BUFFALO, N.Y. (WBEN) – You never know what can happen on Friday the 13th. You may be on your toes bracing for something out of the ordinary.
Fifteen years ago, all of Western New York experienced something out of the ordinary: The October Surprise.
The 16-hour storm devastated the region for two weeks. It was the earliest snow event recorded by the National Weather Service, but among the most unique in regards to destruction of trees and power outages. Nearly 400,000 customers were without power, which impacted almost a million residents of the Niagara Frontier, some for as long as a week.
"Out of season snowstorms can be very catastrophic both on the front end and back end," Tom Niziol, a retired meteorologist in charge at the National Weather Service in Buffalo and winter weather expert on The Weather Channel, said. "…I describe that night stepping outside the office as the night the trees cried because you could hear not branches just cracking, but splitting and peeling down the trees as the weight of that heavy snowfall just laid on those leaves and brought all of those branches down."
WBEN's team of reporters tracked all aspects of the storm and its recovery for weeks. Then-Governor George Pataki visited the region to say: "Mother Nature really threw the people of Western New York a curveball."
We followed developments from emergency officials who warned the snow would melt and cause a snapping of the limbs, which contributed to lengthy power outages for those affected.
WBEN also caught up with the lighter side of news:
"Well, I hope it's freezing all my meats for me," one woman quipped to WBEN at the time. "I've got a whole freezer full of chicken and turkeys and everything else. I don't want it to go to waste."
HEAR SOME OF WBEN'S COVERAGE OF THE OCTOBER SURPRISE IN THIS REPORT BY WBEN'S MIKE BAGGERMAN
The October Surprise remains one of the harshest weather events ever in the region. Governor Pataki declared a state of emergency for Erie, Genesee, Niagara, and Orleans counties on October 13. President George Bush declared the four counties eligible for disaster assistance on October 24.
By that December, nearly $11 million in disaster grants and loans were approved.
One person's death was directly attributed to the storm when an Amherst man was crushed by a tree limb while clearing snow in his driveway.
Fourteen other deaths were indirectly related to the storm, including four who died from carbon monoxide poisoning due to improper use of generators and kerosene heaters. More than 200 people were treated for exposure to carbon monoxide. Seventeen people were treated for hypothermia.
Debris cleanup alone cost more than $150 million, though estimates of total storm damage was well over $500 million.
The snow all melted within 48 to 60 hours with little flooding. Depew and Alden received two feet of snow from the event while the City of Buffalo had 20 inches.
The event prompted former Buffalo Bills executive Don Purdy to write a book about it. It's called "Thunder Snow in Buffalo" and is co-written by Billy Klun.
"While my personal story is a running narrative throughout in terms of at 3 a.m. a tree landed on our roof and shook the foundation of our house," Purdy said. "Our basement flooded. We were without power for eight days. Things happened to hundreds of thousands of other people in the Buffalo area. That's the narrative it keeps coming back to. The stories we have from the 50-plus contributors, they're the authors. We essentially compiled and composed those stories in a chronological way."
Do you have any memories of the October Surprise? Share your comments on our social media pages.
BELOW: Listen to a collection of audio from October 13, 2006 from WBEN's archives; including then-Governor Pataki, New York State Police Captain Mike Nigrelli, National Grid's Steve Brady, Amherst Supervisor Satish Mohan, West Seneca Supervisor Paul Clark as well as WBEN's Barbara Burns and Steve Cichon.
More of WBEN's reporting with former reporter Steve Cichon:
