If you have been in or around North Carolina during the winter, you have probably noticed that things can get downright apocalyptic when it snows. Even before it white (or gray, we’ll get into that later) stuff, it seems that everyone loses their minds; upon the news stations announcements of a potential winter storm, shelves that once held bread and milk become barren in a matter of seconds.

As northerners continue to immigrate into Charlotte and Raleigh, more cries of “North Carolinians suck at winter” can be heard. Power outages, en-masse school closures and massive pileups that would be unheard of in our nation’s northern reach are common here in the Old North State. Is it simply because we have no idea how to operate in winter weather? I would argue that something more is at play here.

See, when we get winter weather here in North Carolina, we rarely ever get just snow. Because the state is not often cold enough for the pure, white, fluffy stuff, we commonly get a nasty, gray cocktail of sleet, ice and snow commonly referred to as a “wintry mix.” This results in slick, nasty roads which further magnify North Carolinians’ general lack of winter weather driving skills. This ice also has the nasty habit of sticking to power lines and trees, and knocking them down.

Granted, northerners also often receive the frozen garbage that is freezing rain; who could ever forget the devastating 2008 ice storm, when roughly 1.7 million people lost power and five people lost their lives. The key difference between in northern and southern ice storms, however, is that while northern storms are occasionally accompanied by ice, southern storms almost always are. In 2002, we got our own severe ice storm, complete with 1.7 million residents losing power and ice accumulations as high as 3/4 of an inch in some places.

Another problem that North Carolinians deal with when it comes to winter weather is the daily melt/refreeze cycle. While the days of snowstorms are usually below freezing, the days after usually are not. This results in the wintry mix on the ground melting during the day, only to refreeze during the night, obliterating any chances that the roads could be usable. This nifty climatological feature, combined with the severe lack of winter weather infrastructure, causes roads to be crappy well after a snowstorm. If you threw the average Bostonian or New York driver into two inches of ice and slush, I’m certain they wouldn’t do much better than many North Carolinians simply because very few people can drive competently in those conditions.

Having lived my entire life in North Carolina, there are some actions that my fellow Tar Heels take that still confuse me to no end. After 18 years of existing in this state, I still don’t really understand the milk and bread thing (which apparently isn’t just a North Carolina phenomenon). And North Carolinians (or anyone, for that matter) who continue to drive on the snow when every news station says “hey, maybe don’t do that” cause me to question the sanity of my fellow residents. At the same time, I have seen Floridians and Marylanders doing even more moronic things when skies are clear and roads are dry.