Occurrences of freezing rain, also known as ice storms, are more common than snow in Houston. Some of the most recent ice storms occurred in 1997, 2007, February 4, 2011, and January 16, 2018. An overnight event occurred from January 23, 2014 to January 24, another significant icing occurred a few days later on January 28, and a third event took place on March 4. These storms can be very disruptive since road crews are not equipped to handle such rare events over the city's expansive size. When ice occurs, roads and schools are usually closed. The city's Office of Emergency Management encourages driver's to "avoid driving unless absolutely necessary... if roadways are at risk of icing." Typically, such ice storms affect mainly the northern/western areas of the metro, while the southern/eastern areas are left with just cold rain. The ice storm that occurred on January 16, 2018 started as cold rain for several hours, before changing to a wintry mix and then eventually sleet and snow. Temperatures started in the low-mid 30s and quickly dropped to the 20s in the afternoon, and before dipping into the teens by the evening/overnight hours, which caused all the rain to turn to ice, accumulating a thickness up to 1" on some roads, bridges, overpasses, making it one of the worst winter storms in the history of the state. The Winter Storm of Feb 15th 2021 was a very Dangerous & Devastating one for the Houston Area, starting out mainly as Freezing Rain with a few flakes or sleet pellets mixing in at times, then transitioning into moderate/heavy sleet during the evening and finally changing over to snow overnight bringing anywhere between 1-4" inches of snow throughout the Houston area on top of a layer of ice/sleet, there were widespread power outages throughout the majority of the state including Houston/Harris County.