THE NORTH CAROLINA FLYOVER – Winter Storm Fern caused hundreds of collisions, thousands of power outages, and widespread flight cancellations over the weekend. The storm also prompted multiple school districts, including Wake, Charlotte-Mecklenburg, and Winston-Salem/Forsyth County, to either switch to remote learning or cancel classes entirely today.
Ice-coated roads are delaying the effectiveness of the salt and brine that NCDOT crews applied in advance. The North Carolina State Highway Patrol responded to 207 collisions and 265 calls for service between 6 p.m. Saturday and 6 a.m. Sunday alone.
Just under 28,000 power outages were reported by Duke Energy, Dominion Energy, North Carolina Electric Cooperatives, and ElectriCities as of 6 p.m. on Sunday, with roughly 41% of them in Henderson County, according to ReadyNC.gov.
The airports were also in disarray. More than 1,100 flight cancellations were reported at Charlotte Douglas, and around 360 had been canceled at Raleigh-Durham International Airport as of Sunday afternoon, according to FlightAware.