Snow Storm Has Few Stranded Motorists
(Le Mars) — Road and highway conditions continue to deteriorate with every passing hour, and emergency officials have been fortunate that so far during this blizzard, people are staying home and off the roads. Earlier this morning I visited with Plymouth County Sheriff Mike Van Otterloo to ask if there had been many reports of stranded motorists.
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The Iowa Department of Transportation and the South Dakota Department of Transportation have closed down Interstate 29 heading northbound. All roads and highways in northwest Iowa are 100 percent snow covered, and travel is not advised.
Blizzard Hampers Efforts To Clear Roads
(Le Mars) — Plymouth County has pulled their snow plows off the roads until such time visibility improves, and the Iowa Highway Patrol has issued a tow band which means tow trucks are being advised not to pull any stranded vehicle until such time the weather improves. As for the city of Le Mars, Scott Kneip the superintendent for the Public Works Department which oversees the snow removal says its been a battle to stay ahead of the falling snow.
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The city is requesting that vehicles stay off the streets until such time the streets have been cleared. Kneip says most everyone is following that request.
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Kneip says since many businesses, industries, and schools are closed for the day, it has been helpful to the city street crews since they have avoided parked vehicles.
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Weather Channel In Sioux City Covering Blizzard
(Sioux City) — You knew the blizzard that hit northwest Iowa was going to be bad when “The Weather Channel” came to cover the storm. Meteorologist Jim Cantore and his crew arrived in Sioux City Monday and spent the morning hours of the storm broadcasting from the Tyson Events Center parking lot. He says Sioux City was in the heart of the storm this (Tuesday) morning.
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Cantore says visibility will be near zero through the afternoon in the Sioux City area.
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Cantore has spent much of his career broadcasting from the worst storms in the country…something he enjoys doing.
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The Weather Channel team planned on being in Sioux City through the duration of the storm. Interstate 29 was closed from Sioux City to near Sioux Falls as of 11:00 a.m.
Clinton And Sanders End In Virtual Tie Across The State And In Plymouth County
(Le Mars) — Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Rodham Clinton and Bernie Sanders ended their campaign with basically a tie. Mark Sturgeon, vice chairman of the Plymouth County Democratic party says Plymouth County Democrats voted much in the same manner as their counterparts across the state.
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State Democratic Party Officials Say Clinton Won Iowa
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – Hillary Clinton has narrowly won the Democratic caucuses in Iowa, outpacing a surprisingly strong challenge from Bernie Sanders to claim the first victory in the 2016 race for president.
The former secretary of state, senator from New York and first lady edged past the Vermont senator in a race the Iowa Democratic Party called the closest in its caucus history.
The Iowa Democratic Party said Tuesday that it would not do any recount of the close results, and a spokesman for the Sanders campaign said it does not intend to challenge the results of the caucuses.
Clinton Has An Advantage With Voting Delegates
MANCHESTER, N.H. (AP) – Hillary Clinton’s victory in the Iowa Democratic caucuses means she will collect 23 delegates and Sen. Bernie Sanders will win 21.
With her advantage in superdelegates – the party officials who can support the candidate of their choice – Clinton now has a total of 385 delegates. Sanders has 29.
It takes 2,382 delegates to win the Democratic nomination for president.
Des Moines Airport Is Open Again
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – Flights are back in the air at Des Moines International Airport after a band of heavy snow moved through the area Tuesday morning.
Airport operations supervisor William Klees says the heavy snow ended a little after 10 a.m. at the airport and that flights “are back on as scheduled.”
Klees said a number of flights were canceled ahead of Tuesday’s snow.
The National Weather Service has issued a winter storm warning until early Wednesday for a stretch of Iowa starting in the southwest corner, through central Iowa and into much of the northeast region of the state. Most of the northwestern and north-central section remains in a blizzard warning, with heavy and blowing snow until early Wednesday.
The storm came on the heels of Iowa’s Monday night presidential caucuses.
