Ohio, at least among Ohioans, is infamous for its unpredictable weather.
However, this past weekend the weather forecasters hit the proverbial nail on the head with the "Blizzard of '08".
Of course, the blizzard hit in March, so Ohio's claim to wacky weather still holds true.
The blizzard caused winter storm warnings from Tennessee all the way north to upstate New York and Maine, according to ABC news.
Westerville received 20.5 inches of snow over the weekend, 15.5 inches coming on Saturday alone, which caused a number of cancellations.
Franklin county was under a level 2 snow emergency warning and Delaware County was under a level 3 last Saturday. These warnings meant Westerville citizens were to avoid driving and use extreme caution if driving became necessary.
"You kinda bank on the common sense of the individual," said Westerville Police Chief Joseph Morbitzer.
High winds between 30-40 mph caused near-whiteout conditions and blizzard warnings Saturday, making driving or going outside dangerous. Drifts of snow reached 5 feet or more in some areas, covering cars and making Sunday travel difficult.
Morbitzer felt roads were cleared in record time by the crews, compared to surrounding areas.
"I complimented those folks several times over the weekend...my opinion is they did an outstanding job," said Morbitzer. "Our roads were much clearer."
Otterbein was the last campus in the area to close on Friday, five hours after OSU. "OC is kind of like the gold standard. It's like 'OK we held out long enough'," said assistant director of physical plant Mark Ewing about the 3 p.m. closing.
In the 21 years Ewing has been working with Otterbein, the college has closed only one other time for inclement weather.
The service department is responsible for clearing out all college property, while Westerville road crews take care of the streets. President C. Brent Devore takes recommendations from the director of the service department and then makes the call to close or reopen the college.
"I actually called him [the director] on Saturday and said they need to cancel these events," said Ewing.
The most stressful event for the service department was the track meet held over the weekend that continued despite the blizzard.
"There was at least one event this weekend that I thought should have been closed...there was a level 3 warning, that means people could get arrested for driving," Ewing said of the meet.
The security department and the service department worked together to help students deal with the blizzard's aftermath.
"The biggest problem that we had was students snowed into their parking place," said head of security Larry Banazsak. "We have shoveled many students over the weekend, sometimes they have to shovel themselves out, sometimes we can help them."
The service department brought in extra equipment and workers put in overtime hours to help dig the college out. Two subcontractors assisted in plowing parking lots.
"When you get hit with a record-breaking storm you just have to get it done and that costs money," said Ewing. t&c;
