My Story: Spooky Halloween Mega Storm memories
Posted at 4:55 PM on October 27, 2011
by Paul Huttner
(13 Comments)
Filed under: Halloween Mega Storm 1991
Halloween 1991: My Halloween Mega Storm story
20 years ago today I was a young buck meteorologist looking at weather maps in the weather center at WCCO-TV in Minneapolis.
I can recall standing there with WCCO's Mike Fairbourne, Mike Lynch, Bill Endersen, Karen Filloon and others in those days leading up to the infamous Halloween Mega Storm and all of us looking in some disbelief at the unfolding weather scenario.
Some of the computer models at the time, with quirky names like LFM (limited fine mesh) and NGM (nested grid model) were winding up a major winter storm early in the season. The storm was gathering strength in Arizona, expected to dip deep into Texas, and then spin up the Mississippi River Valley almost due north into Minnesota and Wisconsin.
The "numerical output" for expected precipitation with the storm was staggering. The day before Halloween, I recall us looking at a forecast of over 2" of liquid for the metro. The system looked just cold enough for all of that to be snow. At a 10:1 snow:rain ratio, that would have been over 20" of snowfall for the Twin Cities!
We knew there was going to be a big storm, but I remember us all just kind of looking at that extreme forecast in some disbelief that it could actually dump that much snow.
NWS surface map shows Mega Storm low pressure winding up in southeast Iowa, moving north. (Note the second area of low presure off the east coast. That's the so called "Perfect Storm")
Halloween Day 1991:
On the day of Halloween 1991, the time had come to make "the call" on the coming storm. Precipitation was scheduled to arrive that night, and would rapidly change to snow. If memory serves me correctly, we put out an initial a forecast of between 8" and 12" of snow for the Twin Cities, with heavier totals possible for Duluth.
WCCO-TV did not have a morning newscast at that time. My news managers decided to have me come in early Thursday morning and do some brief weather "cut-ins" to keep viwers updated until the daytime crews shift began. I was expected to be at the station by around 5am.
Halloween Night 1991:
I had worked the day shift the day of Halloween, and I was home by about 6pm on Halloween night. I remember pulling into my west metro driveway and seeing all the big red oak leaves on the lawn. Was it really possible I wouldn't see the ground again this fall?
As we were handing out candy to the neighborhood kids, I was racing back and forth across the lawn with the lawn mower, in the dark with the house lights on trying to pick up the leaves on the front lawn. The trick or treaters were looking at me as if I was the scariest thing they had seen all night. Who was this crazy guy mowing his lawn in the dark on Halloween night?
When you're the neighborhood weatherman, and when people know who you are, they start asking questions if you're doing something unusual in your yard. Does this guy know something I don't? Is there something I should be doing in my yard too?
As I head off to bed that night, a misty rain is changing to heavy wet snow. The alarm is set for 3:30am.
3:30 am Thursday November 1st 1991:
I wake up in Minnetonka to the sound of wind, and quiet. One look out the front window and I am stunned. The snow is coming down so fast I can barely see the street out front. There is already what looks like 12" to 15" of snow on the ground, and my lawn that was bare 6 hours ago is covered with deep snow.
The driveway and street is deep and unplowed, and I'm about to jump into my little red Honda Accord hatchback and try to get from Minnetonka ot downtown Minneapolis by 5am. There are no traffic sounds, and not a snowplow to be seen.
I jump into my Honda and attempt to back out of the garage into the already snow choked driveway. The car just stops about 15 feet outside the garage. I still have another 30 feet of driveway, slightly uphill to navigate before even getting to the street.
I pull straight back along my tire tracks into the garage in front of me. I shift the (manual) car into reverse, and carefully make another run backwards along my tire tracks. Another 15 feet.
I do it again, careful to stay in my tracks. I know if I skid to one side I'm stuck, and I'm not getting into the station this morning. My tracks now go almost all the way to the street and I decide to go for it. As I make the backwards run out of the garage into my tire tracks, I realize that the only way I'm going to go forward on the street is in one deft move where I let the snow on the street stop me, shift quickly into 1st gear and start forward.
