Just as folks are hoping for Spring to hurry up and come, Old Man Winter reminded us last weekend that he’s still the boss for a little while longer.

A powerful winter storm marched through Kentucky last Friday into Saturday, starting out as rain and thunderstorms before changing to freezing rain, sleet, and finally snow. Across Breathitt County, snow accumulations averaged from two-and-a-half inches to four-and-a-half inches, with a National Weather Service employee reporting 4.5 inches of snow northeast of the Guage community by last Saturday afternoon. Officially at the Weather Service Office on Sugar Camp Mountain, the total snow accumulation was at 2.5 inches.

While the snow brought travel almost to a standstill last Saturday, its wallop wasn’t as powerful as it was in other parts of the region, like the area from Louisville northeast to Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland, Ohio, which got well over a foot of snow and where the storm closed some airports in the Buckeye State.

“We stayed in the warmer air longer on Friday night into early Saturday,” said Bill Modzelewski, who’s a Meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Jackson. “We got lots of moisture before the cold front came in, but as the snow passed over Eastern Kentucky on Saturday, that ‘lift’ of energy in the air that caused the big snows from Louisville all the way up to Buffalo, New York wasn’t in our area.”

Still, the possibility of a major winter storm had some people on Friday making a run to the grocery, the discount center, the convenience store for gas, and the video store. In fact, movie rentals did a big business before the flakes flew, said Tim Morris. “We did a wonderful business over the past weekend. Revenue practically doubled. We saw a lot of people that we ain’t seen in awhile,” said Morris, who’s Store Manager of Movie Gallery on Highway 15 North.

Morris mentioned those folks wanting to hunker down with several flicks began flocking to his store last Friday afternoon. “We had several families come in here then, and parents rented a lot of movies for their children. Our biggest rentals? ‘Into the Wild’, ‘Doctor Doolittle’ and ‘Mr. Magorian’s Wonder Emporium’. It was a good time for the families to stay indoors and watch a movie together.”

On Friday evening most people here watched on TV the reports of heavy snows in Louisville, Central Kentucky and Western Kentucky. And they waited for the storm to come our way. But after a period of heavy rain for much of Friday, some were surprised to hear thunder and see some lightning by the stroke of Midnight. “We don’t usually get this with snow, but the air was quite unstable,” said Meteorologist Modzelewski. “The air was quite intense. And it was that way on Saturday, when the snow finally arrived. The intensity of the snow was more variable on Saturday, like on the ridgetops where the snow was heavier. It’s like how showers and thunderstorms form in the summertime, and you get brief heavy, powerful rains. The same thing happened here Saturday.”

What the snow did last Saturday was postpone the Championship Game of the 14th Region Girls’ Basketball Tournament at Powell County High School in Stanton. Fans of the LadyCats of Breathitt High School would have to wait until the next day - it was rescheduled last Sunday at 3 p.m. - to see if the team would beat Knott County Central and repeat as regional champions.

While several churches across Breathitt County did cancel or postpone their services Sunday morning, the combination of sunshine, warmer temperatures and an extra hour of daylight (thanks to setting our clocks forward one hour the night before) helped to melt most of the snow. As a result, while some nearby counties did cancel or delay the start of school Monday, classes were held at their regular times in the Breathitt County Schools, Jackson Independent Schools, Riverside Christian School and Mount Carmel School.