1-2 inches of snow falls in Richmond area with more on the way Thursday

Richmond and surrounding areas had received 1 to 2 inches of snow as of 6 p.m. Wednesday, but the National Weather Service said up to 2 more inches of snow could accumulate by the end of Thursday.

A winter storm warning remains in effect for the Richmond area until 6 p.m. Thursday. The warning advises travelers to plan for slippery road conditions.

Larry Brown, a forecaster with the NWS Forecast Office in Wakefield, said any additional snow would likely occur during the mid-to-late morning Thursday.

Elsewhere in Virginia, the Hampton Roads area had 2 to 4 inches of snow heading into Wednesday evening. The region was expected to be hit with heavier snow later Wednesday into Thursday.

Including Hampton Roads, NWS projections had southeast Virginia and northeast North Carolina looking at approximately 6 to 10 inches of snow from the storm.

The Virginia National Guard had around 65 soldiers and airmen staged in Bowling Green, Sandston, Lynchburg, Emporia, Virginia Beach and the Eastern Shore, plus another 25 soldiers on duty in Southwest Virginia to support response operations.

The troops were sent to help with transportation, distributing supplies and clearing out debris.

More snow days for schools

In various social media posts, Henrico, Chesterfield and Hanover schools announced that they would close Thursday due to the ongoing inclement weather. Richmond schools will have remote/asynchronous learning.

Henrico schools said 20 minutes will be added to school days from March 3 to March 26 to make up for instructional time lost from Thursday’s closure.

Hanover schools said Thursday’s closure would not require an adjustment to the school calendar, but that the next inclement weather day would result in a remote learning day.

Fewer crashes, outages

Virginia State Police reported that 250 crashes occurred throughout the state between midnight and 4 p.m. Wednesday, with 23 of them resulting in injuries. No fatalities were reported.

Central Virginia had 25 crashes during the same time frame, including three with reported injuries.

In a Facebook post, Chesterfield Police said they responded to 118 crashes and 39 disabled vehicles between 8 a.m. and approximately 4:30 p.m. Wednesday.

Chesterfield Fire & EMS responded to 20 weather-related calls for service between 8 a.m. and 3 p.m., with most of them relating to motor vehicle crashes.

Last week, 951 statewide crashes were reported by VSP during a 40-hour period in the midst of the last winter storm. No fatalities occurred from those crashes, but 95 of them had reported injuries.

Dominion Energy’s outage map showed nearly 300 customers without power in the Richmond and Tri-Cities areas Wednesday afternoon, but that number dropped to 123 by 6 p.m.

Last week, more than 94,000 customers in the region experienced power outages during a winter storm that included ice and high winds.

Including this week’s storm, Richmond is having the snowiest February in recent years. In 2021, the city received 2.8 inches that month.

The last February in Richmond to hit double digit snow totals was 2015, when 12.2 inches dropped on the city. The all-time February snow total on record in Richmond is 21.4 inches, which happened in 1983.