National Guard called to help snow-stranded Kentucky drivers

Kentucky officials reported record snowfalls across the state that stranded motorists and knocked out power.

Emergency officials called in the National Guard on Thursday morning to help people whose cars were stuck in a massive traffic jam on Interstate 65, a north-south artery connecting Lousivlle, Bowling Green and Nashville. Emergency management coordinator Olivia Berry said 18 inches of snow fell quickly overnight, leaving cars and trucks stopped along all the highways that go through Elizabethtown, just south of Louisville.

"Right now, people have been stranded for ... hours," she said early Thursday. "The snow fell fast and hard."

The worst highway conditions were on a 40-mile stretch of I-65 that was impassable because of cars and trucks, said Chuck Wolfe, spokesman for the State Transportation Cabinet.

"There were so many vehicles that got stuck through the course of the night that our plows couldn't get access to the highway," Wolfe said.

By noon, highway officials said traffic was starting to move in that area.

Wolfe, the Transportation Cabinet spokesman, said the problem was complicated because Ky. 313 in Hardin County is usually a detour off I-65, but it was blocked also. Jackknifed trucks also stopped traffic on the Bluegrass Parkway.

Officials in Franklin and Scott counties begged motorists to stay off hazardous roads.

In Nelson County, Eva Prewitt of Nelson County Emergency Medical Services said the county judge-executive signed a state-of-emergency declaration. Nelson County EMS couldn't transport patients from a local hospital to other hospitals because both the Bluegrass Parkway and I-65 in Hardin County were closed.

"We are only transporting people from residences if it is a life-or-death emergency," Prewitt said. "To get to some residences, we have to get the county road department."

In addition to helping stranded motorists on I-65, the National Guard helped remove vehicles that were abandoned.

This story was originally published March 5, 2015 at 1:55 PM with the headline "National Guard called to help snow-stranded Kentucky drivers."