Thankfully there is a slight downhill once I'm on the street, and I lurch forward toward the stop sign. Like every other traffic signal device that morning I will ignore it, knowing if I stop anywhere I'm stuck right there.
It's about a mile to I-394 and I make the ramp. I'm doing about 25 to 30 mph in the deep snow. (My little Honda was great in snow) Snow is flying up on the sides of the car like a rooster tail from water skier as I plow through.
I'm the only car on the freeway, making a lonely run down I-394 through St. Louis Park at 4:15 in the morning heading for downtown Minneapolis. There's are no other cars, no tire tracks on the freeway, and not a snow plow in sight.
As I come off the ramp on 12th Street into downtown Minneapolis the story is the same. Snow choked streets, no traffic and optional traffic lights. After about 6 blocks, I veer into the parking lot behind "The Times" near 11th and the Nicollet Mall...and bury my car sideways in a snow drift n the middle of the parking lot.
I gather my gear and trudge the last block through a more than a foot of snow, prying open the door at WCCO-TV on 11th Street and the Nicollet Mall.
"We're going to turn this into the Weather Channel"
As I stomp into the WCCO Weather Center, Bill Endersen is the only other meteorologist in the house if memory serves me right. He is handling AM radio duties for WCCO Radio.
I am scheduled to do some weather hits for TV starting at about 5:30am. There are just enough crew members to get us on the air.
The radar is choked with blue, green and yellow. The snow is coming down at the rate of "1 to 2"+ per hour, and there's no let up in sight.
We do a couple of weather hits. At around 7am, the News Director John Lansing stomps into the studio with his parka and sorrel boots still caked with snow. The look on his face is priceless.
"Paul, I want you to turn this into the Weather Channel. I want you to go on the air, and stay on the air for as long as you can."
I recall my initial response was one word. "Cool!"
There are no other anchors, no other TV meteorologist, and no reporters in the station, and we're about to go on the air with live continuous weather coverage during the biggest snowstorm in Twin Cities history. Thankfully I had no clue about the magnitude of what was unfolding at the time.
We hit the air again. John is now producing the coverage in the control room and we are switching between any source we can find, Radar, satellite, forecast maps, live cam, snow totals so far. John begins to arrange "phoners" with various officials and some of our reporters and anchor staff who are still stuck at home. Still, no other anchors can make the trip into WCCO-TV to anchor the coverage. I'm on my own.
Soon WCCO-TV reporter Trish Van Pilsum (now at FOX9) makes it into the station. I'm in the studio; she's on the WCCO-TV roof. There is little of no traffic in downtown Minneapolis at the height of rush hour on a Thursday morning. Busses are stuck on the streets. A lone cross country skier is making good time down the empty Nicollet Mall.
For about 5 hours nobody can make it into WCCO-TV, and nobody is moving anywhere in the metro and in most of Minnesota. Somewhat stunned, I keep updating the latest official MSP Airport snowfall totals on the air. 18 inches, 19.5 inches, 20 inches... 23 inches!
I clearly recall the pivotal moment in our live coverage that morning. I am on the air live with the Minnesota State Patrol Captain and he says it. "We are recommending absolutely no travel in the metro and surrounding areas today. It's just too dangerous. Stay home!"
You could almost hear the collective gasp and cheer from homes across the metro.
At some point in the coverage, I uttered the phrase "Halloween Mega Storm" to describe the snowy blitz. I can't recall if I just made it up or repeated it, but it stuck.
We are on the air live for nearly 5 hours straight, with just a few short breaks. Finally a couple of news anchors and reporters manage to make it into the station for the noon newscast. We continue to do extended live coverage through the day, right into the evening newscasts.
I shoot some stories outside that afternoon and finally I'm able to head home around 5 or 6pm. I dig my car out, and somehow manage to navigate the partially plowed streets home. I'm scheduled in again the next morning for more coverage.
The next day the daily ratings come into the newsroom. Because of John's decision to go into continuous live coverage, WCCO-TV was an overwhelming #1 in the market that day. The station pulls a 40+ share for much of the coverage that morning, meaning more than 40% of all Twin Cities households had us dialed in that day.
