By BECKY KISER
Hays Post

The Winter Storm Warning for Ellis and Trego counties expired at noon today but the storm isn’t over. The National Weather Service (NWS), Dodge City, has issued a Winter Storm Advisory until 3 p.m., and a High Wind Warning continues also until 3 p.m.

Winds gusting as high as 60 mph will cause patchy blowing and drifting snow. Just before 9 a.m., NWS reported a peak wind gust of 46 mph at the Hays Regional Airport.

By 8 a.m., Hays had received 2.7 inches of snow. City Manager Toby Dougherty declared a Winter Storm Traffic Emergency Sunday at 7:27 p.m. in front of the storm. During such a declaration, it is unlawful to park a vehicle on any street designated as an emergency snow route. The declaration remains in effect until further notice.

Midwest Energy crews are working to restore power outages throughout northwest Kansas, including in the Victoria area.

In the city of Victoria, a blown transformer in a substation has crews working to re-route power from other directions, while a new transformer is brought in and installed today.

At noon, Kansas Highway Patrol Trooper Tod Hileman reported westbound I-70 just west of Russell is back open after a temporary shutdown to pull a semi-truck out of the median.

“Be careful if you are out driving,” Hileman cautioned. “The roads go from just wet to slushy into icy, then to whiteout conditions all within a few miles stretch.”

According to the Kansas Division of Emergency Management, reported snowfalls include:
1 inch = Russell
2 inches = Gove
3 inches = Norton, Phillips
4 inches = Logan
5 inches = Cheyenne
6 inches = Rooks, Norton

The Kansas Army National Guard Stranded Motorists Assistance Response Teams continue to patrol roads and had assisted at least 11 motorists by noon.

Numerous roads remain closed in northwest Kansas including I-70 from WaKeeney to Limon, Colorado.

For updated road closures and road conditions visit www.kandrive.org.