Hello, and welcome to tonight’s HD News Channel on-the-spot weather report.  The weather has been unusually cold — as if you haven’t noticed the single digit temperatures. Sure makes me wish I could find my scarf and gloves. I’m freezing out here in this wind.

This unusual cold is caused by what we in the weather business call a polar vortex. If you donWe’t know what that means, don’t worry about it. Actually, we don’t either, but we have to have something to blame besides Old Man Winter.

We were getting pretty excited here at the weather station when it looked as if there was a possibility of snow. We had cameras down at Public Works taking pictures of the piles of salt and the salt trucks all lined up in a row like Army tanks.  Unfortunately, we will not be showing those pictures tonight since it failed to snow. Too bad since we even had the scoop on how it can get too cold for the salt to work.

Although we didn’t get to create our little snow panic, we at least have some cold weather to report about. Busted water mains are shooting water out on the roadways. People are hitting the ice and spinning out of control. Watch out! Here comes one now. Whew, close call. Here come the police and tow trucks with lights flashing. There is plenty to report on with a polar vortex even if the snow didn’t materialize.

We threw a cup of boiling water into the air earlier and filmed it so you could see it instantly freeze and fall as snow. By the way, don’t try this at home as it might come down as boiling water and scald your face. Don’t ask us how we know.

We are heading over to the local district’s school bus lot now to show you all the buses with dead batteries. Good thing they decided to cancel school. Lots of people had the same problem with cars, so we are going to call AAA and find out how many calls they are receiving. Well, the line is busy, but believe me, folks, you don’t want to know, especially if you are one of the customers waiting in the cold for a tow truck to arrive sometime this week.

A lot of people are missing work today. The freezing rain froze car doors shut, a perfect excuse to “work from home.”  I was a little late myself, but I swear, my car doors really were frozen shut. I tried hot water, hair dryer, heating pad, everything until I remembered I had a remote start feature and could turn on the heater in the car.

Our featured story tonight is one that is really attracting attention. Over at City Park we found a couple of ducks frozen in the ice on the pond. Park employees had to launch a kayak and chip them out with a hammer. It drew quite a crowd. Animal rescue has pronounced the ducks okay; however, they will take them into custody for observation. Animal experts tell us they are geese, not ducks. Should have known it would be a silly goose that didn’t have enough sense to get out of the water.

One more thing before we sign out for the evening. Remember how we told you to run a little trickle of water to keep your pipes from freezing? Well, forget that advice. Seems so many people are doing it that the city water department is running out of water pressure and wants people to conserve water. 

And that is the HD News on-the-spot weather report for tonight. Be careful out there and stay off the black ice. See you tomorrow morning with an exclusive report about vehicles in the ditch alongside of the Interstate, including the van belonging to our weather team. 

Copyright 2014 Sheila Moss