My news director would joke the next day, "Hey Huttner, you're the only person in the history of this station with their own "40-share."
In spite of the joke, what we all knew was that the decision to take continuous live weather coverage that day was the reason we did huge number and won the day. The Halloween Mega Storm set new highs for news viewership in Minnesota that fateful day, and made lifelong memories for Minnesotans.
Talking to Minnesotans I find the Halloween Mega Storm is one of those events that everyone remembers where they were and has a story. What are your memories of that "weather crazy" day 20 years ago?
PH
Photo: Minnesota Climate Working Group
Comments (13)
I wasn't here for the storm, but I arrived at the U of Mn campus just a couple days after as a prospective EE grad student checking the place out. Huge piles of snow were a positive selling point for me; I moved to Minnesota 9 months later and I'm still here 20 years later.
Halloween 91 was the last time I went trick or treating. I didn't want to go, but my brother did. I remember trudging through drifts of snow to get to houses and my brother whining and whining and whining. :)
Funny thing, this year will be my kids first year out trick or treating. Here's to an uneventful year!
I was in high school in western Wisconsin when this little snow occurrence occurred. The days off from school were awesome, I certainly remember that. I also remember my dad cutting a path through a 6 foot high snow drift with the huge snow blower which attached to a farm tractor. It was like a hallway without a ceiling.
Now I’m in Chicago, and we don’t get storms like that here (except for the 20+ inches that hit us in February 2011……)
Assuming everyone can somehow be home safely, these mega-storms are cool as heck!
I too remember that event, it was my first year with a snow blower, what luck. Like Paul I was able to get to work at Ridgedale Mall. Sitting down in that bowl
I was wondering if I would be able to get to the highway when they decided to finally close the mall about 2pm that afternoon. I also had a small car, a front wheel drive Dodge Charger with a manual transmission and was able to make it out. Many people with heavier rear wheel drive with automatic transmission were not. I heard stories of people spending the night in the hotel behind the mall.
I remember pulling into my driveway as I heard a report of 18" on the radio. The very first thing I did was to measure the snowfall amount at my house, it was around 22" at that time.
The clearest memory however was the aftermath, with the wash board roads we all had to endure
for what seemed like weeks on end.
Some of my neighbors didn't have a snow blower at that time, needless to say I was a bit busy that evening.
One half of me says I never want to see a storm like that again, the other half says bring it on! It would be a blast to try and forecast such a monster.
I was in middle school in Eau Claire, just 90 miles east of here. Luckily, we didn't get any of this storm, though it did snow quite a bit the following weekend.
I was all of 13 and growing up back home on the farm in North Iowa. For us it started as rain switched to snow, then freezing rain, back to snow and more freezing rain to put a cherry on the whole event. I'll never forget seeing power lines moving in tandem like jump ropes do for double dutch. The power was out for nearly a week and I remember my father saying it was the worst ice storm he'd ever seen.
I remember reading in the paper after the storm that the temperatures aloft, around 1500 feet I think, were in the 50's. But at ground level we were below freezing and that's why we got the ice instead of snow.
Yes!
I remember as well the washboard roads after the storm.
The first two inches of snow melted on contact with the warm ground, and then refroze and compressed into an icy mess from the rapid accumulation of snowfall above.
The roads were like tank testing tracks for a month!
PH
I ate up every word. Loved it Paul!
Thanks for such a great read.
I had just moved here in August from Georgia. I remember driving home from an overnight shift (about 8am?) and the only way I could tell I was on the road were the telephone poles that periodically appeared to the side. I love snow but I seriously considered moving home after that!
Great Story Paul,
I see conflicting times on when the snow fell. At your house you mowed the leaves and then it started to snow during the night of Oct. 31-Nov 1. But in the Halloween mega storm article they state it started at 11:30 am on Oct. 31, and that trickertreaters had to slog through the snow. Was this another location?
I missed the storm, living overseas at the time, and heard incredible reports from mom and dad.
Great Story Paul,
I see conflicting times on when the snow fell. At your house you mowed the leaves and then it started to snow during the night of Oct. 31-Nov 1. But in the Halloween mega storm article they state it started at 11:30 am on Oct. 31, and that trickertreaters had to slog through the snow. Was this another location?
