SC snow icy dangerous highway road travel I-95 near Georgia | Myrtle Beach Sun News

It’s still not safe to travel Interstate 95 in the Lowcountry on Thursday, and the South Carolina Department of Transportation is discouraging motorists from venturing out on that roadway in the wake of snow, ice and last night’s hard freeze.

The interstate is one major South Carolina highway that SCDOT said is “periodically having ice issues causing delays” in a 6 a.m. Thursday news release. According to the department’s SCDOT 511 website, much of the current traffic — especially southbound — is moving under 30 mph between Ridgeland and the Georgia state line.

Currently, parts of a nearly 80-mile portion of the interstate are “impassable,” according to officials, who say drivers will have to use different routes.

The South Carolina Department of Public Safety tweeted at 10:53 a.m. the following: “ALERT: The Highway Patrol and SCDOT caution motorists that portions of I-95 are impassable from MM 77/US 178 to the Ga. State Line. Motorists must use alternate routes as SCDOT continues to work to clear the roads. Use 511 for road conditions/alternate routes.”

As of 10:51 a.m. Thursday, SCDOT 511 reported a disabled vehicle northbound near Exit 18 (Bees Creek Road) that had blocked all lanes. The Georgia Dept. of Transportation reported an incident close to the same location it said was backing up traffic all the way to the state line.

Illinois truck divers Lynnette Hamill and Todd Giroux, splitting up the driving and hauling Amazon goods, said they were in standstill traffic at Mile Marker No. 9 heading northbound around 9:45 a.m. Thursday. At 11:15 a.m., an hour and a half later, they had moved just one mile, Hamill said via text message.

It had taken them almost three hours to drive about 10 miles this morning, Hamill said.

Patrick Boyle, a truck driver hauling steel who lives in Rincon, Ga., said he finally gave up and pulled off I-95 at Exit 8 around 2 a.m. Thursday. It had taken him more than five hours to get there from Exit 33, about 25 miles north.

Boyle walked to the U.S. 278 overlooking I-95 around 8 a.m. and took a picture of standstill traffic. “So, my load’s not going to make it on time, of course, and I wanted some proof about why (it) wouldn’t make it.”

As of 9:15 a.m., he hadn’t yet gotten back on the road, and he said traffic was “crawling.”

He slept in his truck last night, and he said a lot of other truckers did, too.

“If they try to get out and go anywhere this morning, it’s going to take them hours,” he said.

Collisions have been reported as recently as the past three hours, when a northbound accident closed a lane near Exit 21 at 7:05 a.m, according to SCDOT’s Low Country Twitter feed.

And a southbound collision near Exit 8 closed the right lane around 8 a.m., according to SCDOT 511.

“I’ve done some checking on I-95, and the issue we’re dealing with is significant icing,” S.C. Highway Patrol spokesman Lance Cpl. Matthew Southern said Thursday morning. “So our biggest plea is if you don’t have to get out on the road and travel, please don’t.”

Southern advised that motorists in need of assistance can reach the Highway Patrol by dialing *47. If you have to travel, Southern advised that you decrease your speed and increase your following distance.

Collisions — some of which blocked all lanes at some points — were reported throughout the predawn hours on that Twitter feed. Nearly a dozen collisions occurred between midnight and 7 a.m. Thursday, according to that feed.

Accidents on I-95 snarled traffic for hours Wednesday.

Leaving Bluffton around 1 p.m. Wednesday, a reporter with The Island Packet and The Beaufort Gazette said she had not made it to Savannah as of 8 p.m. She confirmed two tractor-trailer accidents southbound and one northbound. An editor for the newspapers reported a commute of more than four hours from Bluffton to Savannah.

This story will be updated.