“Just stay at home. The biggest risk to life and injuring yourself is to get out on the roads.”
Those are the words of Jacques Thibodeaux, Director of the Governor's Office of Homeland Security & Emergency Preparedness (GOHSEP). He’s been on top of preparing southeast Louisiana for what many in the area have dubbed “Sneauxmageddon.”
He provided many updates on what the state is doing to weather the storm, including the fleet of snow plow trucks that are headed for our area as we speak. But if he had one message to hammer home it’s this: Stay Home. Stay off the roads.
“It came in earlier than we thought it did,” Thibodeaux explains. “Now the snow is here all the way from Lake Charles to Baton Rouge. And for the first time in history, Lake Charles has a blizzard warning…It’s moving across the state quicker than we expected, and it triggered the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development and the State Police to begin closing interstates and bridges across the Mississippi River.”
Thibodeaux shared that if you want to learn about all the road closures, winter advisories, warming centers, and more resources for riding out this storm you can go to virtual.la.gov.
“This is a significant event,” said Thibodeaux. “The freezing temperatures and snow will be in excess of 40 hours. So, please, take this seriously Just stay home. And as the governor said, get a pot of gumbo and ride this thing out for the next two days.”