UPDATED at 11:15 a.m. Friday with more information about the victim of a fatal crash.

ST. LOUIS • The season's second snow was a relatively gentle dusting. But the frigid front was enough to snarl commuter traffic on many St. Louis interstates and side streets early Thursday.

Thousands of motorists who were trapped in their cars for two- to three-hour commutes were left asking one simple question: How did this happen?

The director of the Missouri Department of Transportation asked the same thing after hearing about commuters' frustrations.

"We didn't do a very good job and my reaction to that is I'm disappointed," Kevin Keith said Thursday evening. "I want to apologize to the people of St. Louis and those in that part Missouri for our efforts. You should expect more from us, and you'll get it."

While snow was in the forecast the previous night, MoDOT decided not to pretreat interstates with a salt brine solution in large part because of the type of storm it expected, said District Engineer Ed Hassinger.

Instead, crews filled their trucks with rock salt and spread it on area highways when the first waves of snow began falling after 3 a.m. Thursday. When temperatures began to dip, they prepared to hit the roads a second time — only this time with chemicals.

By the time they got there, it was too late.

Despite a moderate coating of snow, highways began to freeze. Trucks had difficulty making it up hills. Drivers lost control of their cars.

MoDOT officials said traffic backed up on highways earlier than normal, preventing crews from spreading their mix of salt, beet juice and calcium chloride on the roadways.

"Traffic hit at the time we needed to be out there for the next round," Hassinger said. "We just couldn't get there."

But Keith, Hassinger's boss, said there should be no excuses because MoDOT had ample manpower and equipment to handle the job.

"We still have an expectation that when it snows, we're ready," Keith said. "I wasn't very happy about it. I've expressed my displeasure and expect it won't happen again."

Keith already has talked with St. Louis area officials about what went wrong and had discussions about how to prevent similar breakdowns in the future. Still, he said that one bad morning is not a reason for a complete strategy overhaul.

"Folks just didn't get it right this morning," Keith said.

Drivers fumed that such a light snowfall resulted in such a slow and slippery commute. MoDOT officials reported wet pavement had turned to black ice. Major crashes, including two that were fatal, and impassable conditions affected just about every highway.

One crash on Interstate 55 at U.S. Highway 61 in Jefferson County at 6:40 a.m. left a man dead and a woman seriously injured, the Missouri Highway Patrol said.

Newton Aldridge, 41, of Bloomsdale, Mo., lost control of the Pontiac Grand Am he was driving north on I-55 and crashed into the guardrail, the Highway Patrol said. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Aldridge's wife Christine, 30, a passenger in the car, was taken to Jefferson Regional Medical Center with serious injuries, the Highway Patrol said. She was later transferred to Barnes-Jewish Hospital, where she was listed in fair condition Thursday afternoon.

According to the Highway Patrol report, Newton Aldridge was wearing a seat belt; Christine Aldridge was not.

Another driver died in a crash in Illinois on Thursday afternoon, according to the Illinois State Police. A passenger car traveling south on Route 4 just south of Weber Road in Marine collided head-on with a tractor-trailer traveling north about 2:40 p.m., police said. They believe the car crossed into the path of the truck.

The driver of the car was killed, police said. The driver of the truck was not injured.

The driver who died was identified Friday as Vincent L. Terrie, 50, of New Baden. He was an employee of the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services in East St. Louis.

'PANDEMONIUM'

Drivers shared numerous horror stories Thursday. Some people turned to the Internet to blow off steam. And radio call-in shows were jammed with calls from motorists stuck in traffic.

"It's been pandemonium," said Jim Ferrick, 42, of Ladue.

Ferrick works as a lawyer in downtown St. Louis. The nanny was an hour late because of the road conditions. School was called off for one of his children, but another child was late to school. His wife is also a lawyer downtown.

"Everybody's working today, but we're all late," Ferrick said as he made a quick stop for gasoline at Price and Clayton roads.

Segments of Interstate 70, Highway 40 (Interstate 64) and Interstate 44 were closed for part of the commute because of ice and accidents.

