New England braces for up to 3 feet of snow; flights canceled
»Play Video
BOSTON (AP) - A storm that forecasters warned could be a blizzard for the history books began clobbering the New York-to-Boston corridor on Friday, grounding flights, closing workplaces and sending people rushing to get home ahead of a possible 1 to 3 feet of snow.
From New Jersey to Maine, shoppers crowded into supermarkets and hardware stores to buy food, snow shovels, flashlights and generators, something that became a precious commodity after Superstorm Sandy in October. Others gassed up their cars, another lesson learned all too well after Sandy. Across much of New England, schools closed well ahead of the first snowflakes.
"This is a storm of major proportions," Boston Mayor Thomas Menino warned. "Stay off the roads. Stay home."
The wind-whipped snowstorm mercifully arrived at the start of a weekend, which meant fewer cars on the road and extra time for sanitation crews to clear the mess before commuters in the New York-to-Boston region of roughly 25 million people have to go back to work. But it could also mean a weekend cooped up indoors.
Rainy Neves, a mother of two in Cambridge, just west of Boston, did some last-minute shopping at a grocery store, filling her cart to the brim.
"Honestly, a lot of junk - a lot of quick things you can make just in case lights go out, a lot of snacks to keep the kids busy while they'd be inside during the storm, things to sip with my friends, things for movies," she said. "Just a whole bunch of things to keep us entertained."
In heavily Catholic Boston, the archdiocese urged parishioners to be prudent about attending Sunday Mass and reminded them that, under church law, the obligation "does not apply when there is grave difficulty in fulfilling this obligation."
Halfway through what had been a mild winter across the Northeast, blizzard warnings were posted from parts of New Jersey to Maine. The National Weather Service said Boston could get close to 3 feet of snow by Saturday evening, while most of Rhode Island could receive more than 2 feet. Connecticut was bracing for 2 feet, and New York City was expecting as much as 14 inches.
By Friday evening, the New York-to-Boston corridor was getting blowing, swirling snow and freezing rain. Early snowfall was blamed for a 19-car pileup in Cumberland, Maine, that caused minor injuries.
The snow was expected to be at its heaviest Friday night and into Saturday. Forecasters said wind gusts up to 75 mph could cause widespread power outages and whip the snow into fearsome drifts. Flooding was expected along coastal areas still recovering from Superstorm Sandy, which hit New York and New Jersey the hardest and is considered Jersey's worst natural disaster.
Meteorologist Jeff Masters, of Weather Underground, said the winter storm was a collision of two storms and may end up among the Boston area's Top 5 most intense ever.
"When you add two respectable storms together, you're going to get a knockout punch with this one," he said.
It could break Boston's all-time snowstorm record of 27.6 inches, set in 2003, forecasters said. The storm also comes almost 35 years to the day after the Blizzard of '78, a ferocious storm that dropped 27 inches of snow, packed hurricane-force winds and claimed dozens of lives.
Masters said the region could get a break from warmer air trailing behind that is expected to push temperature up to the 40s by Monday.
"It's going to be not that difficult to dig out, compared to maybe some other nor'easters in the past, where it stayed cold after the storm went through," he said.
Drivers were urged to stay off the streets lest their cars get stuck, preventing snowplows and emergency vehicles from getting through. New York City ran extra commuter trains to help people get home before the brunt of the storm hit.
Amtrak stopped running trains in cities around the Northeast on Friday afternoon. Airlines canceled more than 4,300 flights through Saturday, and New York City's three major airports and Boston's Logan Airport shut down.
Interstate 95 was closed to all but essential traffic in Rhode Island, where the governor said outages remained the biggest threat.
"With tree branches laden with heavy, wet snow, the winds picking up and the temperatures plunging all at the same time, it's a bad combination," Gov. Lincoln Chafee said.
In Massachusetts, Gov. Deval Patrick enacted a statewide driving ban for the first time since the Blizzard of '78. Hours before the ban went into effect at 4 p.m., long lines formed at gas stations, some of which were almost out of fuel.
James Stone said he was saving the remaining regular gas at his station in Abington, south of Boston, for snowplow drivers.
"It hasn't snowed like this in two years," Stone said. "Most people are caught way off-guard."
In New York, Fashion Week, a series of designer showings with some activities held under tents, went on mostly as scheduled, though organizers put on additional crews to deal with the snow and ice, turned up the heat and fortified the tents. The snow did require some wardrobe changes: Designer Michael Kors was forced to arrive at the Project Runway show in Uggs.
For Joe DeMartino, of Fairfield, Conn., being overprepared was impossible: His wife was expecting their first baby Sunday. He stocked up on gas and food, got firewood ready and was installing a baby seat in the car. The couple also packed for the hospital.
"They say that things should clear up by Sunday. We're hoping that they're right," he said.
Said his wife, Michelle: "It adds an element of excitement."
The snow was too much of a good thing in some places. In New Hampshire, the University of Connecticut's Skiing Carnival was canceled because of the snowstorm. In Maine, the National Toboggan Championships in Camden were postponed from Saturday to Sunday, and the Camp Sunshine Polar Plunge was put off until March.
