Blizzard of 1977

thumb|right|Snow drifts made travel difficult in parts of [[New York (state)|New York (February 7, 1977)]]

thumb|A house almost completely buried in snow in [[Tonawanda (town), New York|Tonawanda, New York (January 30, 1977)]]

The blizzard of 1977 hit Western New York, Central New York, Northern New York, and Southern Ontario from January 28 to February 1 of that year. Daily peak wind gusts ranging from were recorded by the National Weather Service in Buffalo, with snowfall as high as recorded in areas, which was very persistent from October 1976 through January 1977, and involved a ridge over western North America and a trough over eastern North America. In January 1977, this pattern persisted, with the pressure of the strong ridge over western North America being more than two standard deviations from the mean, while the strong trough centered over eastern North America was more than three standard deviations from the mean. Strong northwest flow between the ridge and the trough resulted in a strong northwest flow in between, which ushered Arctic air into the central and eastern United States. In contrast, Alaska was exceptionally mild: Anchorage averaged above normal and was in fact warmer for the month than Atlanta half the distance from the equator, and over the Aleutians 1963 was equally warm and 1957 warmer. The Pacific Northwest, located under the strong ridge, experienced unprecedented drought, with all 29 climatic divisions of Washington, Oregon and Idaho experiencing their driest October to February period on record.

In western New York

Antecedent weather

During June through September, the Buffalo National Weather Service (NWS) office recorded of rain, which is wetter than the 1961–1990 average of . In western New York the previously described pattern resulted in snowy and cold weather in the months leading up to the blizzard. Buffalo was a city of about 463,000 people with about 1.5 million in the metropolitan area, the second most populated city in New York State.

The first trace of snow of the winter at the Buffalo NWS weather station in Cheektowaga, New York, occurred on October 9, while the first accumulating snow was on October 21.

November's air temperature in Buffalo was the coldest in nearly 100 years (since 1880), with an average temperature of . November's average temperature was about below normal. The total November snowfall was recorded as in Buffalo. December's snowfall was .

The wintry weather continued in January, with the monthly average temperature being , the coldest on record (records began in 1870 in Buffalo).

The white wall of snow reached the airport around 11:30 am. associated with the cold front. During January, the unusually cold conditions limited thawing and freezing, and thus the snow on the ground (and frozen lake) did not consolidate into a form that would limit drifting.

The new snow associated with the cold front and the snow that had accumulated on land and frozen Lake Erie were all blown by the strong winds and created drifts of over in metropolitan Buffalo.

As stated previously, the storm, with consistent winds of 70 km/h and gusts of 100 to 120 km/h, struck suddenly late in the morning Friday, January 28. The resultant blowing snow causing zero visibility and drifting snow making roads impassable causing many vehicles becoming stuck in the snow, causing their occupants to abandon them. That day of additional snow fell in the Port Colborne-Wainfleet area. That night, 250 people were stranded in the International Nickel Company plant in Port Colborne. Although schools closed when informed of the impending storm, the rapid onset of the storm resulted in about 1,000 students being stranded overnight on January 28, in Port Colborne and Wainfleet schools (about 2,000 students total were stranded in the Niagara region altogether). On Saturday, January 29, more snow was deposited in Port Colbourne-Wainfleet area and the high winds continued to cause blizzard conditions and high drifts of snow. That night, at 6 p.m., 800 students were still trapped, with 600 of them in Wainfleet and Port Colborne. On Sunday, a day when the winds decreased until the mid-afternoon but an additional of snow fell, the remaining students were taken from the schools with the help of the militia; some students were housed in nearby houses. In some areas, buses had become stranded trying to take children home from school Friday, so bus drivers had taken the children to nearby houses. On Monday, January 31 a further of snow fell in Port Colborne and windy conditions caused more blowing snow and higher snow drifts. Snowmobile services were set up at certain locations around the town and the Ontario Provincial Police transported the teachers and other stranded people home one-by-one by snowmobile Saturday night and Sunday.

