With rain and snow moving in the next few days, travel is becoming difficult for some drivers over Interstate 80, including Eleanor McCampbell.
Despite having a brand-new vehicle with all-wheel drive, McCampbell said the conditions heading east over donner almost made her turn around.
“The water was splashing up from the road. It was almost like a whiteout, even though it was not freezing. It was about 45 degrees. It was still pretty bad all the way through to Donner Summit,” she said.
The people of Truckee are no strangers to these conditions. One local said the worst kind of driver is the one that doesn't check the weather before taking on the pass.
"Make sure you check the weather because a lot of people do not and come here looking for chains and they have no idea is it snowing or potential snow coming over,” David Ritchey said. "People end up down the lake, sometimes halfway to it, sliding off the road. So you got to be careful.”
For drivers who've never been in the snow, Donner Summit is not the best place to learn. Thankfully, one driver said her first time in this kind of weather wasn't all that bad.
“It was mostly the rain that got me on the way, i suppose,” Lila Hermiston said. “I did not expect to have to stop and put chains on. I also didn't expect there'd be like shaking when I put chains on or the sound, so that was kind of confusing.”
In fact, the drive itself wasn't the worst part -- it was the cost that came with it.
“"I knew that the chains were going to be expensive, but then there was a $40 fee to put them on, and I also didn't know about that,” Hermiston said. “I could have put them on myself, but I wasn't going to try to YouTube tutorial on the side of the highway.”
If you're driving through the Sierra Nevada this weekend, keep in mind when there's ice and snow, take it slow.
"Take it easy. Chains with four-wheel-drive, make it happen,” Ritchey said.
You can check Nevada 511 and Caltrans QuickMap for the latest information on road conditions.
Alin Beane talked to drivers heading over the pass on Interstate 80
