Over 1 million without power as winter storm pounds Northeast US
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Pastor Dale Morgan
Feb 26, 2010, 4:37:34 PM2/26/10
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Perilous Times
Over 1 million without power as winter storm pounds Northeast US
From staff and wire reports
HAMPTON, N.H. — An unceasing winter storm unleashed multiple dangers across the Northeast on Friday, blasting the coast with hurricane-force winds that fanned a New Hampshire hotel fire, flooding parts of Maine, dropping 2 feet of snow on parts of New York and cutting power to more than 1 million homes and businesses.
Travel throughout the region was almost non-existent.
Power failures were so bad in New Hampshire that even the state Emergency Operations Center was operating on a generator.
The highest wind reported was 91 mph in Portsmouth, N.H. — well above hurricane force of 74 mph. Gusts hit 60 mph or more from New York's Long Island to Massachusetts.
In the coastal town of Hampton, the unoccupied Surf Hotel caught fire, and the howling winds quickly spread the blaze to the rest of the block. Five wood-frame buildings, including an arcade and a restaurant, burned. The cause was unknown.
To the north in Maine, waves crashing ashore at high tide Friday morning turned beachfront streets into rivers in Saco, where storms have claimed several homes over the years.
"Felt like the walls were coming in on the house, and the windows were rattling, and the trees were cracking. It was pretty impressive," said Mark Breton, who rode out the storm in his house a few blocks from the beach.
Public Service of New Hampshire, the state's largest utility, reported that power was cut to at least 237,000 homes and businesses in the state of 1.3 million and said it would take days before everyone's lights flickered back on.
There were more than 220,000 customers without power in New York, mostly in the Hudson Valley north of New York City. There were 130,000 in Maine, 85,000 in Massachusetts, 25,000 in Vermont and more than 14,000 homes and businesses without electricity in New Jersey.
Over the course of two days, about 100,000 Central Hudson Gas & Electric Corp. customers lost power across eight counties in the Hudson Valley.
"The 'one-two punch' of the storms is now creating the largest storm-related outage event in the utility's history, surpassing the previous record of the April 1997 Snowbud storm that knocked out electricity for 100,000 customers," the company said in a press release.
"This was not just any storm," said Denise Doring VanBuren, vice president of corporate communications for the utility. "The truth is, we're facing a natural disaster."
The weather snarled traffic. A tractor-trailer jackknifed and 16 commercial vehicles piled up on a mile of the Pennsylvania Turnpike, forcing closure of a 60-mile stretch in the hills of central Pennsylvania. Two injuries were reported.
In Washington, D.C., wind gusts of 48 mph were clocked at Reagan National Airport. The Washington Monument was closed to tourists because of the high winds.
Heavy snow closed 30 miles of Interstate 84 in New York state, and state Police Sgt. Stephen Meehan called travel conditions throughout the mid-Hudson Valley "an absolute disaster." Tuxedo, N.Y., reported 26 inches of snow, and more was coming down.
In New York City, 17 inches of snow had fallen before dawn and more was expected. A man was killed by a falling snow-laden tree branch in Central Park, one of at least three deaths being blamed on the storm.
Mayor Mike Bloomberg, who had said Thursday that the nation's largest public school district would stay open, changed his mind. It's the second snow day of the month there, but only the fourth in six years.
Eric Warner of Brooklyn had to brave it. He drove a truckload of milk, eggs and cheese from Teaneck, N.J., into Manhattan. The roads were terrible, he said, and even carrying the crates was hard.
"When the snow hits you, it feels like little needles," he said.
The weather forced school closings as far west as Cleveland. In Philadelphia, it could be nearly impossible to get in the state-required 180 days of school before June 15 because of a string of snow days.
Steve Coleman, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, said that most flights out of the metro area's three major airports were canceled. The airports —John F. Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark — remained open.
Delta Air Lines, the world's biggest airline, reported 360 cancellations throughout its system, mostly in the Northeast. It diverted some of its international flights at JFK to other airports.
American Airlines and regional affiliate American Eagle axed 200 flights in and out of New York, 10 in Philadelphia and roughly 80 in Washington. Southwest Airlines scrubbed 297 flights, while US Airways canceled 236 Express flights and 76 mainline flights.
JetBlue Airways nixed 80 flights and AirTran Airways canceled 18 flights.
