Fun today, gridlock later

A major winter storm laid a quilt of snow and ice across the state and region Saturday, and below-freezing temperatures set in, setting up the likelihood of a messy morning as the workweek begins.

Roads were slickened with snow and ice, and officials urged people to check news sources today for the possibility of school and work delays or closings on Monday.

Many churches were canceling services for today. Many grocery stores were planning to open today.

Raleigh-Durham International Airport is open this morning and prepared for commercial airline departures and landings, but about 40 early-morning flights were canceled. More than 325 flights were canceled Saturday, according to an RDU news release, but the airport remained open and received some commercial flights Saturday night.

If you have plans beyond playing board games, sledding or hunkering down, the safe bet: Check first.

Most school systems will decide today about what to do on Monday. Officials want to see how quickly road crews can make side streets and neighborhoods clear enough for buses.

"People at the least need to make contingency plans for a delay or closing," said Michael Evans, a spokesman for the Wake County school district, the largest in the Triangle. "The conditions are probably still going to be a problem, and we will watch to see."

He said the school system will likely decide this afternoon.

Temperatures should warm up by midday Monday and are expected to be in the mid-40s by Tuesday.

The storm, predicted for nearly a week, arrived after rush hour Friday evening and dropped a mixture of snow and sleet through Saturday afternoon.

Many people celebrated their snowy Saturday by sledding in parks, on hillsides and steep roads, by building snowmen or by lobbing snow balls - though the snow in most places was a light, powdery substance that wasn't the best for packing. Sleet topped the snow in most places, too, packing it down.

By midafternoon, when the storm tapered and moved on, the National Weather Service logged accumulations of:

4 to 5 inches in Raleigh.

4 inches in Apex, Holly Springs and Wake Forest.

5 inches in Cary.

7 inches in Durham.

7 inches in Chapel Hill and Hillsborough, with an 8-inch reading at UNC-Chapel Hill.

The average annual snowfall for the Triangle is about 7 inches, according to records.

"This is definitely a significant snowfall," said Brandon Dunstan, a meteorologist at the weather service in Raleigh.

The storm dumped as much as 15 inches in the mountains as the system generally tracked Interstate 40 across North Carolina, with more accumulations north of the highway. Charlotte and the Piedmont saw anything from flurries to as much as 9 inches.

Gov. Bev Perdue declared a state of emergency as power outages were reported, mostly in the western part of the state.

Beware the roads

Officials expect driving to be treacherous Monday morning, and Perdue urged people to consider taking a day off.

"If you don't have to be there, don't go there," the governor said.

In the Triangle, power companies said few customers were without electricity at sundown.

The state Highway Patrol reported 1,000 wrecks across the state. There were no reported fatalities.

Instead, there were reports of a lot of fun.

In Cary, a hill overlooking the lake at Bond Park was packed with more than 100 sledders for most of the day.

Sled styles ranged from the fancy to the improvised with the traditional metal runner variety and wooden toboggans, as well as plastic discs, kayaks, inner tubes, and even a lid from a plastic storage bin.

One mom was seen scraping snow out of the ears of her young son after a wipeout, and many went flying into the air after being clipped by other sledders while trying to make their way back up the hill after a run.

In Raleigh, impromptu sledding hills sprang up across the Quail Hollow, Lakemont and Hickory Hills neighborhoods in midtown Raleigh.

About 60 people, both kids and adults, were sledding in the parking lot of the Lakemont Swim & Tennis Club on Harvard Street about 10 a.m.

Summoned by e-mail

"It's like having your own ski resort in your neighborhood," said Emily Powell, who lives on nearby Radcliff Road.

Powell said neighborhood Bunco and poker groups had sent e-mail to their members about meeting up. Still, the big turnout surprised her.

"All of a sudden, just everybody started coming out here!"

Sledder Amy Moreau said this is the best snow her children - Allison, 7, and Logan, 4 - have seen in their lifetimes. "It's been kind of lame before," she said.

Logan particularly relished his first experience sledding. "It's fast!" he said.

A few blocks away on Purdue Street, others gathered at a longtime favorite sledding spot. Will Costen, 20, who lives on the street, spent Friday preparing for the snowstorm. He made his own special sleds, using old skis from Goodwill and attaching particle board to them. The squeals of sledders seemed to attest that his creation was a success.

But it wasn't all play. A few folks were working. Kendra Gibson, 17, and her sister Kerri Gibson, 15, were busy shoveling the driveway for their grandmother, Louise Williams, on Latimer Road.

Just ask Grandma

Williams wasn't excited about the prospect that ice would form on top of the snow.

"I came from New York, and I know about ice and snow," she said.

But, for the sledders, the thought of ice on snow suggested that the sleds would go even faster. Many were already making plans to gather Sunday morning.

In Chapel Hill, snow plow operators and coffee shop barristas and bartenders seemed to be the hardest-working people in town. City buses ran on a reduced schedule.

But all was not quiet on the western front.

At 2 p.m., hundreds of UNC-Chapel Hill students gathered at the Old Well for a snowball fight.

Zac Lyon, 19, an N.C. State University student from Greensboro; Michael Clear, 19, a UNC-CH sophomore from Greensboro; and Andy Lewis, 19, a UNC-CH sophomore from Rome, Ga., had matching snow outfits. They all sported what they called "onesies for large children," colorful long johns with a sports theme. Adam Canosa's mom, a Mount Airy woman with a crafty touch, had knitted each a scarf to go with the outfit.

Andrew Green, 19, a sophomore from Charlotte, found out about the snowball fight on Facebook. One thousand people had confirmed they would show, so Green and Heather Marley, 18, a freshman from Louisville, Ky., came prepared to scoop masses of snow with two storage-bin tops.

Nisa Gabbidon, 19, a freshman from Sunrise, Fla., was skeptical when she first heard the weather forecasts for a huge snowfall. "I was like, 'North Carolina says they're going to get snow, but you never know,'" she said.

On a Southern campus where there's little need for traditional sleds, students toted makeshift ones of cardboard and storage-bin tops. Some students lugged snowboards to steep hills around town.

At some point, though, the students and others said the novelty of the snow would wear off.

"One or two days is enough," said Nick Wilson, 19, a sophomore from Wilmington. "A week of this would be too much."

Staff writers Scott Sharpe, Brooke Cain and Thad Ogburn contributed to this report.