icy roads

With up to a foot of snow over the past 48 hours, Mother Nature is playing a cruel joke on drivers in Missoula and western Montana today with a good dose of freezing rain over the snowfall.

On the busiest travel day of the year, drivers in western Montana are experiencing a variety of weather and road conditions, according to the National Weather Service.

With the snow showers that arrived just in time for the morning rush hour on Monday, commuters found themselves dealing with very slick roads with little to no warning.

The National Weather Service is calling for an arctic system to enter the Missoula area on Friday, according to meteorologist Jeff Kitzmiller.

As the temperatures have risen around western Montana, snow berms have been melting, making residents think of an early spring, but that will change in the next 24 to 36 hours.

The first calls came in to 9-1-1 late Wednesday evening with vehicles sliding off icy roads in the Butte and Kalispell areas, then as the weather front struck the Missoula area, I-90 became a skating rink for the morning commute.

The National Weather Service is predicting a wintry mix of rain and snow headed toward western Montana in the next few days.

Early on Thursday morning, February 13, media received word that schools and bus services all over western Montana had been delayed by two hours.

Monday night, December 23, Missoula and much of western Montana experienced temperatures just warm enough to allow freezing rain, which has turned into ice overnight into Tuesday.

A winter storm warning has been issued for western Montana by the National Weather Service office in Missoula that will stretch all the way till Wednesday, December 4.

Roads around Missoula are extremely icy on Thursday morning, as rain is freezing as it hits the roadways.

Every Missoulian knows the weather here can change in a Montana minute. That could mean dangerous driving conditions for holiday travelers, and with lots of cars on the road this time of year, there is even more risk of an accident.