New York's Port Authority bus terminal was still open Friday, although bus carriers like Greyhound, Megabus, Bolt Bus and Peter Pan Bus Lines canceled "most, if not all of their service," Coleman said. Amtrak also canceled some Northeast Regional trains between New York and Boston or Washington, D.C.
New Jersey Transit canceled all buses in the northern half of the state, including those that take workers to New York. "The buses are canceled at least through noon," transit spokesman Dan Stessel said. "We will be evaluating when we can restore service later this morning."
Government offices in New Jersey were opening two hours late.
Much of the region, particularly Philadelphia and southern New Jersey, only recently finished cleaning up from a pair of storms a few weeks ago.
Even before snow began falling Thursday, Philadelphia and Atlantic City had experienced their snowiest winters on record.
Across upstate New York and New England, it had been an unusually forgiving winter until this week.
For parts of the region, including western Vermont, snow remains in the forecast through Monday.
In Newark, N.J., Rosa Cabrera waited 20 minutes for a bus that never came, then took off on foot to her job at a factory. Cabrera said her usual 10-minute bus ride was at least a half-hour walk, on a clear day.
"We thought we were used to the winters here," the Ecuador native said in Spanish, "but this is just too much."
Evelyn Burgess, 27, of Rochester, N.Y., arrived at the Greater Rochester International Airport about 5:30 a.m for an early morning flight, one day after her initial Delta Airlines flight to Los Angeles was canceled because of wintry weather. Her morning flight was also canceled.
Burgess was trying to book a flight on another airline since Delta said it couldn't get her to Los Angeles before March 1. "We're hoping to catch an 11 a.m. flight to Washington to L.A.," she said, but she's "waiting to see what happens."
Contributing: Carolyn Pesce in McLean, Va.; Emily Stewart, Poughkeepsie (N.Y.) Journal; Michelle Sahn, Asbury Park (N.J.) Press; Victoria Freile, Rochester (N.Y.) Democrat and Chronicle; Associated Press press reporters Geoff Mulvihill in Philadelphia; Chris Carola in Albany, N.Y.; Clarke Canfield in Saco; Shawn Marsh in Trenton, N.J.; Samantha Henry in Newark, N.J.; Randy Pennell in Philadelphia; Wilson Ring in Montpelier, Vt.; Michael Rubinkam in Allentown, Pa.; and Kiley Armstrong and Ula Ilnytzky in New York City.
Over 1 million without power as winter storm pounds Northeast US
From staff and wire reports
HAMPTON, N.H. — An unceasing winter storm unleashed multiple dangers across the Northeast on Friday, blasting the coast with hurricane-force winds that fanned a New Hampshire hotel fire, flooding parts of Maine, dropping 2 feet of snow on parts of New York and cutting power to more than 1 million homes and businesses.
Travel throughout the region was almost non-existent.
Power failures were so bad in New Hampshire that even the state Emergency Operations Center was operating on a generator.
The highest wind reported was 91 mph in Portsmouth, N.H. — well above hurricane force of 74 mph. Gusts hit 60 mph or more from New York's Long Island to Massachusetts.
In the coastal town of Hampton, the unoccupied Surf Hotel caught fire, and the howling winds quickly spread the blaze to the rest of the block. Five wood-frame buildings, including an arcade and a restaurant, burned. The cause was unknown.
To the north in Maine, waves crashing ashore at high tide Friday morning turned beachfront streets into rivers in Saco, where storms have claimed several homes over the years.
"Felt like the walls were coming in on the house, and the windows were rattling, and the trees were cracking. It was pretty impressive," said Mark Breton, who rode out the storm in his house a few blocks from the beach.
Public Service of New Hampshire, the state's largest utility, reported that power was cut to at least 237,000 homes and businesses in the state of 1.3 million and said it would take days before everyone's lights flickered back on.
There were more than 220,000 customers without power in New York, mostly in the Hudson Valley north of New York City. There were 130,000 in Maine, 85,000 in Massachusetts, 25,000 in Vermont and more than 14,000 homes and businesses without electricity in New Jersey.
Over the course of two days, about 100,000 Central Hudson Gas & Electric Corp. customers lost power across eight counties in the Hudson Valley.
"The 'one-two punch' of the storms is now creating the largest storm-related outage event in the utility's history, surpassing the previous record of the April 1997 Snowbud storm that knocked out electricity for 100,000 customers," the company said in a press release.
"This was not just any storm," said Denise Doring VanBuren, vice president of corporate communications for the utility. "The truth is, we're facing a natural disaster."
