Northeast Digs Out of Nine-Inch Snowfall

The Northeast dug out Saturday from a winter storm that dumped up to nine inches of snow and brought the region to a standstill, while a fast-moving snowstorm hit Salt Lake City and caused about 55 cars to crash on a stretch of icy highway.

Ten motorists were treated by paramedics at the scene for injuries in the accidents on a two-mile stretch of Interstate 15 during the short but intense storm that lashed Salt Lake Valley, the Utah Highway Patrol said. The interstate was closed briefly.

At least seven people have died nationwide in two separate winter storms that rolled across the Northeast and Southwest, authorities said.

Heavy Snow in Texas

The Texas Panhandle had snow-covered, icy roads after its heaviest snowfall in three years, and a new snowstorm was rolling in across the region.

Parts of Texas got up to 14 inches of snow by early Saturday, but most roads were reopened after Friday’s heavy snow that blocked several highways, including parts of Interstate 40.

It was the first substantial moisture for the Panhandle in nearly two months.

The Northeast storm, which brought 4 1/2 inches to Manhattan, will cost New York about $500,000 in overtime, Sanitation Department spokesman Vito Turso said.

‘$100,000 an Inch’

“That’s about $100,000 an inch--a very expensive storm,” Turso said.

Department officials said Saturday that 550 trucks with snowplows and 350 salt spreaders were still on the streets.

“We also had to go back over streets already plowed and salted because of the duration of the storm,” Turso said.

The snowstorm was blamed for two deaths in Connecticut. A 6-year-old boy rode his sled under a moving car near Middleton, and in East Haven, a man on a snowmobile collided with a car, police said.

A winter storm watch was posted for all of New Mexico, which got up to 19 inches of snow Thursday and Friday, as a new storm spread light snow over the mountains of central and northern Arizona and much of New Mexico.

Some Parts All but Buried

Thursday’s snow all but buried east-central New Mexico, and Tucumcari got 19 inches in 36 hours, with nearly two feet in the northern and western mountains.

In Texas, that storm brought 14 inches of snow to Borger, with 12 inches at Canyon and Vega and 10 inches in Miami. Authorities in Vega, west of Amarillo in the Panhandle, said many people called to report their doors blocked by two-foot-high drifts.

A storm that dumped up to seven inches of snow on Michigan moved out Saturday, helping Monroe County residents recover from flooding caused by gale-force wind pushing water up on the Lake Erie shore. About two dozen families fled their homes early Friday at Stony Point, Luna Pier and Gibraltar, but the water receded by early Saturday, county authorities said.