MENTOR, Ohio — With a record number of people hitting the road this Thanksgiving holiday, all have their eyes on the weather, but nowhere is that more true than those heading east on Interstate 90 through Lake and Ashtabula counties.
News 5 caught up with Bill Kinman of Louisville, Kentucky, traveling with his family 600 miles to Rochester, New York. They made a switch to his car, which is better in the snow for the trip in the event they hit a squall on their return trip on Saturday. The key on this day, though, was getting on the road early, like before sunrise.
“My daughter said that we have to get out by 4 a.m., but we got out about 6:30 a.m., so it did help,” he said.
Of all the holiday travelers this weekend, those taking Interstate 90 between Cleveland and Western New York do so knowing things could get dicey.
“Coming from Indianapolis, going to Buffalo,” said another driver we caught up with on Wednesday. When asked if he had any concerns about the weather for his return trip, he offered a nervous laugh.
Michigander Sue Benson knows she’ll be rolling the dice on her drive back from Binghamton on Monday.
“Going towards the Great Lakes, you could be in serious trouble, but I’m originally from there, so I have a little skill,” she said.
Steve Bogran of Uniontown is headed to Syracuse and coming back on Saturday.
“So hopefully, we’ll make it back,” he said, adding he’ll check Mark Johnson’s forecast. “I’m following Mark, and hopefully, he can guide us to safety to get back.”
Most travelers we spoke with enter this tri-state lake effect corridor, fully aware of the chance they’d be taking in a few days. Greg from Wadsworth is driving back from Erie, Pennsylvania, on Saturday. “Is it supposed to snow,” he asked. “It looks beautiful.”
With lake-effect snow, though, looks can be deceiving. Sunny in one spot, and then maybe these 20 miles away white-out conditions. That’s why Mark Johnson’s familiar refrain, “where squalls persist,” will come into play.
Those on the road for the next few days know that ODOT will be watching the radar closely and will be ready to move their crews accordingly to where the lake effect bands are set up.
"If we know that it's going to start hitting really, really hard in Lake and Geauga Counties but not so much on the West Side of Cuyahoga; we can shift crews to those areas to help keep the roadways as safe and passable as possible,” said ODOT’s Amanda McFarland.
