National Weather Service issues winter storm warning for central Indiana

Photo Provided by the NewsLink Indiana Weather Team
Photo Provided by the NewsLink Indiana Weather Team

The National Weather Service (NWS) Indianapolis issued a winter storm warning for central, east-central and west-central Indiana Feb. 1 at 5:20 a.m. The warning is to remain in effect from 7 a.m. Wednesday, Feb. 2, to 1 a.m. Friday, Feb. 4.  

Ro-Anne Royer Engle, Ball State vice president of student affairs, and Alan Finn, vice president for business affairs and treasurer, sent a campus-wide email Feb. 1 regarding the potential for severe winter weather. The email said “Students should anticipate participating in all classes this week,” leaving open the possibility that “classes will be shifted from in-person to online modalities,” should the weather conditions worsen.

The NWS is reporting an expected 7 inches of snow during this time, after “a brief period of sleet and freezing rain.” Driving of any kind “could be very difficult to impossible” and “could impact the morning or evening commute,” according to the NWS’s winter weather message issued 3:06 p.m. Feb. 1.

The Indiana Department of Transportation tweeted Feb. 1 at 2:32 p.m. urging drivers to “please stay off the roads.” It said it takes plow trucks two to three hours to return to the beginning of their routes, therefore making roads “impassable, depending on snowfall rates, wind etc.”

A winter storm warning can be issued from a winter storm watch if the NWS determines the conditions for a winter storm are expected rather than just possible, according to the NWS’s website.

The email The Ball State Daily News received Feb. 1 from the father of a student of the Unified Media Lab. It is unknown whether the email is a scam or something else. Photo Submitted

The Ball State Daily News contacted Greg Fallon, Ball State chief digital marketing and communications officer, regarding an email from a “Public Safety Advisory” account claiming a campus closure and cancellation of classes in effect “from 7 a.m. Wednesday until 11 a.m. Thursday.” The email was received by a Unified Media Lab student’s father, although there have been no other reports The Daily News is aware of, of students or other parents receiving similar emails.

It is unclear whether this email was some type of scam or something else. Fallon did not answer direct questions about that message. Instead, he said, “We are working to finalize and distribute an email to our entire campus community outlining policies, expectations, and more as it relates to the impending winter storm this week.”

In the campus-wide email, Royer Engle and Finn said to “always assume Ball State is open for regularly scheduled classes and business unless there has been a notice of changes.” 

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