Associated Press
BUFFALO, N.Y. – Sunshine returned to Buffalo on Saturday as the city set to work digging out from under nearly 7 feet of snow piled up by a storm that lasted most of the week.
National Guard troops and crews from other cities helped city workers dig out streets and haul away snow. Prison inmates cleared fire hydrants while residents with shovels and snow blowers tackled eye-level mounds covering their driveways and cars.
“I’ve never seen snow this deep,” said Dennis Myers, a landlord using a snow blower to clear his parking lot.
At least three deaths were blamed on the snow in the Buffalo area, one an 83-year-old killed by a collapsing carport.
Traffic began moving again Saturday on a 75-mile stretch of the New York State Thruway, a major east-west highway, which had been closed since Thursday. Buffalo Niagara International Airport reopened late Friday after being snowed in much of the week.
Cold wind feeding on moisture from Lake Erie dropped 82.3 inches of snow in five days before shifting southward Friday to ski country. The city’s average for an entire year is 93.5 inches.
As the snow shifted out of the Buffalo area it headed into Pennsylvania, causing sudden whiteouts.
Near Loganton, Pa., a 51-vehicle pileup on Interstate 80 killed six people on Friday and injured many more. Separate chain-reaction crashes blamed on whiteouts elsewhere in the state killed two other people.
Farther west, snow blowing in from Lake Michigan buried parts of northern Michigan, with state police saying some parts of Emmet County had received nearly 90 inches of snow since Dec. 25. Michigan Lt. Gov. Dick Posthumus declared a snow emergency for the county.
Copyright ©2001 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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