Ice Storm Hits New England; Misses Boston

Beginning late Thursday night and early Friday morning, an ice storm hit New England affecting mostly Massachusetts and New Hampshire and to a lesser extent Maine. New York and several other states outside of New England have been touched by it as well.

Here in Massachusetts, over a million people have lost power and many of them won't get it back until early next week. Many trees and wires were knocked down creating havoc and chaos.

Fortunately for myself, Boston was spared although many of my colleagues who live in other parts of Massachusetts and New Hampshire aren't so fortunate.

I love winter and cold weather. I'll take forty below zero over forty above zero (celsius) any day of the week.

But I draw the line at ice storms.

A much larger ice storm hit New England and much of Eastern Canada in January 1998. I was living in Ottawa at the time and I lost power for a day or so. Ottawa lost 10% of its trees due to that storm. There were trees in the street, live wires on top of very slippery ice. Things were so hazardous I couldn't go into work for nearly a week.

In retrospect, I was lucky. Others were without power for a month. Quebec was hardest hit. One hundred foot hydro towers were knocked to the ground encased in ice.

Today, it is sunny and very, very cold here in Boston. I'll gladly take it.