Archive through January 21, 2003
TV ClubHouse: Archives: 2003 January:
OMG I woke up to snow this morning!!! OMG And its really d@mn cold here too!!!! (ARCHIVE):
Archive through January 21, 2003
Hippyt | Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 05:39 pm     I swear I noidea this was going on!!! And,I have been watching about this storm all day long!!!!!!!! Makes me so damn mad,something like that should never have happened in the first place,and then the way it was handled was simply disgusting!If some man in a pick-up truck could get to these poor kids,then certainly the school or local officials should have taken control and gotten those kids of those buses!!! Makes me angry,angry!!!! Phatcat,I'm so glad to hear everyone is home safe! |
Fluff | Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 05:51 pm     It's snowing here! Doing happy dance! |
Phatcat | Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 06:28 pm     Here is a link to one of the local TV stations if anyone is interested. I hope they are flooded with emails and calls from irate parents of these children. There is also a news report on this site about the policeman who shot the family dog when the car was stopped because of an erroneous report filed by a concerned citizen who saw money flying 'out of the car'. It was actually the guy's wallet...he left it on top of his car before he drove off. Hippyt, the guy in the pick up called into WSMV4 and was interviewed by Dan Miller, the news anchor. While the man was trying to help...and certainly did help get several children home...I also have to question who permitted those children to go off the school bus in this weather with a stranger. What if he had been a serial killer? Just unbelievable. I'm anxiously waiting for the 10:00 p.m. news to see what time all the kids got home. A school board official was on the 6:00 p.m. news telling folks that the 'majority of the kids were home, safe and warm'. When pressed further by the anchor on that broadcast as to how many buses were still stranded, he replied...'I really have no way of knowing'. OMG...rage is all I can say about how I felt. Why the he!! didn't he have a way of knowing. As I said before, there are radios on the buses. I have let all the local stations know my feelings...in no uncertain terms...about their coverage of this situation. AARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH http://newschannel5.com/ You stay safe, Fluff. HEEVY girl! Sure wish Firebird would check in with us. |
Firebird05 | Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 08:07 pm     Sorry I did not check in sooner y'all. Dh and dd finally made it home around 5pm board time and all are okay. Dh took so long cause he was helping other stranded people. I don't know if all the children have made it home yet or not. Dh said there were still alot of children at the school when he left. Right now they seem to be more interested in covering there backsides than anything else. They said "We cannot close schools based on a forecast." Even though it's been done many times before. They seem to think they did a good job. There are still alot of people on the road and in trouble so your continued prayers and concern are appreciated. Thanks for your thoughts and prayers my way. Birdie |
Phatcat | Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 08:27 pm     Birdie...so thankful your loved ones are safely home. And you are exactly right...they have closed the schools many times before based on a forecast. I agree that the media is downplaying this to cover their "backsides", as you politely put it. The same school board official, mentioned in one of my earlier posts, was on at 10:10 p.m. announcing that the last group of children had just been safely delivered to their homes. He added that there were three buses still stranded and someone was being dispatched to pick up the drivers of those buses. The children had already been taken off. It looks like this same weather system is now covering the Carolina's and Virginia so please be safe all our friends in those areas. Thanks again to all who responded with love, prayers and concern. |
Firebird05 | Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 08:37 pm     Yeah Phatcat. When they came on to say "in the best interset of the children we are closing schools tomarrow", I had to wonder best interest of the children or give the parents a few days to cool off. They messed it up big time. But then they usually do. I wish I had gone with my own instincts and not sent them to school at all. My love and prayers to the ones that are still in the path of this storm. |
Juju2bigdog | Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 08:45 pm     Wow! I neglected to read this thread earlier. I had no idea this was going on. Firebird, I make it about 8-9 hours that the dh was gone to get the dd? Phatcat and Birdie, I am so glad your families are safe. |
Phatcat | Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 09:05 pm     Thanks, Juju. You know, Birdie, there is something really strange about the lack of coverage by the local stations on this story. Are they trying to protect the Board of Education? The TV crews could have just gone on one of the buses and interviewed the kids, stayed with one of the buses till they got all the kids safely home, interviewed the parents...lots of ideas for great news coverage. But...NOTHING to speak of. I really don't understand this, but I am not going to stop trying to get some answers. Then I wonder if the reason they didn't do something like that is that they didn't want the public to see how upset those children were. OH I AM STILL SO ANGRY!!! |
