Winter weather cancels flights, leads to death in Texas

Thank goodness.

At least this storm is supposed to move along fairly quickly. I’ve observed that Austin drivers are among the worst in any place I’ve ever lived, and that’s on dry roads. They drive the same way on wet, icy roads!

I’ve lived here over 15 years, used to live in a much icier, snowier, major winter state. Texans just can’t handle it. It is not a major storm. We’re having the very lightest icing. It’s enough to be crap to drive on if you don’t know how, and if the city/state doesn’t sand or salt. Of course, in most areas here, they don’t have the equipment. In larger cities they do, but just close down the high flyover ramps and such. There, it’s no big deal to drive unless you’re an idiot.

Which some are. I’ll never forget the day we went to a volunteer gig after a winter storm like this, and narrowly avoided being hit because some Trumpy moron in a jacked up diesel truck and no traction decided to try to gun it up the hill coming the opposite direction from us. We wound up in the ditch because it was the only place to duck the truck as it went airborne, flipped upside down, flew down the hill, and slid on its roof. Other cars and trucks, like ours, had been scooting up and down that hill with little trouble. The little car ahead of us was lucky not to have been taken out as it easily cleared the top of the hill as the truck flew up it at high speed and flipped.

Expensive stupidity tax.

And they drive like STUPID assholes when it rains or snows

Link to tweet

Au contraire, my esteemed colleague! We are a very large state and driving habits vary regionally as well as personally. Your over generalization does injustice to the kinder folk as we creep toward blueness. For example; folks in Houston drive like a stock car round track, everyone vying for a better position, while the people in the Peoples Republic of Austin tend to drive like those in L.A., more like a NASCAR race, close, fast and controlled. Go blue! Have a good year.

Texans like to think of themselves as tough and independent but they seem to fall apart with bad weather - crowding the stores for: 1/4" of ice that will last for....a couple of days

Texan. I have to agree. I remember the mad rush at the grocery stores like it was the apocalypse for a day or two of weather. Now I live in the Sierra foothills and can't imagine how any of my family or friends in Texas would survive a winter here. Hell just a week of it would send them all over the edge.

but from my experience living in Texas a long time, there's a bit of ice almost EVERY winter

the laws of physics and common sense and make roads too dangerous for the rest.

(I am hoping my son there takes my advice and stays home today!)

And yet, they get ice storms maybe once a year, and everything comes to standstill. It's shocking to me that even the airport has no way to salt their runways or clear off the ice or snow.

People who don't know how to drive on ice are SMART to stay home and take a day off work or school.
Ice is scary and dangerous to drive on - take it from a northerner.