20 Years Ago Today - My Memories of Ice Storm 1998

My family lost power for days. I was 17 years old. Our house became so cold all our plants died. We had to keep water running so pipes wouldn't freeze, but the water was ice cold. Thankfully my parents enjoy fondue, so we had lots of fondue fluid at the beginning. We could at least heat up canned food in a fondue pot! As the days went by and things got worse, we were starting to run low. Fondue fluid was impossible to find and it was 5x the normal price.Everyone was scooping up anything that could heat up food or houses.

Some people died from barbecuing inside and inhaling carbon monoxide. People also died from frozen ice heavy branches falling, and sheets of ice falling off buildings. Some people died from the cold and not having anyone to help them..

I can remember the sound of branches snapping, falling, and all the ice shattering and scattering off the smaller branches as it hit the ground. My friends and I spent days helping neighbors clean up their yards. Even some telephone poles snapped from the ice accumulation on the wires. It was dangerous for a while there were live power lines down all over the place before the power went out to the whole region.

Many metal electrical pylons collapsed, which made restoring power almost impossible for the electrical company. I can remember all sorts of power company people from the USA, and other parts of Canada came to help get everything up and running again. It's specialized work that not many people are trained to do, so it was amazing to see that.

Our house happened to be in a zone with a hospital close by, so we were among lucky ones that got power back in under a week - but some places had no electricity for over 2 months. They called the effected area the "Black Triangle". Some farmers in rural areas lost their whole herds of animals. I can remember one city eventually brought in an old train locomotive to act as a generator.

As far as witnessing the power of mother nature, it was awesome, but I hope I never have to live through something like that again. - Adam