St. Catharines, situated on the north side of the Niagara Peninsula on the shore of Lake Ontario, had winds between 50 and 70 km/h with blowing snow causing low visibility/almost blizzard conditions (0.4 km visibility) the entire afternoon of January 28, and had winds between 40 and 60 km/h and reduced visibility (approximately 0.8 km) most of January 29, and variable reduced visibility (ranging from 0.4 km to 1.2 km) for much of January 31, before the winds and blowing snow curtailed on February 1. Winds gust were as high as 98 km/h on January 28 and 93 km/h on January 31 leading to wind chill temperatures of −16.9 °C and −14.6 °C on those days, while 8.8 cm of snow was distributed on the city on January 28 and with lower amounts between 0.5 and 1.5 cm on the other days of the blizzard.

London, Ontario, experienced consistent winds of about 50 km/h which caused blowing snow and near zero visibility (0.2 km or less) for the entire afternoon of January 28 even though only of new snow was deposited that day. Consistent winds of 35 to 40 km/h continued over three of the next four days, resulting in drifting and blowing snow causing reduced visibility (between 1 and 1.6 km) for almost all of January 29, low visibility (between 0.6 and 1.2 km) for almost all of January 31, and reduced visibility (between 1.2 and 1.6 km) for several hours on February 1, although only additional snow fell over the four days.

Northern New York

Portions of northern New York state, particularly Jefferson and Lewis counties, were also hard hit. At 3:10 pm, on Friday, January 28, Watertown reported zero visibility and wind gusting to as the cold front that had moved through southern Ontario and Western New York advanced through northern New York. The Watertown region received of snow with the cold front, but unfrozen Lake Ontario (in contrast to frozen Lake Erie), along with atmospheric conditions favorable for lake effect snow, allowed snow bands to form that resulted in storm totals of in Watertown, in Mansville, Fort Drum, and more than in areas southeast of Watertown. The snow, along with the winds, resulted in drifts of , and stranded of more than 1,000 motorists.

On February 9, about a week after the storm ended, the average snow depth in the Black River basin (about ) which include Jefferson, Lewis and other counties was , having a liquid equivalent of that raised flooding concerns. Sears Pond, about southeast of Watertown, recorded a snow depth of with a liquid equivalent of .

New Jersey

In New Jersey, Rutgers University was forced to shut down classes for the first time ever.

Cultural references

Music

The alternative rock band Nada Surf recorded a song in 2002 titled "Blizzard of '77", which opens with the following lyrics: "In the blizzard of '77 / The cars were just lumps on the snow."

Canadian post-hardcore band Alexisonfire released their third studio album, Crisis in 2006, which had a victim of the blizzard with frostbitten hands as the cover art and the title song, and contains many lyrics directly referring to the blizzard, including the repeated lyrics "One nine seven seven."

Jimmy Buffett's 1978 album Son of a Son of a Sailor included the song "Mañana", which lyrics include: "Yeah, they're freezin' up in Buffalo stuck in their cars..."

The pop punk band The Ataris recorded a song in 2025 titled "Car Song" in which the singer says "I was born in the blizzard of 1977".

Literature

Two books have been written about it, The Blizzard by Robert Bahr and White Death – The Blizzard of '77, which is a compilation by Erno Rossi of accounts of the blizzard from both southern Ontario and western New York (Rossi 1999; note the original edition of the book was entitled White Death – Blizzard of '77 and published in 1978).

Other

A board game, called The Blizzard of '77 Travel Game was created after the storm. In it, the players drive around the board, trying to collect goods, such as groceries, bank, work, drug store, and hardware with 2 safe spots of home and gasoline, before the storm hits. Once the storm hits, the board is flipped over to the "Blizzard" side and the players must continue in blizzard conditions.

A set of six glasses was sold by the Buffalo Courier-Express newspaper with reproductions of newspaper articles about the storm on them.

Notes

References

Bibliography

Online at Archive.org