SOUTHEAST MISSOURI SNOWED IN; SNOW REDUCES TRAFFIC TO CRAWL, PRODUCES WRECKS

Mother Nature started dumping snow on Cape Girardeau County around 10 a.m. Friday and, predictably, the car accident reports began rolling in an hour later.

By late Friday night, there were four inches of snow on the ground, and many residents heeded advice on television and radio to stay off the roads.

But they were out driving at noon, and Cape Girardeau police eventually responded only to accidents with injuries, Sgt. Carl Kinnison said. There were six officers on duty, all working at accidents, and there were nine more accidents to handle.

"This happens when we have a snow or ice or anything of this nature," Kinnison said. "At some point, you have to make a call and tell people to just exchange their information, come in later if they need a report and work it out with their insurance companies."

The primary concern was keeping traffic moving, he said, something that wasn't easy. Cars were backed up along Route K after a tractor-trailer jack-knifed at Route K and Edgewood Road.

In the meantime, officers with the Missouri Highway Patrol were busy with a late-morning accident on Interstate 55 near Benton. A tractor-trailer jack-knifed there, too, blocking the passing lane on the southbound side. A patrol spokesman from Troop E in Sikeston said rumors about the patrol closing the interstate were untrue -- traffic was moving so slowly it only seemed to be closed.

By Friday evening the snow had stopped, but as temperatures began to drop the melting snow turned to ice and a second wave of accidents kept authorities jumping.

At about 8:30 p.m., police and rescue personnel responded to at least three accidents near the 105-mile marker of Interstate 55 near Fruitland.

At least one person was transported by helicopter from the accidents near Fruitland.

Earlier on Friday, area schools, including Cape Girardeau, Jackson, Scott City and Sikeston and several rural districts, began sending students home around 1:30 p.m. Most canceled Friday-night basketball games.

Cape Girardeau had an extra problem getting some of its students home -- about 2,300 were being transported to the Show Me Center for a performance of the "Nutcracker" when the decision was made to cancel school.

"When the buses showed up at the Show Me Center, we sent them back to the elementary schools," Superintendent Neyland Clark said. "We had some buses in areas that weren't able to get up some hills, but we had a lot of help from the Public Works Department and got the kids home."

Public Works Director Doug Leslie mobilized his crew mid-morning, sanding bridges and hills. He said his department spent Thursday readying for the snowfall, and said employees would work through Friday night, depending on what the weather did.

There isn't much chance of the ice clearing off roads today, according to National Weather Service reports from St. Louis. Forecasters predict a bitterly cold day with highs around 20 in Southeast Missouri.