Extremely cold temperatures are expected to accompany the latest winter storm set to impact the listening area through the end of the work week.
With wind chills possibly ranging from -15 to -30 between Thursday night into the following work week, the National Weather Service has issued a series of wind chill watches for the entire listening area from 6 pm Friday through noon Tuesday. CareArc Nurse Practitioner Tammy Black recently spoke with KVOE News to offer some tips that can help residents combat the biting cold.
Black says the best thing one can do to avoid negative impacts from the cold is simply to stay out of it altogether. If that is not possible, however, Black says residents need to take several precautions starting with bundling up.
Black adds that those who are working in the outdoors or need to be out for any reason should take breaks and limit their exposure to the elements. With temperatures such as those forecasted in the coming days, Black says it can take very little time for cold-related afflictions, such as frostbite, to set in.
Black adds another major concern that many don’t often take into account but need to be aware of is hypothermia.
If you believe you are suffering from either frostbite or hypothermia, you should seek medical attention immediately.
Current forecasts are calling for accumulating snowfall in the evening hours Thursday with overnight lows around 10 degrees and wind chills between -6 and 4. Conditions will only get colder with low temperatures forecasted around 1 Friday evening and daytime highs in the low teens through the weekend.
Temperatures are expected to remain in the low single digits through the Martin Luther King Day holiday before warming up into the upper teens by Tuesday with highs approaching 20 degrees. Stay with KVOE, KVOE.com and KVOE social media for more weather updates as they develop.
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9:45 am Wednesday: WEATHER: Road conditions closer to normal; power almost fully restored areawide
After a combination of powdery snow and blustery winds, the weather picture is a good deal calmer Wednesday.
This includes travel, which has seen notable improvements in and out of Emporia from Tuesday afternoon onward. Lyon County conditions are already improved because roads aren’t drifting shut nearly as quickly as they did for most of Tuesday.
Emporia’s street conditions saw another step towards normal flow by mid-morning as sunshine combined with temperatures nearing 25 degrees, the magic mark for the city’s treatment materials to have a significant impact. Temperatures are set to climb to the mid-30s by late afternoon, so arterials and residential collector streets will likely all be wet for the afternoon hours. Side streets may also see a decent amount of melting.
Another improvement: the number of outages and affected utility customers. After close to 3,000 customers offline at times areawide between Evergy and 4 Rivers, the area total is under 30 at last check — all through Evergy. The 4 Rivers outages were restored before 4 am Wednesday.
Snow totals ranged from moderate to heavy:
*KVOE studios: 6 inches snow
*5 miles east-southeast of Emporia: 6.4 inches snow
*3 miles northwest of Emporia: 4 inches snow
*1 mile west-northwest of Americus: 6 inches snow
*BETO Junction: 10 inches snow
*Burlington: 6 inches
*Cottonwood Falls: 6 inches snow
*Council Grove: 8.5 inches snow
*5 miles north of Dunlap: 9.3 inches snow
*Eureka: 2 inches snow
*Gridley: 7.3 inches snow
*Lake Kahola: 4-6 inches of snow. Drifts as high as 4 feet.
*1 mile south-southeast of Lyndon: 9 inches snow
*Overbrook: 10.9 inches snow
*Wilsey: 9 inches snow
5:40 am Wednesday: Travel conditions, power outage numbers improve considerably
Travel conditions are already better than they were Tuesday across the KVOE listening area, and that improvement could well continue all day.
Lyon County and KDOT road crews had a long, frustrating Tuesday due to high winds and drifting snow. Here’s Seth Snyder of the Lyon County Highway Department:
In town, Emporia Police Sgt. Dominick Vortherms says conditions improved all day Tuesday.
For area highways, several were cleared Tuesday but a number are still having issues as of 5 am:
*Interstate 35 is completely covered east of Kansas Highway 130
*US Highway 50 is partly covered west of Emporia
*US Highway 56 is partly covered from Burlingame to Herington
*US Highway 75 is completely covered from Kansas Highway 58 north to I-35 and partly covered from I-35 north to Carbondale
*Kansas Highway 99 is completely covered from the Lyon-Greenwood county line north to US Highway 56
*Kansas Highway 130 is completely covered from I-35 south to Hartford
*Kansas Highway 170 is completely covered from K-99 to Reading and partly covered from Reading to Osage City
*Kansas Highway 177 is completely covered from Cassoday north to Council Grove and partly covered from Council Grove to Manhattan
Despite the conditions and a fair number of noninjury wrecks, there were no injury crashes reported. Emporia Police used its Phase 2 Emergency Crash Reporting procedures for much of Tuesday but have since returned to normal crash reporting.
Another component of the winter storm was a long list of power outages, some of which were significant. Emporia had around 2,000 Evergy customers offline Tuesday, the vast majority of which lost power along and east of Commercial Street for several hours. All told, there were about 2,500 Evergy customers and another 300 with 4 Rivers who were offline at times Tuesday. As of 5 am Wednesday, Evergy’s area list is much smaller:
*Madison: Under 10 customers
*Lyndon: Under 20 customers
All told, Evergy says its crews and contract crews restored power to over 160,000 customers statewide. All 4 Rivers outages from Tuesday have been restored.
Weatherwise, attention turns to our next winter storm, which could give us up to 2 inches of snow Thursday night into Friday — and will give us our coldest air this winter afterward. Overnight lows Friday will be below zero with wind chills around -20 or lower, and overnight lows could approach -10 by Sunday night.
Be sure to stay with KVOE, KVOE.com and KVOE social media for updates. If you have schedule adjustments — closings, cancellations, delays or postponements — to announce, call KVOE at 620-342-1400, email kvoe@kvoe.com or message the Bluestem Farm and Ranch text line at 620-342-5863. To find us on social media, look for Facebook@kvoenews, Instagram@kvoenews, YouTube@kvoenews or X@kvoeam1400.
*Click here for KVOE’s YouTube channel, including weather and travel updates.
Photos by KVOE listeners and Chuck Samples/KVOE News
