Many children in the snow-affected areas of north and central Mississippi are back to school today. However, as MPB’s Sandra Knispel reports, some areas are still struggling with power outages.
Kids in Oxford used the snow for snowball fights on a snow-covered trampoline, happy to miss a couple of days of school. But for those who were left without electricity, the winter white is a lot less attractive. In Grenada County, about 2,500 were still without power yesterday afternoon after receiving 6 to 8 inches of snow on Wednesday. Trebia Rodgers is the Grenada County emergency manager.
“The majority should be late tomorrow afternoon but it might me mid-day Saturday before they get all of them back on,” said Trebia Rodgers.
Surprisingly, the Red Cross Shelter at the Lewis Johnson Senior Complex in Grenada served only a handful of people yesterday, despite the county’s best attempts to get the word out. Just south one county over – Montgomery County is also still struggling with power loss after 8 inches of snow, says its emergency manager Allan Pratt.
“We still got approximately 4500 customers out of electricity, which you know they are working on, trying to restore,” Pratt said. “Our roads are travelable and passable but you need to watch bridge and overpasses and low-lying areas."
In Oxford and Lafayette County, meanwhile, things are almost back to normal after about 5 inches of snow and two missed school days. David Shaw is the Lafayette County emergency manager .
“All of the primary roads and most of the secondary roads are in excellent shape.”
According to MEMA, at the peak a total of about 40,000 customers, most of them in north central and northeast Mississippi, lost electricity.