By David Schuh and Anne Halliwell

news@kykernel.com

For the first time since 2003, UK has had two snow days in a school year.

“Unfortunately, the snow isn’t really good for snowballs and snowmen,” said freshman Carli Ackerstein. “Too powdery.”

Ackerstein was out with a group of friends Monday who braved the biting winds with a sled in front of  W.T. Young Library.

Ackerstein said many of her friends decided that the weather was too chilly for playing in the snow, but she was undeterred.

The university made the decision to cancel classes at around 4 a.m. Monday. The snowfall started later and lasted longer than initially expected, said UK spokesman Jay Blanton.

“It became challenging to get ahead of that,” he said.

WKYT chief meteorologist Chris Bailey said main roads probably would not be clear until Tuesday and side roads until Wednesday.

The roads are particularly bad because of the type of precipitation the winter storm brought, Bailey said.

“Any time you start out with ice, then sleet on top of it, then snow on top of that, you get kind of a cake layer. You know the roads are going to be absolutely horrible,” he said.

It was not clear Monday night whether there would be cancellations or delays on Tuesday. Blanton said crews have been working around the clock since 2 a.m. Monday.

Many students took full advantage of the day free of class.

Later in the afternoon, about 30 students gathered on Stoll Field to pelt each other with snowballs.

Mechanical engineering and finance freshmen Evan Atwell and Alexander Simpson dove onto blue swimming-pool inner tubes and rode them down the Willy T. hill.

The pair bought the inner tubes for $5 at Walmart about three weeks ago, after the last snow day, Simpson said.

“They’re much better than the last time, when we used cardboard boxes,” Atwell said.

One sentiment was shared by several students playing in the piles of snow.

“We’re in college and having a snowball fight on a snow day,” freshman Andrew Simpson said. “It’s going to be a pretty good day.”

Monday student dining hours:

Blazer : 8 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Commons : 8 a.m. t0 9 p.m.

Ovid’s : 7 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Ovid’s Starbucks : 7 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Commons Starbucks : 8 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Student Center Starbucks : 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Clinic Starbucks : 8 a.m. to  5 p.m.

Chick-fil-A  : 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Subway : 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Quickstop at the Student Center : 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Quickstop at Blazer : 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Quickstop at Commons : 10 a.m. to 9 p.m.