I-95, Virginia - Through the state of Virginia on Monday and early Tuesday, thousands of travelers were left stranded in their cars after a winter storm. Over a foot of snow and ice on Interstate 95 made it nearly impassable. Police and emergency crews were working for more than a day to get help to drivers and get traffic moving.

A Warren man was driving back up to Ohio when he was stranded by the storm. He told 21 News' Erin Simonek that he's lucky to be back home and have his basic necessities back, including food, water and heat, after that terrifying wait on the highway. 

"I was running out of gas and my gas light was about to come on," said Scott Harker of Warren. "My family was like,' hey, did you make it to the exit yet?' I'm like, no."

Harker was on his way back home from North Carolina, taking Interstate 95 when he figured he'd run into some winter weather.

"It rained all through North Carolina," Harker said. "There was tornado warnings through North Carolina it was 70 degrees when I left there. By the time I hit Virginia, it was 33 degrees and it started sleeting."

Harker kept driving north as heavy snowfall came down through the region, creeping up on local plow crews.

"Semis being stuck, cars being stuck" Harker described. "When we were all stuck in line, people were all so courteous offering people water. There was actually people urinating on the highways because they had nowhere to go."

Harker documented his personal journey on social media. He finally made it to a gas tank after 8 hours on I-95, calling himself lucky he found an open steakhouse for dinner.

He eventually decided to sleep in his car in a Walmart parking lot, after striking out on an available hotel.

"I actually slept in my car from 10:30-12 and I woke up at 3:30 and figured I had to get out of there," Harker said. 

Harker took backroads the rest of his journey home. In a trip that should have taken 8 hours to get back to the Mahoning Valley, took him more than 30 hours to make it home.

According to the Virginia Department of Transportation, the back-up was partly because of disabled trucks that blocked the way in those conditions.