'Lake effect' storm paralyzes Buffalo area

NEW YORK, Dec. 2 (UPI) -- Highway crews struggled to dig stranded trucks and cars out of heavy snow Thursday on the New York Thruway near Buffalo.

Many drivers spent the night on the highway, the Buffalo News reported. Snow continued to fall Thursday, and David Zaff, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service, said some areas could get 32 inches by Friday.

Zaff said the storm, which began Wednesday as rain, was one of Buffalo's notorious "lake effect" snowfalls. The city sits at the eastern end of Lake Erie.

"If you're north of the lake effect band, you saw nothing," he said. "If you're in it, you got a lot of snow. In the same town, you can have one inch of snow in one area, and a foot in another area."

While highway workers used shovels, chains and front-loaders to pull 18-wheelers out of drifts, some drivers were brought to a senior center in Cheektowaga to warm up. Tony Garrett, a North Carolina trucker, arrived early Thursday afternoon on an ATV.

"There's hundreds of vehicles out there for sure," he said. "I've been sitting out there since about 3:30 this morning."

Another driver who had been stuck since 10 p.m. Wednesday told him he was lucky.

Accuweather.com said the snow is a backwash from a big rainstorm that has been plaguing the East this week. The Weather Channel said the heaviest snow is expected to fall in southwestern New York, not too far south of Buffalo, and in the Tug Hill Plateau east of Lake Ontario, north of Syracuse.

It said rain and snow should gradually end in central and western Maine, and that accumulating snow should be confined to the mountains.