Updated- 9:00 a.m. Accumulating snow continues to fall across the Riverhead area this morning, making travel difficult on local roads.
State, county and town plow trucks have been out plowing but all roads are snow covered and slippery, Riverhead Police said in a travel advisory this morning.
Until very early this morning, the National Weather Service was predicting the precipitation would change over to sleet and rain very quickly, Riverhead Highway Superintendent George Woodson said in a phone interview.
But the storm track shifted and Riverhead is getting more accumulating snow than originally forecast, Woodson said.
The weather service issued a winter weather advisory for northeast Suffolk County just before 4 a.m.
“We had a small crew out at 3:30 this morning, but once the forecast changed, I called in everyone to plow,” Woodson said.
The highway superintendent called on residents to stay off the roads this morning.
“The roads are slippery. If you absolutely must go out, you’ve gotta slow down,” Woodson said. “We say it every time. People think they got four-wheel drive and can do the regular speed limit. It doesn’t work that way,” he said.
Woodson repeated his mantra: “Drive for the conditions of the road.”
There have been several minor accidents already this morning.
An Uber driver with two passengers in his vehicle lost control on Route 58 and crashed into a utility pole on the south side of the road near McDonald’s. No one was injured, but the car and the utility sustained major damages.
The winter weather advisory will remain in effect until noon today.
Police urge residents to remove their vehicles from the street to increase the effectiveness of snowplowing operations.
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