SURRY COUNTY, N.C. (WGHP) — Once it started flurrying in Surry County on Sunday night, the roads became super icy, and drivers started to panic.
“When you see a hill glazed over of complete ice … you begin to be real nervous real quick,” Pilot Mountain Rescue Chief Elijah Childers said.
The ice was so thick, it took hours for first responders, salt trucks and tow trucks to clear the road.
“I had tractor-trailers beginning to slide down the embankments,” Childers said.
Alex Niston was among the many who got stuck on the mountain. Her family waited for two and a half hours while the road was cleared.
She said she learned a lesson about traveling with kids from this experience.
“I was absolutely terrified of her waking up. We had no formula. We had no food with us … If she would’ve woken up, I would’ve had no way of feeding here,” Niston said.
Childers says the pressure was on to get the road cleared.
“The reason we were out there working 52 so hard is if there was an incident, there’s no way I could get a rescue truck out to help somebody,” Childers sid.
Childers said 52 is the main route in and out of town, so when it’s backed up, it puts the whole community at risk.
Surry County EMS Director Eric Southern says they were answering calls across the entire county.
“Several crashes were on hills and things like that, so we actually had to put our paramedics into four-wheel drive vehicles to do get down to the patients,” Southern said.
Southern confirmed that as of Monday morning, there were 73 crashes and 22 incidents that held up traffic.
