And it's not like this is somewhere like Montana where it can be many miles between homes. It's Illinois fgs- and a mile would be a long way between homes/ buildings- even in rural areas.
I wonder (and that's just it, wondering) if she is a 'young' 53 year old or an 'old' 53 year old? (Hey, I'm 60+, I'm allowed to ask!)
That's not really true about Illinois. Yes, she was in Bloomington, but she was headed toward Pekin, and if she took I-74, there are many miles between exits. It's also not flat in those areas on the interstate. It is extremely likely that she could have gone off the road and down a hill into woods or a ravine.
Around Galesburg, IL last year, I think, the cousin of someone I went to school with disappeared and was found a week or two later where she had gone off the road and not been seen in the snow. Obviously, she had passed away by that time.
Years ago in my area of Illinois, which is relatively flat, someone went into a ravine as well and was not noticed for days.
Illinois, aside from the Chicago area, is very rural with exits few and far between in many places. It is also a misconception that it is very flat. In fact, we have a lot of hills in many parts. Driving from here to my sister's house in IL, a 35 minute drive, the towns are 10 to 15 miles apart with many curves and hills, and houses between those towns are miles apart.
Four years ago, someone I knew from school who was in his late 30s died about 2 miles from my house when his car went in the ditch and he got out to walk. He died within about 30 minutes from exposure, and was found in the first hour. That was a particularly bad winter.
I am about an hour and a half from Pekin, so I can't be certain of the conditions there on Christmas morning, but I will tell you the conditions here. Christmas Eve morning was so overcast, and with the snow, visibility was crap. I drove 8 miles to my mother's house that afternoon and I could barely see vehicles coming towards me, especially if they were light in color or partially covered in snow because the sky, the roads, the fields, and the cars all blended together (which is why having lights on during the day is so important here). By that evening, the only thing that was better was that roads were cleared better and the snow had stopped. The next day, Christmas day, it had stopped snowing entirely here but had become brutally cold.
This morning it was a real temp of -7 when I got up, with a wind chill of -13. The current wind chill where I am is -15 and there is a wind chill advisory.
If she went off the road, unless she had an emergency kit with hand warmers and candles in a coffee can to produce enough heat in the car for a couple of days, she is not ok.
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