Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) felt bad for the stranded families packed in their cars and minivans all around him on Interstate 95. Then, when the temperature dipped even lower overnight, as he shivered alone in his car, he started to envy the larger groups, wondering if maybe their cars were warmer.

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       “It was cold,” he said in an interview around 10 a.m. Tuesday about his overnight experience being stranded on the interstate. “It was very cold.”

       Kaine, a former Virginia governor, was one of countless people trapped on one of the state’s busiest thoroughfares in below-freezing weather for hours — more than an entire day — on what was supposed to be a typical commute to work at the U.S. Capitol from Richmond. Instead, it turned into a marathon nightmare of fuel rationing, hunger and sleep deprivation for no doubt hundreds of people, although officials said they did not know exactly just how many people were trapped on the 48-mile stretch south of Washington.

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       The catastrophe was a result of the massive winter storm that on Monday dumped up to 12 inches of snow on the D.C. region and the Fredericksburg area, combined with jackknifed tractor-trailers, collisions and what Virginia Department of Transportation officials said was more snowfall than they had anticipated and that they could not keep up with.

       “Some people are running out of gas,” Kaine said Tuesday morning. “If you run out of gas, then what do you do as a family?”

       Capital Weather Gang’s Jason Samenow talks about what caused Monday’s disruptive snowstorm across the D.C. region and provides a forecast for Thursday. (The Washington Post)

       Officials said later in the day that they hoped I-95 would be cleared and open again by Tuesday night and that they had been sending emergency crews to try to reach still-stranded motorists, while pledging a full investigation of what went wrong.

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       Kaine said he left Richmond at around 1 p.m. Monday for a pressing voting rights meeting later that day with other lawmakers at the Capitol, believing he had plenty of time. The commute typically took him two hours.

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       This time, it would take him nearly 27 hours.

       With multiple senators absent, the Senate delayed roll call votes on Monday, and on Tuesday afternoon decided to delay votes again until Wednesday.

       All the while, Kaine — who settled for calling into his voting rights meeting on Bluetooth — had almost nothing to eat or drink. He had not eaten a meal since Sunday night. He doesn’t typically eat breakfast, and he hadn’t eaten lunch either by the time he left Monday.

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       “The only nourishment I had — if you count it as nourishment — is two cups of coffee and a Dr Pepper,” Kaine said. “I’ll deal with hunger rather than eat a lot of food and have to worry about bathrooms.”

       Schumer says Senate will vote by Jan. 17 on changing rules if GOP continues to block voting rights legislation

       Overnight, as temperatures dipped below freezing, Kaine said he would turn the engine on for 10 minutes or so to heat up the car, then turn it off for an hour to conserve fuel. He tilted his head back and tried to sleep in the driver-side seat.

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       It didn’t work, at least not for long.

       “I would nap for 15 or 20 minutes — usually I’d wake up because I got too cold,” he said.

       Still, he was encouraged to see other drivers around him trying to share what they could. In the middle of the night, he said, he met a man traveling from Florida back home to Connecticut with his family who was going car-to-car delivering souvenir oranges to hungry people.

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       Kaine accepted one, and saved it for later. At 10 a.m., he said he was planning to peel it momentarily.

       By then, the senator was thinking the hellish experience might soon be coming to an end: He and his office had been in touch with VDOT and Gov. Ralph Northam (D), seeking answers about when traffic would be cleared. State officials had been assuring the public that they were doing everything they could.

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       Kaine said he talked to Northam mainly to ask what people were supposed to do if they ran out of gas or needed help. Kaine had been able to refuel in Fredericksburg, but feared others might be in much more dire situations.

       “That was one of the things I wanted to find out. How should we let people know if they need help?” He repeated the phone number that Northam and VDOT have been encouraging motorists to call if they’re in trouble: 1-800-FOR-ROAD.

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       He was then slowly inching toward exit 136 near the Stafford airport, still waiting to hear the state’s outlook on the unfathomable traffic jam, trying to decide whether to get off the road.

       Ultimately, he found his way off the interstate onto Highway 1, which was also still clogged with cars.

       At 3:45, he finally arrived on Capitol grounds.

       “I don’t always have a feeling of joy when I see the Capitol,” Kaine told reporters upon arriving, “but I did today.”

       Seung Min Kim contributed to this report.