Firebird05 | Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 09:05 pm     Yeah JuJu it took about an hour to take them to school, which is normal, eight hours to get them back. I wasn't really worried about dh, he is an ex Army Ranger and was station in Alaska for two years. The probelm was more that we had no communication because all the cell phone lines were jammed. Because dh has a good 4 wheel drive vehicle and knows about snow he did his "dudley dooright routine" and spent alot of time helping others. I am glad he did but I still was pretty unnervered, even though I knew they were probably okay. But everyone is home and safely tucked into bed now. So now I am just looking out the window enjoying the beauty and praying that everyone else makes it home safe. |
Firebird05 | Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 09:15 pm     Phatcat I am guessing the media doesn't want to point fingers because thay blew it so bad. They told us the snow would not be here till noon and didn't report snow untill it actually fell on their heads. The schools are saying that they cound not call it untill there was actual snowfall. As we know that is to late here. For those who don't know TN it is not because we are all ignorant and can't drive in the snow. It's because the only straight flat roads we have are the interstate. Everything else is all hills, curves and steep inclines. There is no good excuse for their call. |
Crossfire | Thursday, January 16, 2003 - 09:35 pm     This is probably not the time or place, but that never stopped me before. From what I can tell, but being angry at the schools is not really being terribly helpful or fair to the officials and emergency personnel who are most likely doing the best they can in what I think can be fairly described due to record snow as an extraordinary situation. Once crap happens, there is very little they can do to speed it up. It was mentioned that this had been on the TV for days. Maybe the parents should have kept the kids home of their own volition, mine used to do that. Regardless, I would not be looking to assign blame so much as making sure it does not happen again, or at the least, making sure there is a plan in place for when it does as weather can be unpredictable at times. I am also concerned about the guy running kids around in his truck. In my opinion, that was the wrong thing to do on many levels. I am very surprised the bus drivers let the kids out of their custody. What would have been more appropriate if he was mobile, and wanted to help, would be ferrying supplies around. In situations like that, he was at just as much risk of getting stuck or having an accident as any of the other stuck vehicles. He put the kids at considerable risk. Had he himself become stuck in an unknown location, then we have two problems instead of one. Can you imagine if all the kids but the ones he took got home, the parents would be freaking out wondering where the heck their kids are. I think in those situations, it is important to keep the kids together in one safe location until a proper plan is in place than having 'some guy' scooting them around in a pickup truck. As far as the media goes, from what was said earlier, it started snowing around 9am. If they were not expecting it until 12, I can't say I am surprised that they were not able to report it until it was on their heads. Weather is not an exact science, sounds like they only missed by a few hours after warning people for days. Sounds pretty reasonable to me. I think some slack needs to be cut all around. Bottom line: Glad to hear it sounds like the worst is over with, everyone stay home tomorrow and enjoy, it should be sweet to look at if you don't get to see it often. Make an angel and a snowman, please don't hate me. |
Squaredsc | Friday, January 17, 2003 - 09:35 am     i don't agree with you. |
Crossfire | Friday, January 17, 2003 - 09:54 am     Uh huh, that's fine. Happens all the time. |
Webkitty | Friday, January 17, 2003 - 10:18 am     Phatcat and Firebird and any others that went through hours of panic yesterday, I'm glad your little ones are home and safe. When 911 happened, I got a call from my son who lives there, right as it was happening. He said he was headed that way to see if he could help. I pleaded with him not too, he told me not to worry, and he would call me. He never made it near there, but I didn't know that as the phone lines went down shortly after. I didn't hear from him until late that night. I lost my mind. So, I can understand fully the panic and desperation of any who haved loved ones in a dangerous situation, and not being able to receive word of them. (no matter how old they are) I won't go into whose fault the snow situation was, its not for me to say. I just wanted to let you all know I'm happy the little ones are safe. |