I missed the storm, living overseas at the time, and heard incredible reports from mom and dad.
Posted by Lars | October 27, 2011 5:53 PM
Hi Lars:
Yes I see that too. With daylight saving time back then I may have been mowing earlier in the day and near dark before heavy snow hit my location.
I do recall some snow as I was mowing, but not enough on the ground to stop me from getting the leaves up.
You can see that snow had not yet reached the Twin Cities by 7am the morning of Halloween on this surface weather map. It may have begun at the Airport before my location.
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/images/dlh/StormSummaries/Other/HalloweenBlizz/911031_12z_sfc.JPG
Let me do some more digging to see what I can find out about snowfall start times at different locations that day.
PH
My husband and I live 25 miles north of Two Harbors in the forested area of Brimson/Toimi. We had over 36 inches of snow in this storm. My husband couldn't get home from work in Grand Rapids and Duluth for 3 days. I stoked the wood stove and watched the snow pile up on the windows. I finally gave up trying to shovel paths to the outhouse and wood shed and just left my sorrels in the snowshoe bindings on the porch and would put them on and make my way over snowdrifts over my head to get wood and other needs. But the electricity stayed on and it was pretty exciting - the best storm I have ever experienced because I wasn't out on the road dealing with it!
I was in Cleveland, where I had just finished two weeks' temporary duty at the 9th Coast Guard District Headquarters. I rode a train to the airport, wearing the uniform equivalent of a suit. The weather was mild. I expected to be in Duluth in the late evening.
From the airport, I called my parents, who were staying with my teenage boys. As I started to tell my mother that my flight out of Cleveland was having mechanical difficulties, she said, "Yes, I know you're snowbound. We've heard the news that Minneapolis is shutting down." She went on to tell the volume of snow that had fallen. She said, "Your father couldn't get out of the back door to shovel, so he crawled through the kitchen window." When I asked if the drop to the sidewalk hurt him, she said, "It wasn't much of a drop!"
My delayed flight did get into Minneapolis, and then the airport shut down. I immediately went to the Minnesota Armed Forces Service Center (http://www.mnafsc.org/) and signed up for a bed. In the men's bedroom, I found trains of double bunks pushed head to foot with aisles between the rows. I hung my cardboard name tag to mark my choice. I returned to the main room, where rows of big recliners face a wide screen TV. Sandwiches and fresh fruit were available free.
At bedtime, I carefully hung my service uniform on a coat hanger attached to the upper bunk. During the night, I awakened to use the bathroom. It meant going out into the airport passenger area. I slid into my trousers, uniform shirt, and shoes. As I stepped away from the bunk, the man in the bunk across the aisle said, "Chief, you're not going out like that are you?" His hanging uniform jacket was that of an Army Lieutenant Colonel.
I whispered, "No, Colonel, I'm not." I put on my tie and jacket to go to the bathroom. The TV room was full of sleepers in recliners. As I walked into the airport terminal, I saw a vision of recent disaster. The airlines or airport authority had distributed wooden pallets covered with carpeting. Sleepers were sprawled on those pallets, as if something had mowed them down. No one was awake.
On Saturday morning, the airport remained closed. The volunteers at the Armed Forces Service Center told us again about the free sandwiches and fruit, but they said no one could get in to replenish them. I noticed most of my fellow travelers were in the three lowest military pay grades. I was a Chief Petty Officer with $1200 travel pay in $50 traveler's checks. I decided to eat at restaurants and leave the sandwiches for the younger troops.
I went into a fast food restaurant and ordered breakfast with a small coffee. The counter attendant said, "We're only using our big cups today." I decided to only use my big bills today and paid him with a $50. Throughout Saturday and Sunday morning, I scheduled flights to Duluth, only to hear them cancelled. Throughout the day and next morning, I bought four more meals, each with a big cup, and each from a $50. Thinking about the inconvenience to the restaurant, I was blinded to other people's inconvenience if the restaurant ran out of change.
