The Blizzard of 1978

It was Feb 6, 1978. Sport utility vehicles didn’t exist and 4-wheel drive vehicles were an anomaly. The weather man had said we were in for a big storm but the magnitude of it hit hurricane status. It started to snow about noon. By 5pm there was no going home for a lot of folks with cars stranded along highways all over the state. It continued to snow for 30 hours leaving over 2 feet of wind wiped snow behind. Drifts at times would be as high as houses. Eventually, Gov. Ella Grasso literally closed down the state. It took a good three days to dig out, longer for some of us. For those of us who lived through it, it was either a royal pain or a time for pride in our Yankee resourcefulness. As an employee at the AAA of Hartford, the emergency service lines started lighting up and all departments were called in to help. Some of the guys were recruited to stay overnight, sleeping on cots in the basement. The rest were told to go home early. At one point, even road service had to be closed down as the wreckers were bogged down and drivers decided to wait it out. Emergency personal couldn’t get to their stations with police giving nurses and doctors rides that sometime ended up taking hours. For some of us who were lucky enough to have friends that lived close by our job, it was a time to pack it in and sit it out, not realizing it would be 3 days before we could get home. The Blizzard of 1978 came, claimed its place in history, and left behind life long memories.