Wind Chill Warning expires; warmer weather on the way...
The "Polar Vortex" -- or Express... is finally expected to loosen it's grip slightly on Chautauqua County... and, all of Western New York today. We are still experiencing potentially dangerous wind chills through mid-morning today. However... Forecaster Tom Paone with the National Weather Service in Buffalo says it won't be quite as bad as yesterday... when wind chill reached about 41-below at the Jamestown Airport. In fact... Paone says the actual temperatures will be back into positive double-digits by this afternoon. Highs will be into the upper teens to near 20 this afternoon. By Friday, Paone says we'll see the mid-30s, and by Saturday, we'll be close to 50-degrees. With temperatures getting back towards 50 by the weekend... Paone says we may be looking at ice-jamming by then. The Blizzard of 2014 has dropped a good two-feet of snow -- or more -- in parts of the north county into the Buffalo-area.
Local Red Cross busy before, and during Winter Storm on State Thruway...
This week's Winter Storm and blizzard conditions along the Lake Erie shoreline made for a busy past five to six days for the local Red Cross. Executive Director Bill Tucker with the Southwestern New York chapter says they're closing up some four shelters along the state Thruway in Chautauqua County today. Tucker says their long week began last Friday... as they're Disaster Action Team members were called out to five family disasters... mainly fires and a Carbon Monoxide event. Fortunately... no serious injuries were reported. However... Tucker says they began planning early Monday for the likely closing the state Thruway during the storm. He says they worked with the county's Office of Emergency Services, the Thruway Authority, and other community partners to open shelters for stranded motorists in Ripley, and Silver Creek-Irving area... where they housed dozens of motorists due to driving bans in Erie County and Buffalo. In fact... Tucker says the situation got to the point where they opened up two more shelters on Monday night at the Irving and Sunset Bay Fire Departments. He says they had the most people at those locations last night.
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Tucker reminds residents that they are 100-percent funded by public contributions... and, they get some funding from the United Ways in Chautauqua County. If you would like to make a donation to help out... contact the Red Cross at 664-5115.
State Thruway open again as of 5 this morning...
The state Thruway in western New York has reopened after being closed since Monday by a blizzard that's winding down after dumping nearly 20 inches of snow on the region. The Thruway Authority says Interstate 90 from Exit 46 at Rochester to Exit 61 on the Pennsylvania border opened to all traffic around 5 a.m. Wednesday. State officials began shutting down a 75-mile stretch of the highway from Buffalo to Ripley in Chautauqua County on Monday afternoon, when blowing snow made driving treacherous. That stretch of the Thruway was fully closed later that night, and the shutdown was extended to Exit 46 outside Rochester late Tuesday morning. The Buffalo section of Interstate 190, the Niagara Thruway, has also reopened after being closed Tuesday.