At Rosie's Liquors in Abington, customers were lined up eight to 10 deep Friday, snapping up rum, wine and 30-packs of beer.
"We've been absolutely slammed. It's almost been like Christmas here," manager Kristen Brown said. "A lot of people are saying, 'I'm going to be stuck with my family all weekend. I need something to do.'"
From New Jersey to Maine, shoppers crowded into supermarkets and hardware stores to buy food, snow shovels, flashlights and generators, something that became a precious commodity after Superstorm Sandy in October. Others gassed up their cars, another lesson learned all too well after Sandy. Across much of New England, schools closed well ahead of the first snowflakes.
"This is a storm of major proportions," Boston Mayor Thomas Menino warned. "Stay off the roads. Stay home."
The wind-whipped snowstorm mercifully arrived at the start of a weekend, which meant fewer cars on the road and extra time for sanitation crews to clear the mess before commuters in the New York-to-Boston region of roughly 25 million people have to go back to work. But it could also mean a weekend cooped up indoors.
Rainy Neves, a mother of two in Cambridge, just west of Boston, did some last-minute shopping at a grocery store, filling her cart to the brim.
"Honestly, a lot of junk - a lot of quick things you can make just in case lights go out, a lot of snacks to keep the kids busy while they'd be inside during the storm, things to sip with my friends, things for movies," she said. "Just a whole bunch of things to keep us entertained."
In heavily Catholic Boston, the archdiocese urged parishioners to be prudent about attending Sunday Mass and reminded them that, under church law, the obligation "does not apply when there is grave difficulty in fulfilling this obligation."
Halfway through what had been a mild winter across the Northeast, blizzard warnings were posted from parts of New Jersey to Maine. The National Weather Service said Boston could get close to 3 feet of snow by Saturday evening, while most of Rhode Island could receive more than 2 feet. Connecticut was bracing for 2 feet, and New York City was expecting as much as 14 inches.
By Friday evening, the New York-to-Boston corridor was getting blowing, swirling snow and freezing rain. Early snowfall was blamed for a 19-car pileup in Cumberland, Maine, that caused minor injuries.
The snow was expected to be at its heaviest Friday night and into Saturday. Forecasters said wind gusts up to 75 mph could cause widespread power outages and whip the snow into fearsome drifts. Flooding was expected along coastal areas still recovering from Superstorm Sandy, which hit New York and New Jersey the hardest and is considered Jersey's worst natural disaster.
Meteorologist Jeff Masters, of Weather Underground, said the winter storm was a collision of two storms and may end up among the Boston area's Top 5 most intense ever.
"When you add two respectable storms together, you're going to get a knockout punch with this one," he said.
It could break Boston's all-time snowstorm record of 27.6 inches, set in 2003, forecasters said. The storm also comes almost 35 years to the day after the Blizzard of '78, a ferocious storm that dropped 27 inches of snow, packed hurricane-force winds and claimed dozens of lives.
Masters said the region could get a break from warmer air trailing behind that is expected to push temperature up to the 40s by Monday.
"It's going to be not that difficult to dig out, compared to maybe some other nor'easters in the past, where it stayed cold after the storm went through," he said.
Drivers were urged to stay off the streets lest their cars get stuck, preventing snowplows and emergency vehicles from getting through. New York City ran extra commuter trains to help people get home before the brunt of the storm hit.
Amtrak stopped running trains in cities around the Northeast on Friday afternoon. Airlines canceled more than 4,300 flights through Saturday, and New York City's three major airports and Boston's Logan Airport shut down.
Interstate 95 was closed to all but essential traffic in Rhode Island, where the governor said outages remained the biggest threat.
"With tree branches laden with heavy, wet snow, the winds picking up and the temperatures plunging all at the same time, it's a bad combination," Gov. Lincoln Chafee said.
In Massachusetts, Gov. Deval Patrick enacted a statewide driving ban for the first time since the Blizzard of '78. Hours before the ban went into effect at 4 p.m., long lines formed at gas stations, some of which were almost out of fuel.
James Stone said he was saving the remaining regular gas at his station in Abington, south of Boston, for snowplow drivers.
"It hasn't snowed like this in two years," Stone said. "Most people are caught way off-guard."
In New York, Fashion Week, a series of designer showings with some activities held under tents, went on mostly as scheduled, though organizers put on additional crews to deal with the snow and ice, turned up the heat and fortified the tents. The snow did require some wardrobe changes: Designer Michael Kors was forced to arrive at the Project Runway show in Uggs.
For Joe DeMartino, of Fairfield, Conn., being overprepared was impossible: His wife was expecting their first baby Sunday. He stocked up on gas and food, got firewood ready and was installing a baby seat in the car. The couple also packed for the hospital.
"They say that things should clear up by Sunday. We're hoping that they're right," he said.
Said his wife, Michelle: "It adds an element of excitement."
The snow was too much of a good thing in some places. In New Hampshire, the University of Connecticut's Skiing Carnival was canceled because of the snowstorm. In Maine, the National Toboggan Championships in Camden were postponed from Saturday to Sunday, and the Camp Sunshine Polar Plunge was put off until March.
