Some ice that accumulated overnight in Pine Bluff melted away by Wednesday morning, but that’s just it — some of it melted.
An ice storm warning remains in effect until noon Thursday, with rain/freezing rain most likely and patchy fog set to descend on Pine Bluff Wednesday evening. A low of 29 degrees tonight and more of the same is forecast for Thursday, which could see a high of 35.
The warning, updated Wednesday morning, extended into counties farther south of Jefferson, including Drew, Bradley, Calhoun, Ouachita and Desha. Jefferson, Arkansas, Dallas, Cleveland and Lincoln counties are also impacted by the declaration from the National Weather Service office in North Little Rock.
Entergy crews were seen staging at Walmart and hotels in Stuttgart in preparation for the ice storm, but no outages were reported in Arkansas County as of 1:50 p.m., according to Entergy’s outage map. There were 29 outages reported west of Pine Bluff at the time and 419 in the vicinity of Fordyce.
Pine Bluff, Watson Chapel and White Hall school districts announced classes would remain in alternate methods of instruction for a third straight day Thursday.
No announcements about Thursday’s classes had yet been made for either the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff or Southeast Arkansas College.
Both the city of Pine Bluff and Jefferson County announced its public offices would remain closed Thursday due to inclement weather. Jefferson County Judge Gerald Robinson said no emergency services would be affected by the closure of the courthouse and county offices.