ATLANTA — It’s not an official emergency – not yet – but the state and city of Atlanta are closing government offices Tuesday and some school districts are keeping kids home.
Officials are bracing for the worst even though it’s unclear how bad it will get.
The Georgia Department of Transportation has 900,000 gallons of brine and its workers are going to start spreading it shortly after sunset.
The state aims to use its supply of brine to thwart the dreaded "black ice" – the slick and all but invisible traffic wild card.
“There is a history there that the state is not willing to repeat,” said state homeland security director Homer Bryson during a Monday news conference.
The history that looms in metro Atlanta is now five years old -- the icy weather from January of 2014. That sneaky storm stranded thousands of people on roads around metro Atlanta.
When state officials viewed weather maps Monday morning, they had flashbacks.
“It’s moving in so quickly, temperatures are going to plummet, and it's very similar to what we saw in 2014,” said Gov. Brian Kemp.
The 2014 storm was a daytime event that caught people at work and at school. Roads froze quickly. Motorists and school buses became stuck, immobile, on impassable highways.
Tuesday’s weather is also forecast to strike hardest during daylight.
“Very similar to 2014 is the (upcoming) weather event,” said Russell McMurray, director of GDOT. “And because we don’t want a repeat of 2014, we have already begun to pre-treat our streets,” said Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms.
That pre-treatment did not happen in 2014. State officials in 2014 admitted they misjudged the storm and mishandled the response. They have spent five years trying to avoid a repeat.
“As my mother often says, it’s better to be safe than sorry,” Bottoms said Monday. “You can see the message is pretty clear: Err on the side of caution,” added Georgia State Patrol commander Mark McDonough.
State and city officials say they expect to decide Tuesday whether to extend government office closures into Wednesday.