At Rosie's Liquors in Abington, customers were lined up eight to 10 deep Friday, snapping up rum, wine and 30-packs of beer.
"We've been absolutely slammed. It's almost been like Christmas here," manager Kristen Brown said. "A lot of people are saying, 'I'm going to be stuck with my family all weekend. I need something to do.'"
Dust off your favorite Donner Party recipes, east coast. And size up your juiciest neighbors, you never know when food may run out and this storm looks like a doozy.
"Snow was being blamed for a 19-car pileup in Maine Friday morning in Cumberland, as 6 inches blanketed the area.'
Â
I had no idea that snow could drive cars. Â I always thought it was the person in the drivers seat that gave the car the command to drive dangerously on roads that were covered in snow. Â If my car ever crashes in the snow I'll know who to blame. Â Snow certainly is evil!
Â
/sarcasm
but Fashion Week in NYC must go on! that would be funny as heck to see all the waifish skinny models trying in vain to retain body heat...
I would love to have some of that snow here- a good foot of snow for a week and I would be happy till July when the sun begins to really shine.Â
It sounds like this blizzard wipe away the memory of the blizzard of 1978 when schools were closed for three weeks and employers shutdown for at least a week.
So much for global warming.
 @Glassman As I understand it, science is inconclusive as to whether global warming causes more extreme weather events more often. But it is certainly a prediction that is made by climate models even if we have no way of testing yet.
 @Glassman Well that's a load off my mind. Esteemed climate scientist "Glassman" has definitively proved, for all time, that there is no such thing as global warming.
Â
All of those temperature records -- none of that stuff counts. The only thing that matters is whether Glassman sees snow somewhere in the northern hemisphere during winter.
 @Glassman And where did you think all this water in the form of snow came from?  Even a small increase in the global temperature evaporates more water from the 70% of the Earth's surface that is covered by water and it all has to fall somewhere.  In this case in a blizzard that that is dumping 2 - 3 FEET of snow.
Also look back at the record floods world wide over the last several years and tell me where all that water came from and why.
Get a clue.
 @My_Thoughts 2,000 years ago the northern hemisphere was covered with a 2 mile thick mantle of ice. The earth has been warming naturally ever since. I suppose you will be telling me that man-caused global warming was because of cave men's camp fires.Â
The earth is going through a natural cycle and no amount of hand wringing by you or politicians will change it.
 @Glassman  @My_Thoughts Glassman wrote: "2,000 years ago the northern hemisphere was covered with a 2 mile thick mantle of ice."
Â
Really? Two thousand years ago, the entire northern half of the Earth had two miles of ice covering it?Â
Â
Sorry, Glassman, but you have jumped the shark with that one.
 @Glassman Well aren't you original.
Oh so glad I live in WA state. As a child that would appeal to me but being a grown up with responsibilities I'm so glad I don't have to deal with that mess.
And in the Pacific NW some of us will die from weather related boredom.
Sounds like you might be happier living somewhere else.
If you are bored with your weather, come visit us here in Southwest Florida for some of ours. It is going to be 80 degrees today here in Naples. We would love to welcome you!
Until the next hurricane comes and wipes you out.
@ValleyBronco @mstipton As I said above, pay your money and make your choice. I have lived here 20 years and seen three hurricanes in my area, Andrew, Charlie and Wilma. Not every hurricane lands in the same place in Florida.Â
Â
If you want some lovely sunshine in the winter, this a great place to visit. Hurricane season is June through November. Most of the hurricanes are from August through mid October, when the gulf waters are at their warmest.
 @Gottadance  @mstipton hmmm, florida has atleast one good hurricane a year, we get a minor earthquake maybe every 10 years. Yep, we still win. : )
@Glassman @mstipton I was raised in Wisconsin and am no stranger to feet of snow. Rain is way better, I have to agree, until the flooding and landslides start. It's always something with mother nature.
Â
As to gators, we have only had one in our lake in the last 20 years. A cotton mouth I have never seen here, although I did see a pigmy rattler. Most of the snakes you see are black racers or other harmless variety. I get out my broom and it is "batter up"! Palmetto bugs go up vacuum cleaner easily enough. If you spray around the foundations of your home, having one inside is very rare.
Â
The Pacific Northwest is lovely and I would love to see your neck of the woods,Â
@glynes @mstipton There is something unpleasant wherever you live. I think people see my comment as casting a slur on your area. It was not meant as such. My husband was stationed in your area when he was in the Navy. It is a beautiful area and I would love to visit one day. My comment was simply a fun reply to someone. I like visitors to our area and to hear about where they come from and what they do for a living.
 @Gottadance  @mstipton We also sit amidst a chain of potentially active volcanoes. It's always something!! >8-)
 @Gottadance  @mstipton Better earthquakes than Gators, cotton mouths and "palmetto beetles". At least we don't have to shovel rain.
@mstipton This is not hurricane season.  You have the next earthquake to worry about. There is no perfect place. You pay your money and make your choice.