Old Man Winter gripped South Baldwin this week as freezing temperatures and ice brought the region to a halt.

Tuesday, rain began mixing with sleet and then freezing as temperatures began dropping by mid-afternoon, ending up as low as the teens in some areas. Wednesday offered no reprieve as the area remained under cloud cover all day and temperatures barely rose above the freezing mark. Following more lows of teens and 20s Wednesday night, South Baldwin remained under a hard-freeze warning until 9 a.m. Thursday. However, sunshine and temperatures expected to rise into the mid-40s by Thursday afternoon brought and end to the winter-weather event.

But thanks to that event, businesses and municipal services throughout South Baldwin closed Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.That’s because emergency officials advised residents not to get out on the roads, which had dangers of being covered with ice.

Among those municipalities closing at least Tuesday and Wednesday were Summerdale, Perdido Beach and Magnolia Springs. The city of Foley added Thursday to that list. Meanwhile, the town of Elberta remained open Tuesday, but closed Wednesday, due to dangers of the accumulated ice.

That ice did play havoc with South Baldwin power lines as both Baldwin EMC and Riviera Utilities reported power outages, all of which were repaired within three hours’ time.

“The most we had at any one time was around 11 p.m. Tueday,” Karen Moore of Baldwin EMC said. “That was 600 accounts.”

Moore added that while outages were sporadic, most of them took place further south.

“From Foley south is where all the activity was,” she said.

Miles McDaniel of Riviera Utilities reported outages in various service areas, with approximately 2,000 customers losing power Tuesday night.

“The most we had at any one time was 800,” he said, adding that those, too had power restored within a few hours.

As for law enforcement, both Summerdale and Elberta Police Departments reported no unusual, weather-related incidents.

However, the same couldn’t be said by Foley Police.

“We planned for the worse and hoped for the best during the storm,” Foley Police Chief David Wilson said. “We had some low-lying tree limbs over roadways because of the ice accumulation. This required police officers to block traffic while the street department made it safe. Some roads got very icy during the night but most everyone drove carefully and slow and we got through it without incident.”