Ithaca’s biggest snowstorm of the year brought more inconveniences across campus than major damages. In all, more than two feet of new snow accumulated from Thursday night to yesterday.
The Cornell University Police Department reported only minor incidents, with several cars crashing into snow banks due to the slippery road conditions and needing assistance to get out, according to Simeon Moss, deputy University spokesperson. But there were no injuries reported due to the accidents and the cars were later able to drive off on their own.
Moss said CUPD also monitored students sledding down Libe slope throughout the weekend and issued “a lot” of warnings to students that were sledding too fast or dangerously, but made no arrests.
The storm also caused inconveniences for several University employees and campus clubs.
One Bear Necessities employee, Rebecca Niles, was forced to stay overnight at the Hasbrouck apartment complex –– an option that Cornell Dining offers Bear Necessities staff if its too late or dangerous to return home.
“The reason I stayed there was because the roads were bad and kind of slippery and the storm was still there,” Niles explained. “Plus I had work the next day.”
Ronnie Horton, a supervisor at Bear Necessities, said that they needed to operate with a short staff on Friday, as some employees were unable to get to work.
Campus groups were forced to try to reschedule guest speakers that were no longer able to travel to Ithaca.
The Society for Human Resource Management, who was expecting to hear today from Sean Kelley — the staffing director for Microsoft — was unsure whether they would be able to schedule another date, according to the club’s president Patrick Ryan ’10.
The University’s delayed 9:30 a.m. opening compelled some eateries to change their hours.
“[We] opened at 10 a.m. instead of 8 a.m. on Friday,” Michael Shores ’10, an employee at Libe Café, stated in an e-mail.
Yet for most students, the snowstorm was cause for celebration and many took advantage of the University’s delayed start time as well as the two feet of fresh powder.
One student, Tommy Gabay ’12, said that he skipped his classes on Friday to go to Greek Peak and snowboard.
“How often do you get to ski in those kind of conditions?” he said.
Others were just happy to sleep in for the morning.
“I wasn’t at all disappointed that my 9 a.m. class was canceled,” Sam Mark ’13 said.
Original Author: Ben Gitlin