Weather outside is frightful, fun – and frustrating

Thursday’s storm left about 75 travelers stranded at Spokane International Airport overnight, and while flights were returning to normal Friday, plenty of travelers were still facing delays and cancellations as the airlines tried to fit them into an already packed schedule.

Matt Oh, a student at Gonzaga University trying to get home to Portland for the holidays, spent the night at the airport after his Thursday night flight was canceled. He got a standby ticket for an early-morning flight Friday, but “it got delayed, like, five different times.”

He decided to give up.

“I’m driving to Portland now,” he said.

A classmate, Nick Howell, had his flights home to Phoenix canceled both Thursday and Friday.

“The next flight is Sunday night,” he said. “So that’s what I’m on.”

Todd Woodard, airport spokesman, said the airlines were working hard to get travelers to their destinations.

“I think we’re getting back to normalcy,” he said.

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Charles Hawkins was out walking his two dogs at midday Friday, on his way to the store to pick up nuts to feed the squirrels outside his mother’s home and lettuce for a neighbor’s hamster.

“I’m on a life-saving mission right now,” he said.

A resident of northwest Spokane, Hawkins found himself snowbound at his 81-year-old mother’s residential complex on East 27th Avenue on the South Hill. His truck, parked along the curb, had been under a heavy white mound. It took him two hours and a borrowed shovel to dig it out.

“I’ve never seen this much snow at one time in my life,” Hawkins said. “Never. My dogs love it.”

Just up the avenue, a station wagon and a small SUV awaited a police car after a fender bender. A big Chevy pickup spun out trying to go up the small rise, then gave up and turned around. Royce Fry and his mom, Tammy Fry, hauled bags of groceries back from the store.

A car spun to a stop in the deep snow nearby.

“Now you see why I didn’t want to drive to the store,” she told her son.

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If the snow was causing headaches and backaches for some, it was causing some big smiles elsewhere.

Shannon Eaglin and her two kids were among a group of people sledding down a short, steep pitch at Chase Middle School.

“This is perfect sledding,” she said. “It’s just a matter of whether you can get here” on the roads.

The sledders had constructed a snow ramp in the middle of the hill, and some sledders launched into the air – and sometimes tipped over after missing the approach.

Thirteen-year-old Tatum Eaglin said that was her favorite part – “the suspense of going off the jump or not going off the jump.”

Erika Whittaker, a student at Western Washington University home for the holidays, took full advantage of the snow, strapping on cross-country skis to get across town to meet a friend and then to Manito Park for sledding.

“The side streets are really nice because they’re not groomed,” she said, taking a break at Lincoln and 22nd.

The arterials – “the groomed ones,” she said – were a little trickier.