How the winter weather played out on campus, in city
8:33 p.m. Tuesday – Snow begins to fall, accumulating at the airport for the first time since January 2011.
11 p.m. – Snowball fight on the Horseshoe
Hundreds of students flocked to the Horseshoe Tuesday night to get up close and personal with the winter weather. Snowballs flew through the air, and students ran all over, either for cover or into the battle.
First-year sport and entertainment management student Abby Hunt walked all the way from Bates West to see what all the fuss was about.
“I’ve been out here for about two hours, so my hair is like a congealed mess,” she said as snowballs whizzed overhead.
Student Body President Chase Mizzell ventured out into the storm wearing moccasins, though he would have worn flip flops had he not misplaced them, he said.
Then Mizzell paused.
“Okay, he put snow in my ear,” Mizzell said, gesturing to a friend, “so I’m gonna go tackle him.”
He did, running down the Horseshoe, picking up his friend and taking him to the ground.
—Hannah Jeffrey, News Editor
11:30 p.m. – Snowman building on the Horseshoe
Ramona Angus had planned to stay inside and read a book during the snowfall.
After all, the third-year anthropology student is from Pennsylvania, so a few inches of snow didn’t seem like much.
“Then you start hearing people outside from your dorm room, and you just want to go out there and have fun with everyone,” she said after pushing piles of snow together to build a snowman.
Across the Horseshoe, groups of students shouted as snowball fights broke out.
Angus built her snowman beside Ashley Thoerner, a first-year biochemistry and molecular biology student, who said she understood the late-night glee. She remembered that as a kid, she piled together all the snow she could beside her family’s barn in Aiken and built a snowman so big it spooked the horses.
“I definitely think the snow brings out the child in everyone,” Angus said.
—Thad Moore, Editor-in-Chief
Midnight Wednesday – Car troubles on Blossom Street
Away from the Horseshoe, not everyone was enjoying the snow.
On Blossom Street, a group lined the back of a sedan, pushing the car as its wheels spun out on the hill between Bull and Sumter streets as SUVs and trucks passed by. No luck.
The driver gave up, backing up, hopping the median and driving downhill. At the bottom, the car spun 180 degrees, and the driver revved his engine before making another try at the hill.
The tires squealed, and the hill won again.
—Thad Moore, Editor-in-Chief
1:30 a.m. – Sledding on Blatt fields
While the Horseshoe was quieting down, students across campus were trekking out to USC’s steepest hills, at the Blatt P.E. Center, with makeshift sleds in hand.
The newly fallen snow was littered with students attempting, and often failing, to sled down on anything they could find in their dorm rooms and apartments. Students in the Honors Residence Hall took the tops off their desk chairs and slid through the snow sitting down. Although some of the chairs came back damaged, most seemed to think it was well worth it for the adventure.
Other students used kayaks, propelling themselves down the slopes with paddles. Some took the lids from storage bins in an attempt to join in on the fun.
If they couldn’t find anything appropriate for sledding from their own rooms, students looked other places.
By the end of the night, meal trays from Russell House were scattered across the snow-covered ground.
—Natalie Pita, Assistant News Editor
2:55 a.m. – The snow stops falling.
9 a.m. – The National Weather Service lifts its advisory for Columbia.
12:30 p.m. – Groucho’s
The icy parking lot was empty, save for a few snow-dusted cars, but Groucho’s was packed on the inside.
The Harden Street sandwich shop provided students with a warm place to sit and a hot meal, as much of USC’s on-campus dining was closed due to the weather.
Waitresses carrying sandwiches and sodas wove in and out of the tables, while friends squeezed six or seven people into booths made for three or four. Coats and scarves hung on the backs of chairs, and hungry patrons waited by the door, ready to pounce on tables as they opened up and place orders of their own.
—Hannah Jeffrey, News Editor
2:35 p.m. – Plows return to storage lot
By the afternoon, Columbia’s snowplows were on their way back into storage, having cleared the city’s main roadways.
The city had eight plows running during the storm, starting at around 8:30 p.m. Tuesday, along with four sand spreaders and two salt trucks.
Jeff Glenn, Columbia’s assistant street superintendent, drove the last plow back Wednesday afternoon. He worked the day shifts Tuesday and Wednesday, spreading salt and plowing roads from 8 a.m. until 8 p.m.
“We’ll have a few guys out with trucks tonight, and of course, we’ll respond to any calls from the police department if we get any,” he said.
—Hannah Jeffrey, News Editor
5:30 p.m. – Parking woes in garages
Many students decided to stay on campus because of the weather and the hazardous roads, and Jeffrey Murphy, a first-year business and economics student, said that the Blossom Street Garage seemed more full than usual when he tried to find a parking spot after returning from visiting a friend off campus.
“I had to park on the third floor, which is weird,” Murphy said. “Today it’s really full.”
He was right: Almost all of the parking spaces in the garage were occupied. The Bull Street Garage had closed during the storm, so USC let drivers with spots there park in the Blossom garage.
One car had to drive backwards the length of the garage so it could turn around to hunt for an empty spot on another level. And while parking was messy Tuesday and Wednesday, Murphy said he thought the roads “weren’t that bad.”
—Ginny Ryerson, The Daily Gamecock
5:54 p.m. – USC delays its Thursday schedule, canceling classes that start before 10 a.m.