Afternoon commuters handle slick roads and whiteout conditions traveling past the Kelly and Diehl car dealerships on Route 8 south of Butler. Icy conditions plagued rush hour travelers across the county Tuesday evening.

Emergency dispatch radio early Tuesday evening was bombarded with reports of stuck drivers, vehicle accidents and icy roads.

According to emergency services radio chatter and 911 dispatches, road conditions in Cranberry Township deteriorated rapidly late Tuesday afternoon, causing multiple crashes and dozens of backups during the evening commute.

Road conditions worsened throughout the evening across Butler County.

Franklin Road was declared “a sheet of ice” by one officer at 4:30 p.m., with several cars disabled.

Accidents at the roundabout on Glen Eden Road and another at Unionville and Ogle View roads occurred while officers at the Franklin Road crash asked 911 dispatchers to close the road.

Various backups were reported by police, including those on Route 19 from Rowan Road south and Thomson Park Drive from Rochester Road to Costco Wholesale.

Whiteout conditions also closed Route 228 according to emergency radio personnel.

Dispatchers sent crews at 5 p.m. to South Main Street Hill in Butler Township for a report of multiple cars stuck on the hill. Police were sent at 5:10 p.m. to Jackson Township for a report of seven cars stuck on a hill on Kniess Road.

And around 5:30 p.m. dispatches sent crews to a reported four-vehicle crash on Upper Harmony Road, where one vehicle was on its side with an uninjured woman trapped inside.

Jason Dailey, Cranberry Township director of public works, had some advice for drivers who wanted to get home safely.

“Everybody's really getting used to winter driving, so give yourself plenty of time in advance,” he said.

He said the township prefers applying anti-icing brine mixed with liquid magnesium chloride — those straight lines of color seen on the interstates before snow or ice storms — before a snow event.

But with Monday's high of 56 degrees keeping precipitation in a liquid form, it wouldn't have worked.

“The characteristics of this storm are different,” Dailey said. “There was rain ahead of that, it turned to snow overnight and right before rush hour. We didn't have that option for this event.”

The rain-before-snow event in this storm is not unprecedented, Dailey said. But no matter how much the township lays down salt, it still can inconvenience drivers who may be used to already melted snow by the time they start their commutes. “We will typically have a bunch of freeze-thaws early in the season, and we will have a bunch of freeze-thaws at the end of the season,” he said. “We have enough material, and we're prepared for those types of events.”

Instead, salt truck drivers went out en force at 4 a.m., salting the 130 miles of road for which the township is responsible. Salt, however, takes time to work. That didn't bode well with the sudden spurts of whiteout snow.

“It needs time to work, it needs time to get worked into these tire tracks, especially with these fast-moving squalls that can put down a half-inch, three-quarters of an inch (of snow),” Dailey said.

While only an inch of snow was expected on Tuesday, temperatures dipped to the mid 20s, with wind chills in the teens.