Snow, Cold Grip States Subzero Temperatures, Drifts Paralyze Much Of The Nation

A fierce “lake effect” storm packing winds of up to 48 mph brought travel to a halt Saturday with up to 2 feet of snow, too much even for a city accustomed to severe winter weather.

“Being from Buffalo, I’ve seen worse. But it’s bad out there,” said Robert Smith, a service station mechanic watching people struggle to walk down a snow-clogged street.

“I guess we’re paying for the mild winter we had so far.”

Mayor Anthony Masiello banned driving in the city for most of Saturday so crews could plow the streets without running into stalled cars. Buffalo’s airport also shut down for much of the day.

Michael and Denise Denz hiked through the drifts with their two young sons to get supplies at a neighborhood market, which was mobbed by others doing the same thing.

“We’re honoring the driving ban,” Denz said.

“I couldn’t get out of my driveway anyway because the plowing contractor hasn’t come yet.”

Although Buffalo averages 99 inches of snow per year, the 21.4 inches measured at the airport at noon Saturday was the city’s fourth greatest 24-hour snowfall since 1893, according to the National Weather Service. And the city’s northern suburbs measured 24 inches.

Elsewhere, hundreds of miles of highways remained snowbound on the northern Plains with some drifts standing up to 16 feet high. Unknown numbers of travelers were stuck in truck stops and other shelters.

More than 400 National Guardsmen helped dig out highways in South Dakota, but Gov. Bill Janklow said plows would be taken off the roads during the night because hydraulic equipment was freezing.

Overnight lows in South Dakota were expected down to 30 below zero, not counting the effect of the wind.

Farther west, Havre, Mont., bottomed out at 41 below zero Saturday morning, and Minot, N.D., reported a wind chill of 82 below zero.

About a 200-mile stretch of Interstate 94 across eastern North Dakota was still closed by deep snow between Bismarck and Fargo; 150 miles of I-94 was reopened Saturday west of Bismarck and a 120-mile section in Minnesota also was reopened for the first time since Thursday.

North-south I-29, however, was still shut for about 400 miles from the Canadian border to Sioux Falls, S.D.

Crews encountered one drift on I-29 in southeastern North Dakota that was up to the top of a 16-foot-high overpass.

“When we get something like that, it’s going to take some time,” said state Transportation Department spokesman Troy Gilbertson.