The weather snarled traffic. A tractor-trailer jackknifed and 16 commercial vehicles piled up on a mile of the Pennsylvania Turnpike, forcing closure of a 60-mile stretch in the hills of central Pennsylvania. Two injuries were reported.
In Washington, D.C., wind gusts of 48 mph were clocked at Reagan National Airport. The Washington Monument was closed to tourists because of the high winds.
Heavy snow closed 30 miles of Interstate 84 in New York state, and state Police Sgt. Stephen Meehan called travel conditions throughout the mid-Hudson Valley "an absolute disaster." Tuxedo, N.Y., reported 26 inches of snow, and more was coming down.
In New York City, 17 inches of snow had fallen before dawn and more was expected. A man was killed by a falling snow-laden tree branch in Central Park, one of at least three deaths being blamed on the storm.
Mayor Mike Bloomberg, who had said Thursday that the nation's largest public school district would stay open, changed his mind. It's the second snow day of the month there, but only the fourth in six years.
Eric Warner of Brooklyn had to brave it. He drove a truckload of milk, eggs and cheese from Teaneck, N.J., into Manhattan. The roads were terrible, he said, and even carrying the crates was hard.
"When the snow hits you, it feels like little needles," he said.
The weather forced school closings as far west as Cleveland. In Philadelphia, it could be nearly impossible to get in the state-required 180 days of school before June 15 because of a string of snow days.
Steve Coleman, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, said that most flights out of the metro area's three major airports were canceled. The airports —John F. Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark — remained open.
Delta Air Lines, the world's biggest airline, reported 360 cancellations throughout its system, mostly in the Northeast. It diverted some of its international flights at JFK to other airports.
American Airlines and regional affiliate American Eagle axed 200 flights in and out of New York, 10 in Philadelphia and roughly 80 in Washington. Southwest Airlines scrubbed 297 flights, while US Airways canceled 236 Express flights and 76 mainline flights.
JetBlue Airways nixed 80 flights and AirTran Airways canceled 18 flights.
New York's Port Authority bus terminal was still open Friday, although bus carriers like Greyhound, Megabus, Bolt Bus and Peter Pan Bus Lines canceled "most, if not all of their service," Coleman said. Amtrak also canceled some Northeast Regional trains between New York and Boston or Washington, D.C.
New Jersey Transit canceled all buses in the northern half of the state, including those that take workers to New York. "The buses are canceled at least through noon," transit spokesman Dan Stessel said. "We will be evaluating when we can restore service later this morning."
Government offices in New Jersey were opening two hours late.
Much of the region, particularly Philadelphia and southern New Jersey, only recently finished cleaning up from a pair of storms a few weeks ago.
Even before snow began falling Thursday, Philadelphia and Atlantic City had experienced their snowiest winters on record.
Across upstate New York and New England, it had been an unusually forgiving winter until this week.
For parts of the region, including western Vermont, snow remains in the forecast through Monday.
In Newark, N.J., Rosa Cabrera waited 20 minutes for a bus that never came, then took off on foot to her job at a factory. Cabrera said her usual 10-minute bus ride was at least a half-hour walk, on a clear day.
"We thought we were used to the winters here," the Ecuador native said in Spanish, "but this is just too much."
Evelyn Burgess, 27, of Rochester, N.Y., arrived at the Greater Rochester International Airport about 5:30 a.m for an early morning flight, one day after her initial Delta Airlines flight to Los Angeles was canceled because of wintry weather. Her morning flight was also canceled.
Burgess was trying to book a flight on another airline since Delta said it couldn't get her to Los Angeles before March 1. "We're hoping to catch an 11 a.m. flight to Washington to L.A.," she said, but she's "waiting to see what happens."
Contributing: Carolyn Pesce in McLean, Va.; Emily Stewart, Poughkeepsie (N.Y.) Journal; Michelle Sahn, Asbury Park (N.J.) Press; Victoria Freile, Rochester (N.Y.) Democrat and Chronicle; Associated Press press reporters Geoff Mulvihill in Philadelphia; Chris Carola in Albany, N.Y.; Clarke Canfield in Saco; Shawn Marsh in Trenton, N.J.; Samantha Henry in Newark, N.J.; Randy Pennell in Philadelphia; Wilson Ring in Montpelier, Vt.; Michael Rubinkam in Allentown, Pa.; and Kiley Armstrong and Ula Ilnytzky in New York City.
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