Jason Merrill, who works at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, was in his car, creeping along Page Avenue near Interstate 170 at 9:30 a.m., more than 90 minutes after he left home in St. Charles County. He picked Page because I-70 wasn't moving.

"I'm beyond angry," he said. "This is probably the worst traffic experience I've had. To know so little precipitation fell from the sky and that the roads are this bad ... the highways are atrocious."

The Missouri Highway Patrol said most crashes involved only minor injuries. The patrol was swamped with calls. At 4 a.m., when few cars were on the road, the patrol got about 80 calls reporting crashes. By 9 a.m., more than 240 calls had come in across the Troop C's coverage area of 11 counties, said Cpl. Jeff Wilson, a patrol spokesman.

ILLINOIS PROBLEMS

The Illinois State Police said road conditions caused numerous crashes, most involving cars sliding off the roads, but some were rollover crashes.

Illinois Department of Transportation crews began working at 1:40 a.m. Thursday and pretreated bridges and overpasses with salt brine, said Joseph Monroe, District 8 operations engineer for the department.

"We still have blowing and drifting snow that is causing problems throughout the district," he said.

Dozens of school districts called off classes. Among the largest districts to cancel were the Fort Zumwalt and Francis Howell districts in St. Charles County.

Kacey Ruckstaetter, 37, of Creve Coeur, said the heavy traffic made her late dropping off her two kids at two schools. As she was getting gas for her minivan in Clayton just before 10 a.m., Ruckstaetter said, "I debated just going home, but we're close enough now."

Westbound Interstate 70, west of Union Boulevard, was shut down about 6 a.m. because of a crash. Other crashes were blocking lanes of westbound Highway 40 near Clayton Road, near Mason Road and west of Timberlake Manor Drive; Tesson Ferry at Mattis Road; southbound I-55 near Richardson Road in the Arnold area; and northbound I-55 at Potomac Road.

Police said some drivers were reporting that westbound I-44 at Arsenal Street was like a sheet of ice about 7 a.m. It was shut down on and off throughout the morning.

It was about 20 degrees by 6 a.m., but the wind chill was making it feel more like 10. The moderate snowfall tapered off by late morning, and flurries were expected throughout the day. The National Weather Service expected accumulation of 1 to 3 inches.

MoDOT deployed full crews Thursday to retreat every interstate highway and major route with salt, chemicals and beet juice before the evening commute. The state replowed some spots where wind gusts blew snow back onto roads.

Today's high temperature could reach 27 degrees. Forecasters expect temperatures to top the freezing mark Saturday.

St. Louis County and the city of St. Louis pretreated streets and reported no significant problems with snow.

St. Louis County was expecting up to 5 inches of snow Thursday but got only 1½, said David Wrone, spokesman for the county Department of Highways and Traffic. The county pretreated residential roads before the snow arrived, then moved to major roads.

St. Louis streets Director Todd Waelterman said the city began pretreating streets with brine Wednesday.

Shortly after snow began to fall Thursday, crews hit the local streets with another shot of salt.

MoDOT engineer Hassinger said pretreating area highways is different from residential streets. Rock salt that is spread on the residential streets, for instance, would blow away on highways when cars pass by at 60 mph.

Hassinger said crews often pretreat bridges and overpasses with salt brine — because they freeze faster in low temperatures — but that's not where the problems surfaced Thursday.

On Thursday, MoDOT was prepared for 1 to 3 inches of dry, powdery snow. Instead, it came in somewhat wet, Hassinger said. Further, as the salt the trucks spread on the highways began to melt, it became diluted.

Still, Hassinger acknowledged the decision not to pretreat the highways in the Missouri half of the region will be debated by the public — and possibly within the agency itself. While acknowledging that pretreatment would have been effective, he still supported the decision.

But it wouldn't have solved the problem of getting trucks back to the highway with a second dose of snow-fighting chemicals, he said.

"I think right now it wouldn't have made any difference," Hassinger said. "We'll just have to look at the timing. I know people are frustrated. Nobody is more frustrated than we are."

Patrick M. O'Connell and Jonah Newman of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this report.