DC Residents Organize Snowball Fight While Blizzard Pounds the Area

Even before the snow started to stick on the ground in DC, the Internet was abuzz with plans for snowball fights all over the city. Several different snowball fight sites popped up, including one at the Ellipse in front of the White House and one in the National Mall near the Smithsonian Metro. But none were more successful than the Dupont Circle snowball fight.

With the help of social networking sites, like Twitter and Facebook, organizers were able to round up at least a few hundred, and by some counts, more than 2,000 people to come out and play. By the start of the fight, the park was full of people, from the young to the old, ready to pelt balls of snow at each other. Some people traveled quite a ways to be able to participate, taking the Metro from far out of central DC. Myself, I walked a mile and a half through the snowpocalyptic streets to the celebratory fight.

Though blizzard warnings were still in effect, by 1:30 p.m., the park was starting to fill up with people and pets. News crews were on the scene reporting on the event. Some people prepared forts of snow and plenty of ammo before the fight. Others got there and started pelting each other with whatever they could grab. Though organizers said they would blow the start whistle at 2:15, the snowballs were flying promptly at 2 p.m.

The idea was to have the north and south side fight each other. Many people huddled on the fountain in the center of the park and in the midst of the snowballs flying about and the snow still falling everywhere, one person managed to climb up the fountain with a red flag that had an N on it and plant it to loud cheers from the north side and more enthusiastic snowball throwing from the south side.

But this was just the beginning of a long afternoon of cheerful winter fun, closely monitored by DC police and the media. Thankfully, no one brought guns this time around. Though there were undoubtedly some minor snowball injuries, no one was seriously hurt and the event went off without a hitch.

Whether you were there for some healthy competition or just to make use of your skiing equipment, everyone can agree that this was an epic snowbattle to go down in the history books along with the epic snow storm that started it all. The Blizzard of 2010 (or the Snowpocalypse, Snomaggedon, or SnowtoriousBIG as some are referring to it) is already poised to be one of the biggest snowstorms to hit DC in recorded history. Residents definitely took advantage of the once in a lifetime event.