Northeastern Minnesota's Blizzard of 2008

On Wednesday, April 9, 2008, meteorologists around the western half of Lake Superior watched an early spring storm cell which they predicted would become a major blizzard by late Thursday evening. Local television and radio stations urged their listeners to prepare. Northlanders remembered the Blizzard of 2007, a monster storm that lasted three days and hit in two waves with snow accumulations of 20 inches and wind gusts over 50 miles per hour. Those who lived in northeastern Minnesota wondered if this storm would rival that one.

The first foreign ship of the spring season, the Gadwall of Hong Kong, fled the approaching Lake Superior gale and arrived safely in the Duluth port at about 2:30 on Thursday afternoon. The welcoming ceremony would be postponed due to the blizzard.

The Northland Country Club of Duluth, Minnesota advertised a special happy hour to celebrate the arrival of the blizzard. Their celebration, held on Thursday from 4:30 to 6:30, was meant to show how hardy Northlanders could be. The next day the country club would close due to the same blizzard.

My family was preparing for the blizzard as well. We had stocked our shelves with groceries on Wednesday and my husband took our youngest daughter on her motor paper route before 7:00 Thursday evening. By the time they came home, the wind was howling and whistling around our house.

The blizzard hit the Twin Ports of Duluth, Minnesota, and Superior, Wisconsin, and the neighboring communities five hours later than earlier predicted, at about 11:30 Thursday evening. By midnight, the falling snow was sticking to the sidewalks and roadways. The high winds and snow created white-out conditions across the Northland.

My husband put an extra blanket on my temporary bed on the living room fold-out sofa and made sure both space heaters were set at a comfortable temperature. On Easter Sunday I had surgery to piece together a broken ankle. Since then, my temporary bedroom was located on the main floor of our two story house.

At about 4:00 Friday morning I was awakened to the flickering of the living room light. The light, clock radio, and space heaters shut down. For the next 45 minutes the power flickered on and off about eight times before finally going off for about an hour. Only one of the space heaters was within my reach. I burrowed deeper into the blankets and listened to the horrendous racket of the wind. I wondered how cold the living room would get and if the 70 foot pine tree that stood at the corner of our neighbor's adjoining lot was sturdy enough to remain standing.

The Duluth radio station KDAL AM was my comfort during those predawn hours. When it went off during power outages, I stared at the living room windows and the blizzard's milky white blur outside and waited to turn the space heater within my reach on again. I saw occasional lightning flashes, a bizarre accompaniment to this April blizzard.

The radio announcers reported that the Duluth city plows were pulled off the streets at about 4:45 Friday morning. The blizzard's white-out conditions had become too dangerous for the plow drivers. The Duluth plows would return two hours later to attempt to clear emergency routes in the city.

A gale warning was issued for the waters of Lake Superior. Sixteen foot waves were expected and experts were concerned that the force of the waves would cause shoreline erosion and flooding.

At the Duluth International Airport, a gust of 62 miles per hour was recorded. Gusts of 55 miles per hour were common throughout this blizzard Numerous power outages were reported as trees and power lines were felled by the tremendous winds of the blizzard. Hermantown, Minnesota, was the first community to be hit with large scale power outages, with 4000 customers impacted. By 6:45, a number of Duluth neighborhoods and other cities were seeing sporadic power outages. Ten thousand customers of Minnesota Power were without electricity at 7:00 Friday morning because of the blizzard.

The winds and snow fall from the blizzard caused roadways to drift over. The two bridges connecting Duluth and Superior remained open but were hazardous to cross due to the blizzard's high winds. Duluth's hillside streets were difficult to ascend. Park Point residents wondered if they would be cut off from the rest of Duluth as they were during the Blizzard of 2007. During that storm, orders were given to lower the Aerial Lift Bridge arms to keep nosy spectators from getting their vehicles stuck in drifts and hampering eventual snow removal. Law enforcement officials, radio announcers, and meteorologists alike were warning Northlanders to stay home unless they had very good reason to venture outdoors.

The advice to stay home was wise. Where would anyone go anyway? Among the announced closings were the major malls in Duluth and in Superior, both the University of Minnesota-Duluth and the University of Wisconsin-Superior as well as the College of Saint Scholastica and Lake Superior College, most of the area private and parochial schools and day care facilities, and the state offices in Lake and Saint Louis Counties. Banks, car dealerships, and public libraries announced their intentions to remain closed on Friday. The Two Harbors restaurant at which our two oldest daughters work did not open all day. The Friday performance of the Shrine Circus was canceled, and the ticket-holders were advised they could attend the Saturday or Sunday shows instead.

The Duluth Police Department garaged their rear wheel drive squad cars in favor of the twelve four-wheel drive vehicles owned by the city. All mail delivery was suspended, although, despite the blizzard, some brave paper carriers made sure their customers received the Duluth News Tribune on time.

St. Mary's Medical Center and Duluth Clinic switched to their emergency procedures. The many branches of the Duluth Clinic as well as the Urgent Care clinic were closed and only essential personnel were asked to report. The emergency room remained open. In the past, my husband, an SMDC security officer, would be asked to drive the security vehicle to transport snowbound staff in to work. Thursday and Friday were my husband's days off.

The three local Duluth television stations had their share of trouble with the blizzard. Two of the stations, KBJR and KDLH, had power failures that forced their transmissions to be audio only. WDIO could not transmit over cable but could be received the old-fashioned way, with an antenna.

As for me, I was relieved when dawn finally came. Though I could not see out of the snow-caked east windows of our living room I felt less isolated. The huge pine tree on our neighbor's property was still standing despite boughs drooping with snow from the blizzard. A number of birds tried to roost in the branches of our privacy hedge to be close to the feeders. At 7:45 in the morning the first city plow rumbled past in front of our home.

The blizzard warning remained in effect until 7:00 A. M. Saturday morning. Northeastern Minnesota was expected to get an additional 2 to 4 inches of wet, heavy snow and the winds were still fierce enough to cause drifting. The weather forecast promised temperatures in the 40's when the blizzard was finally over. True to the weather predictions, temperatures rose enough late Saturday for some of the snow to melt.

The memory of the Blizzard of 2008, however, will remain.