October Surprise Storm 20 years later

Buffalo, NY (WBEN) In a matter of hours, Western New York went from dry roads to two feet on the ground 20 years ago this week. The October Surprise Storm hit the region, and one man recalls his time getting the Bills on the road.

Don Purdy says he had a daughter in in middle school at a soccer game that afternoon. "The skies turned a color that I'd never seen before, and like like a purplish. And there was talk about maybe snow, maybe rain, but if the snow was going to be anything, it was just going to be a couple harmless inches, which, albeit in you know early to mid October, would be odd, but but not not not a problem. But of course, turned out to be quite wrong. It was a problem, big one," recalls Purdy. The realization came several hours later. "About 11 o'clock outside, there there were the sounds of what sounded like gunshots, but they turned out to be trees cracking, and in fact, at 3o'clock, one landed on our roof and shook the house very hard. It was it was quite scary. But it wasn't until the sun came up and and you could see the Armageddon-like scene of the trees and the power lines that had come down just from our own our own perspective on our street."

Purdy, working for the Bills at the time, had a dilemma on his hands. "We had to try to get the team to Detroit. It's now Friday morning, and we were set to leave Saturday to travel to Detroit. And depending on where you lived, you just could not get in the office unless you had a helicopter or access to one," notes Purdy. "We had to try to get every player and coach to the airport. Of course, the game happened. That's in history, and but how it happened is described in the book as extremely tenuous. And yeah, it was it was the trees and the power lines that were the problem, and and were distinctive for for that storm." He says it meant everyone had to chip in to try to get their neighbor there. "There was no dress code as it normally was. Just get yourself there if you're in the clothes that you wore to bed. We'll figure that out. Coach Dick Jauron at the time just said everyone, every trainer, every front office person. If you know a player they can't get there, find someone that could get them to a place where someone can pick them up. A lot of players, their cell phones had died because they lost power, so they had to go knocking on doors to get them out. Former player Kevin Everett, who prior to the year that he was was injured so badly, had to pick up Roscoe Parrish. They were two teammates in Miami, and Roscoe Parrish looked out and said, "I don't want any part of that. And Kevin had a an SUV and said, "I'll give it a try. And they had a very scary ride that's documented in the book, and everyone got there. Jabari Greer was about a half hour late, but everyone got got to Detroit and where the weather was perfect. And at our hotel, they were people were dressed up and watching their Tigers play in the World Series," says Purdy.

Purdy says a slight change in temperature could have made all the difference. "Had the temperature been a 10th of a degree more, it would have been rain but it was a 10th of a degree cooler so it was two pounds of the heaviest two feet of the heaviest snow possible that ripped the trees down," notes Purdy.

Purdy recalls more in his book, Thunder Snow of Buffalo.