Officials said more than 30 people have been reported dead so far from the blizzard that raged Friday and Saturday in western New York, an area prone to severe winter storms. The historic 1977 Blizzard killed 29.
Antwaine Parker told The Buffalo News that his mother, Carolyn Eubanks, died at the home of strangers who took them away.
after her family tried to get help for the sick woman.
Eubanks, 63, was dependent on an oxygen machine. With the power outage at her home and emergency services unable to answer calls amid the blizzard, Parker said, he and her stepbrother drove through the snow Saturday to rescue her themselves. She collapsed when she was led to a car, she said.
“She says, ‘I can’t go on.’ I’m begging her, ‘Mom, just get up.’ She fell into my arms and she never said another word,” Parker told the newspaper.
The stepbrothers knocked on nearby doors, looking for someone to help them. They found David Purdy, who opened the door for two desperate strangers and helped them carry Eubanks inside and try in vain to revive her.
After they realized she was gone, Purdy and his fiancée guarded her body until first responders showed up with plows the next day.
“I did it in the most respectful way that I could,” Purdy told The Buffalo News. Her own mother is about the same age as Eubanks and she also uses an oxygen machine, she said, and “if she needed help, I hope there are people out there to help her too.” Temperatures were expected to rise to the mid 40s (around 7 degrees Celsius) on Wednesday and to the 50s (around 10 Celsius) by Friday, the National Weather Service said.
With enough snow still on the ground to prohibit driving in New York’s second most populous city, officials worked to clear storm drains and watched a forecast for rain later in the week.
Officials in Erie County, which includes Buffalo, said Tuesday they were concerned about the possibility of flooding.
The weather service said Wednesday that “any flooding is expected to be minor or bothersome.” While suburban roads and most major highways in the area reopened Tuesday, a driving ban was still in place in Buffalo, and state and military police were assigned to enforce it. Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz, a Democrat, said “too many people are ignoring the ban.” A Facebook group originally created in 2014, when Buffalo was buried under deep snow, has become a lifeline, seeking to help thousands of people seeking food, medicine, shelter and rescue in the latest storm. Currently led by five women, the group has grown to at least 68,000 people as of Tuesday.
“We are seeing a lot of despair,” Erin Aquilinia, founder of the original group, said in an online interview.