Marysafan | Friday, January 17, 2003 - 10:24 am     A few years ago when I first moved to this community, I was asked to be part of a citizens committee for the school system. They had divided the school system into different sections and I got put on the safety committee. While we were discussing ways to make the school environment safer, we became aware of a policy that floored us. We found out that our school buses (in very rural Iowa) did not have radios in case of emergency or at the time cell phones. The policy was (I swear I am not making this up) that in the event of a breakdown...the driver HAD to stay with the bus...while an "older" child went for help. Can you even imagine! Needless to say when we made the parents aware of this situation...radios were bought and installed within months. The following year there was a bus accident where the bus rolled over into a ditch. Thank goodness they had those radios installed and help arrived in very short order. |
Dahli | Friday, January 17, 2003 - 10:39 am     That is precisely Crossfire's well made point, change and improvement is far more productive than anger and blame... I would agree. |
Squaredsc | Friday, January 17, 2003 - 10:54 am     until you have a child stuck on the road. anger is never productive but it is a human emotion. and yes i would blame school officials for not closing the schools in the first place. our school system closed schools in anticipation of a pending bad snowstorm so that no one will be stranded. of course last nite we had what i would call a dusting of 1 to 2 inches and schools opened 2 hrs late. its better to err on the side of caution espcially when kids are involved. |
Zachsmom | Friday, January 17, 2003 - 10:57 am     I could understand not anticipating the severity of the storm..you cannot predict mother nature.. I could not and do not understand the bus driver(s) allowing children to leave his care with a stranger!!! That is totally unacceptable! |
Phatcat | Saturday, January 18, 2003 - 11:58 am     Well, Cross, I spent all day yesterday FTPing with Whit so I am just now getting back to this thread. After watching the news last night, I found I was not the only parent/grandparent who was angry about the handling of this situation. Common sense decisions would have better served these children. The schools never should have opened, parents shouldn't have allowed their children to go to school with the impending storm, the weather forecasters knew quite early how fast the storm was moving and how fast the snow was accumulating, the children should not have been sent out from the schools on the buses...at least had they stayed at the schools, they would have had heat, food, water, bathrooms. All three TV stations broadcast nothing but live feeds from crews all over Nashville from 8:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m. You could see the school buses in the background on many of these feeds. The crews were going up to truck drivers and interviewing them...I just didn't understand why they didn't go on one of the school buses and talk to the kids. One mother was told her child was at school, it took her 2 hours to get to the school...only to find her son had been put on a school bus before she had called the school. Four hours later, her son got home...after he was let off the bus several blocks from his home and walked home. He was 14 years old. Another young girl, who was interviewed last night, said after four hours the bus stopped at a gas station so the children could go to the bathroom. The school board official said many mistakes were made, but the bottom line was that they got 45,000 kids safely home with only one child being injured. A car slid into a child who was walking from the bus, but no serious injuries. As for the pick-up truck driver...my son-in-law teaches school in the community where this happened and he said that everybody knows all the people in that community. Still, there would have been some serious liability issues had any of those children been injured. Oh well, its over now and hopefully there will be strict guidelines and procedures before anything like this happens again. Thanks again to all for support and prayers during that awful day. I pray all of you are safe and warm. |
Crossfire | Saturday, January 18, 2003 - 12:58 pm     Sounds like you guys had a heck of a time, I am glad to hear they managed to get them all home. I hope the child injured walking from the bus makes a quick recovery. I also feel bad for the driver involved, I myself have nearly been in the same situation, and it was by far the scariest thing I've personally experienced. To be in an automobile heading toward a child is the stuff of nightmares. I have a dozen other thoughts but I doubt they would be well received so I am going to spare everyone. |
Crossfire | Tuesday, January 21, 2003 - 04:29 am     Sure could use a stern blast of the fabled global warming right about now. Brrrrrr. |
Jeep | Tuesday, January 21, 2003 - 05:13 am     I bet, Crossfire! I saw the weather map and Canada looks like a big deep freeze. It's heading my way, so I'm going to stay inside as much as possible this week. By the weekend we should be up to freezing, ha! We had a dusting of snow this am, to. WHERE IS SPRING???? |
Lumbele | Tuesday, January 21, 2003 - 01:23 pm     Awwwwwwwwww, poor Crossfire - NOT! Cheesh, Toronto sounds practically balmy compared to our temps. Wanna blow some of that warm air West, please? And they *really* could use your new toy down East. |
Crossfire | Tuesday, January 21, 2003 - 01:30 pm     Hehehe. Looks like I got busted. |
Dahli | Tuesday, January 21, 2003 - 02:50 pm     Hello!! - we got the wind chill warning crawling across the screen all afternoon... my poor whippets are beggin' to go to Toronto for relief! |
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