now, officially, pull your heads out of your smog !! Breathe a little easier, America, for President Obama is, and will be, handling the crisis, for the foreseeable future !!
As for the Doubting Demagogues, here is some information, for your edification:
http://blogdredd.blogspot.com/2010/02/momcom-and-war-with-earth.html
SUPPORT OUR TROOPS, BRING THEM HOME, ALIVE AND WHOLE. NOW.
Posted by: Don Fitzgerald, IL | February 7, 2010 7:30 PM
FITZ,
Pentagon is probably looking for about $50 billion in additional spending to prepare for this. Follow the money dufus.
Posted by: Terry | February 7, 2010 10:00 PM
Here's another Kool-Aid drinker whose theory on the climate just fell apart. Bobby, better go your tow rope.
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/RFK-79834057.html
One Kennedy rails against the oil's effects on the environment, another Kennedy own's a heating oil company. However, just to make sure he is politically correct, he does partner with every American Flatliners' favorite socialist - Dictator Chavez.
I wonder why Bobby doesn't complain about Joey?
Posted by: Terry | February 7, 2010 10:11 PM
Too much fun, even got the shirt !!!
http://www.zazzle.com/snowmageddon_2010_tshirt-235616099468926888
Shovel On.
Posted by: Matthew Snyder | February 8, 2010 6:10 PM