After a second night of sleeping in the Armed Forces Service Center and putting on a tie and jacket to walk to the bathroom, I caught a flight to Duluth. My father met me at the airport. As he drove me home, my father explained that my avenue was still snowbound, except for the block from my house to the main street a block away. One block of clogged avenue prevented my father's reaching the airport - until a neighbor needed an ambulance. The ambulance had come up my avenue and turned onto my street preceded by a snowplow. That had allowed my father’s leaving for the airport. As we arrived at my avenue and turned off of the major street, I saw that beyond my house, the avenue remained snowbound.
Recent Entries
- Moore "Super Tornado": Radar shows "hook echo" and "debris ball"
- "May-soon" continues; More scattered rain & T-Storms today; Slight severe risk
- MPR Weather Live Blog: Metro severe threat fades; Chance of rain overnight
- Tornado Watch until 9pm includes the Twin Cities
- 1st MN Tornado of 2013; Sun, rain & thunder; Record late Mille Lacs ice out
- "May Monsoon" moves in; Warm thundery weekend mixes sun & rain; Ice out up north
- Weather perfection today; rain & thunder Friday morning; mixed weekend
- Springtacular Thursday; "May Monsoon" starts Friday; 3"+ rainfall by Tuesday?
- Record setting heat gives way to more normal conditions
- A day of record toasty weather
| October 2011 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| S | M | T | W | T | F | S |
| 1 | ||||||
| 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 |
| 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 |
| 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 |
| 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 |
| 30 | 31 | |||||
Master Archive
Recent Entries
- Moore "Super Tornado": Radar shows "hook echo" and "debris ball"
- "May-soon" continues; More scattered rain & T-Storms today; Slight severe risk
- MPR Weather Live Blog: Metro severe threat fades; Chance of rain overnight
- Tornado Watch until 9pm includes the Twin Cities
- 1st MN Tornado of 2013; Sun, rain & thunder; Record late Mille Lacs ice out
- "May Monsoon" moves in; Warm thundery weekend mixes sun & rain; Ice out up north
- Weather perfection today; rain & thunder Friday morning; mixed weekend
- Springtacular Thursday; "May Monsoon" starts Friday; 3"+ rainfall by Tuesday?
- Record setting heat gives way to more normal conditions
- A day of record toasty weather
Categories
- 2010 highlights
- 2011 highlights
- Arctic Sea Ice
- Astronomy
- Aurora
- Baseball
- Blizzard
- Climate
- Climate Cast
- Climate change
- Cold
- Crops
- Crow River
- Daylight
- dew point
- Drought
- Earthquakes
- El Nino
- Fall
- Fall color
- Fire
- Fire weather
- Flooding
- Forecast models
- Freezing rain
- Frost
- Gravity waves
- Growing season
- Gulf oil spill
- Halloween Mega Storm 1991
- Heat
- Heat bursts
- Hockey
- Hurricanes
- Ice
- Ice out
- Indian Summer
- Japan disaster 2011
- La Nina
- Lake effect snow
- Lake Superior
- Lakes
- Land Hurricane 2010
- Live blog
- Meteors
- Microclimates
- Minnesota River
- Mississippi River
- Monsoon
- Mosquitoes
- NOAA
- Northern lights
- NWS
- Phenology
- Pollen
- Radar
- Rainfall
- Record
- Red River
- Remote sensing
- Renewable energy
- SAD
- Seasonal forecasting
- Severe weather
- SKYWARN
- Snow
- Snow cover
- Space Shuttle/ISS
- Space weather
- Spring 2012
- Springtime
- St. Croix River
- State Fair
- Storms
- Summer
- Sunsets 2011
- Target Field
- Thunderstorms
- Tornadoes
- Tsunami
- TV weather
- Urban Heat Island
- Volcanoes
- VORTEX2
- Warm fronts
- Warnings
- Water
- Weather history
- Weather Watchers
- Weekend
- White Christmas
- Wildfires
- Winter
- Winter 2011-12
- Winter 2012-13
- Winter storms
- Winter/spring 2011
Services
- Become a Member
- Member Connect Accounts
- Leadership Circle
- Sustaining Members
- Member Discounts
- Become a Sponsor
- Tax Information
- Planned Giving
- Vehicle Donation
- Donate Stock