MOUNTAINS OF SNOW COVER CITY OF BUFFALO, NY - People trapped in homes and on highways - And it's not even winter yet

Keep on digging! Buffalo braces for three MORE feet of snow - bringing the total to eight - as scores remain trapped.

Three more feet of snow is expected in Buffalo today - making it eight feet since Monday night

Sections of the New York State Thruway remain closed 

Some truckers and other motorists have spent three days stranded in their vehicles waiting for the road to open 

Thundersnow is coming to Buffalo, bringing dangerous lightning strikes

Weekend thaw and rainstorms could cause flash flooding as snow melts rapidly

Roofs are collapsing across western New York from the weight of the snow

 

WHAT'S THE POINT, REALLY?

Continue reading and see additional images

 

TRAPPED

STUCK

 

NICE -  BUT TO GO WHERE, EXACTLY?

JUST GO INSIDE AND ENJOY SOME FAMILY TIME

Just when beleaguered Buffalo residents started to dig out from a historic blizzard that dumped up to 65 inches - it's snowing again in western New York. 

 

The new lake effect storm could pile another three feet - bringing the total to eight feet in some places - on a region already struggling to cope with an unprecedented mid-November storm. Authorities have been waging a losing battle to clear away the incredible mounds and the additional wintry blast will make it even harder for the region to return to normal life.

 

Dozens of truckers remain stranded the New York State Thruway, a vital highway between western New York and the rest of the state. A 135-mile stretch of the highway remains closed three days after the storm first hit. More than 150 abandoned cars are stuck on the highway, slowing down snow plows that are clearing the lanes.

 

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said the last of the motorists have finally been rescued from the Thruway today, some 72 hours after they got stuck. Cuomo blamed the drivers for getting on the highway after it had been closed and said they should be ticketed.

 

However, motorists hit back at the governor, saying that entrance ramps were left open and no signs were posted to stay off the road. They said they were left stranded and abandoned and that, despite assurances from the New York State Police, help never came as they ran out of food, water and fuel. It was not until nervous family members pressured the governor and local officials that state troopers were dispatched to save them, according to the Buffalo News. 

 

Roofs across the region have begun to cave in under the massive snowfall. Five feet of snow on a roof can add weight equivalent to two pickup trucks to a roof. A boy in Lancaster, New York, was hurt when a porch collapsed on him. A house in house in Alden crashed in on itself because of the snow, though the family inside was not hurt, the Buffalo News reports.

 

Meanwhile, the Buffalo Bills worked to clear out 72,000-seat Ralph Wilson Stadium in time for Sunday's game against the New York Jets.  

 

Even good news is bad news in Buffalo. A warmup this weekend that will see temperatures hit 57 by Monday could bring flash floods as the snow melts rapidly, fueled by a deluge of rain. 

The rest of the country saw a reprieve today, as temperatures warmed significantly.

 

The low this morning in New York, Philadelphia and Washington, DC, was 36 - lower than average for mid-November, but balmy compared to the 20 degrees that greeted commuters on Wednesday. 

 

The Midwest remained frigid - Chicago saw a low of 20 this morning - but lows were in the high teens and 20s across most of the Midwest, about 10 degrees warmer than Wednesday.  
 

'It is an extraordinary situation,' Gov. Andrew Cuomo told reporters after touring the region Wednesday and talking to truckers who had been stranded more than 24 hours on the Thruway. 'It will get worse before it gets better.'

 

Even for Buffalo, a place that typically shrugs at snow, this was a stunning snowfall — the kind of onslaught folks will be telling their grandchildren about.

 

Those living in the Buffalo area were already buried under as much as 5½ feet of snow Wednesday, and they awoke Thursday to more heavy snow that could bring 1 to 3 feet more.

 

The new snow and high winds moved through the city of Buffalo with lightning and thunder overnight Thursday, dropping several inches before blasting towns to the south, which were in line for the highest totals, National Weather Service meteorologist David Zaff said.

 

'This is an historic event. When all is said and done, this snowstorm will break all sorts of records, and that's saying something in Buffalo,' Cuomo said.

 

The storm came in so fast and furious over Lake Erie early Tuesday it trapped more than 100 vehicles along a 132-mile stretch of the New York State Thruway that remained closed Wednesday.

 

Tom Wilson, of West Seneca, split a Salisbury steak frozen dinner with co-workers and tried his best to get some rest when he was stuck 36 hours at his warehouse job.

 

'I slept on a pallet. Then I slept on some office chairs, and then I went back to the pallet,' Wilson said. 'Then I found some sponges to lay on. I found one pack of sponges unopened. That looks like a pillow to me.

 

'We tried to make popcorn with a two-by-four, two empty pop kegs, some charcoal and a dust pan,' he added. 'It didn't work.'

 

Bethany Hojnacki went into labor at the height of the storm and ended up giving birth in a Buffalo fire station after she and her husband couldn't get to the hospital. Mother and daughter were later taken to the hospital in an ambulance.

 

Cuomo said Wednesday afternoon that all trapped travelers had been removed from their cars, though some truckers were staying with their rigs.

 

Asked by reporters how officials could allow people to be snowbound in cars for 24 hours, Cuomo cited a jackknifed trailer that prevented plows from removing fast-falling snow, and drivers' own wrongheaded choices.

 

'What happened was, even though the Thruway was officially closed, people went on. We didn't immediately block every entrance. It was a mistake,' Cuomo said.

 

'Part of it is citizen responsibility,' he added. 'If the road is closed, it's closed.'

The storm was blamed for up to eight deaths in western New York, at least five of them from heart attacks. Erie County officials announced the latest death on Thursday, that of a man in his 60s who was stricken Wednesday while operating a snowblower.

 

Residents of a mobile home park in the suburb of West Seneca were being evacuated Thursday after their roofs began to collapse under the weight of heavy snow.

 

Source
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2841992/Round-2-Buffalo-braces-wintry-wallop.html

*****************************************************************************