LJWorld.com / Clearer skies give time to clean up

Archive for Friday, January 7, 2005

Still much work to be done removing debris after the winter storm

January 7, 2005

The county's battle with a torrid ice storm looked to be ending Thursday as the sun made a brief appearance and began melting away some ice.

But snow-removal efforts at the city's recreation facilities hardly have started, said Fred DeVictor, director of the city's Parks and Recreation Department.

"We were busy with limb removal and didn't get much of a start on cleaning up," DeVictor said.

A light dusting of snowflakes fell Thursday, but not enough to make much of a difference in weather conditions, said Matt Sayers, 6News meteorologist.

Sayers expects mostly cloudy skies today with high temperatures in the low 30s. By Sunday, the mercury will hit about 57 degrees.

Electricity out

People with the city and area businesses kept busy Thursday removing fallen tree limbs while Westar crews worked to restore electricity to 1,200 customers in the Douglas County area.

By 6:30 p.m., about 100 customers were still without electricity.

The electric company brought in extra crews from St. Louis and Omaha, Neb., to help with the job, said Gina Penzig, Westar spokeswoman.

Iced-over trees loom large in the background as neighborhood friends, from left, Armand Eich, 7, Dalton Stender, 10, and Ben Richards, 8, take turns pulling each other on a sled in central Lawrence. The trio navigated the icy streets Thursday, the second consecutive day that schools were closed.
Photo Gallery: After the Winter Storm

"We've just had a lot of power lines down because of tree branches taking them out or ice accumulating on wires," she said.

The delays in restoring electricity had officials with the Kansas Department of Agriculture advising people who lost power to assess their food before eating it.

"If a consumer is in doubt, it's best they throw the food out," said Evan Sumner, food safety director with the Kansas Department of Agriculture.

Refrigerated food should be safe as long as the temperature hasn't been above 40 degrees for two hours or more. Frozen foods are safe and can be refrozen if the temperature of the food did not exceed 40 degrees. If a frozen food still has ice crystals in its package, its temperature did not rise above 40 degrees.

When perishable foods such as meat, poultry, seafood, milk, eggs and cooked vegetables are not properly refrigerated or frozen, they can cause illness when consumed, even if thoroughly cooked.

Accidents minimal

Emergency crews were put through the usual paces dealing with accidents and falls, said Lawrence-Douglas County Fire & Medical Deputy Chief Mark Bradford.

Oskaloosa and Basehor-Linwood public schools won't be in session today. District officials called off school because of weather conditions. Check www.ljworld.com for additional closings and cancellations.

"It was the type of things you would expect with this weather, but there was nothing out of the ordinary and nothing too bad," Bradford said. "We had the normal minor car crashes and calls on people slipping and falling."

Bradford said there was some concern about the traffic involved with the Kansas University basketball game Wednesday night against Texas A&M University.

"But it went fine," he said.

Law enforcement officers in surrounding counties said they had few accidents, considering the icy road conditions, and the ones they worked generally involved no or minor injuries.

Although some city recreation facilities opened an hour or two later than usual Thursday, Tim Laurent, facilities operations supervisor for Parks and Recreation, said they should be on regular schedules for the remainder of the week.