7 killed in ‘once in a generation’ Buffalo winter storm with many roads still ‘impassable’
At least seven people were killed by the violent winter storm in and around Buffalo, New York, and the death toll was expected to rise, officials said in a “sobering” Christmas morning media briefing.
The grim update came as first responders were working frantically to clear main roads to assist rescue and recovery efforts and help utility crews get the power back on to some 19,000 households.
“We are at war. This is a war with Mother Nature,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said during a Sunday morning video conference. “We’re still in the middle of it. We still have people who need to be rescued.”
Among the victims was William “Romello” Clay, who was found frozen to death outside on the street on his 56th birthday.
With many roads still “impassable,” volunteer snowmobilers were being dispatched to assist motorists who had been stranded in their cars for more than a day, leaving officers who had not been able to reach them “demoralized,” Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown said.
At least one of the city’s six victims of the storm died while stuck in their cars, and emergency officials had received other unconfirmed reports of deceased individuals trapped in their vehicles, officials told The Post on a Zoom call.
“We know that number is going to be higher,” Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia said of the stated death toll, as Erie County officials announced another fatality in the suburbs.
New York State Police and the National Guard had been called into the city as it began to dig out of the snow Sunday, according to Brown.
SWAT teams and underwater recovery teams — which have a “tremendous amount” of cold weather gear, had also been deployed to Buffalo, after the snow stopped falling earlier Sunday morning.
At least 10 department apparatuses had been stranded in the heavy snow, which was blown into drifts of up to six feet tall by hurricane strength winds of up to 79 mph at the height of the storm.
Fire Commissioner William Renaldo said many of his firefighters had been working for 96 hours straight, and the department battled three “very serious” fires that resulted in a “number of families” being relocated by the Red Cross.
Brown said Buffalo was “ground zero” for what “local and national meteorologists… described … as a ‘once in a generation storm,'” as he warned residents to abide by the city’s driving ban.
“People have put themselves in danger in some instances when they try to leave homes without power,” Byron said. “They have found themselves in worse situations.”
The Democrat told reporters that his home was one of many without power until recently, and he and his family wore layers, and slept under extra blankets as the temperature in his house fell to 42 degrees.
“We know that this is a serious situation, we know that some people have been out of power in their homes for up to 24 hours,” Brown said.
“We are again stressing: do not go out,” the mayor warned. “The sun is out, don’t be fooled …. you will become a part of the problem.”
Buffalo’s airport had recorded 43 inches of cumulative snow from the “historic” event, but the paralyzed city on the lake was not yet out of the woods, according to Christopher Tate, associate weather producer and meteorologist at Fox Weather.
“There is still a band of lake effect snow currently sitting south of Buffalo. If the wind shifts back … south just a little bit, that would push that band of lake effect snow north back into Buffalo. That is still possible,” Tate explained to The Post.
The region’s Buffalo Niagara International Airport will not reopen until 11 a.m. Tuesday, officials said. Many streets were “completely impassable,” according to Department of Public Works Commissioner Nate Markin, and relief on many secondary streets was not expected until Monday or later.
Crews were focused on clearing emergency routes to the hospital Sunday, and did not anticipate clearing side streets, Markin said.
Parking regulations and garbage and recycling pickup was suspended ” indefinitely” to “allow crews to focus on life safety and access efforts,” according to the commissioner. The airport also remained shuttered, and was scheduled to reopen Monday at 11 a.m.
The deadly snow emergency came a little more than a month after the Erie County town of Hamburg, New York recorded 81.2 inches between Nov. 16 and 20, but the “historic” nature of the current storm was due to its unprecedented ferocity and proximity to Christmas.
“This is the first time there have been blizzard conditions leading right up into Christmas Day,” Tate said. “It was also coupled with such intense snow and very very cold temperatures.”
Blizzard conditions are officially defined as snow events three hours of 35 mph wind and a quarter mile of visibility. Some parts of Western New York had experienced those intense conditions for nearly 24 consecutive hours, Tate explained.
“Even in a blizzard, it’s rare to get absolutely zero visibility. Usually it’s even a sixteenth of a mile… and we had that for an extended period with this system,” he said.
The bomb cyclone weather event — which occurs when atmospheric pressure plummets and cold air collides with warmer moist air to explosive effect — was heightened by temperatures in the single digits and teens colliding with relatively warm air of Lake Erie, where temps were in the mid 40s.
“This is probably just going to be called in the local vernacular, this was ‘The Christmas Blizzard,'” Tate predicted.
“Twenty years from now, you could mention that, and someone whose been in the area long enough will know exactly which storm you’re talking about.”
Additional reporting by David Meyer
