Motorists in Georgia shuddered at the foreign squeal of back tires spinning on ice. California drought officials traded in their sun visors for umbrellas and began dispensing flood-control information. In Massachusetts, the state’s $9 million snow-removal budget is already exhausted. New York, 16 in.), the West with drenching rains and high winds, the South with frigid temperatures and a score of tornadoes. First the winter of ‘78 clobbered the East with heavy snow (Boston, 21 in. 6, 1978, issue: Now It’s The Midwest’s TurnĪ blizzard in early 1978 struck the East first, before turning bringing the Midwest to a stand-still and costing the auto industry an estimated $130 million:Įnough already. Not until six hours later could snowbound police remove her body.įrom the Feb. A 50-year-old woman suffered a fatal heart attack on a stalled bus at 5 a.m. On the Calumet Expressway, 1,000 stranded motorists joined hands so that they would not get lost, snaked their way to nearby homes. With traffic at a standstill and visibility at zero, tens of thousands of marooned workers had to spend the night in firehouses, hospitals and hotels. By midafternoon, Chicago’s streets were clogged by wind-whipped snowdrifts and stalled autos. The howling blast began Thursday morning. Though no stranger to wintry storms, Chicago found itself in the brief space of 24 hours paralyzed by the worst blizzard in its history-a raging storm that tore through large sections of the Midwest and caused at least 75 deaths. Within two days, the temperature plummeted to the 20s, snow came cascading down, and icy winds gusted through the streets. 24 on record- but they little dreamed how startling the change would be. When Chicago was hit with a record 23 inches of show in 1967, it shut down the city almost entirely:Ĭhicagoans knew that the balmy 65° weather could hardly last-it was, after all, the warmest Jan. 3, 1967, issue: The 24-Million-Ton Snow Job Last week, in a taxi driver’s dream of heaven, private cars were banned in Manhattan for five days to facilitate snow removal, which so far has cost the metropolis some $20 million.įrom the Feb. New York City, buried under 55.7 inches of snow that had fallen this season, also endured 16 days of continuously below-freezing temperatures. Georgia peach trees shivered in the coldest winter in 25 years. 1 had the cities and farms east of the Mississippi seen even reasonable winter weather. Patton’s exasperated wartime injunction to his chaplain: “Goddam it, get me some good weather!” last week could only echo General George S. Particularly in the East, the frozen, snow-strangled U.S. The result was a string of bad weather nationwide: 17, 1961, issue: The Cause of the Snowīlizzards in 1961 were, TIME reported, due to a vicious cycle of weather, in which storms kept the ground from warming, which allowed cold air to get up under warmer winds, causing further storms. It got radio stations to ask the citizenry kindly not to let their houses burn down.įrom the Feb. Its engine-house gongs rang out the “five sixes” (all firemen report for duty). Meanwhile the Fire Department was struck by the horrible thought-it couldn’t move its trucks. Hotels were besieged and a backwash of the stranded headed for bars, all-night movies and the apartments of friends. Shoe stores were invaded by snow-powdered hikers in search of rubbers and galoshes. It was 4.9 inches above the record set in the legendary three-day blizzard of 1888.īy 5 o’clock, central Manhattan subway stations were jammed with pushing, gesticulating throngs. At midnight, 18 hours and 35 minutes after the storm began, the Weather Bureau announced that 25.8 inches had fallen. It was seeing its heaviest snowfall in Weather Bureau history (76 years). Suddenly the city began to realize what was happening. Though New Yorkers “disregard nature until it makes more noise than the subway,” a storm at the turn of 1948 got their attention:

When the storm ceased and the cold intensified, herd after herd stood wearily with their breaths steaming, waiting patiently for death.įrom the Jan. But some time during the second night, when the snow was belly deep on the flats and higher than a rider’s head in the drifts, they stopped. When they came to fences they turned, followed the wire. Then, for 48 hours, a blizzard-the worst in 33 years-moaned down out of Wyoming with nothing to stop it but fence posts and cottonwood trees.Īs the prairies whitened, scores of thousands of chunky Hereford cattle turned tail to the storm, lowered their heads, and began to drift disconsolately before it. It grew dark, and salt-like snow began hissing across leagues of sere buffalo grass. After that a freezing wind rose, banged barn doors and snatched at the smoke from lonely ranch houses. The sun disappeared behind a grey overcast, and a great stillness fell over the eastern Colorado plains.

Snow totals michigan 2015