Snow Paralyzes Capital Offices Record 5th Day

The nation’s capital was virtually closed Monday as a second snowstorm in less than a week spread winter’s bite along the Eastern Seaboard, keeping non-essential federal offices shut for a record fifth straight day.

From Virginia north to New England, hundreds of thousands of schoolchildren, workers and much of the federal government in Washington stayed home to avoid struggling with snow, sleet, wind and ice.

Roads that were, at best, barely passable from a storm last Thursday were buried anew under as much as 20 inches in some mid-Atlantic areas. Hospitals in Virginia, Maryland and Washington issued pleas for citizens with four- wheel-drive vehicles to help transport doctors and nurses. Some facilities said they were running short of blood supplies.

Federal officials urged all non-essential employees to take the day off to ease the burden on unplowed streets and troubled transit systems “so those who are in essential positions can get to work.”

Jim Colvard, deputy director of the Office of Personnel Management, said that in his 28 years in government he had never witnessed weather so severe as to keep a large majority of the city’s 300,000 or so federal workers snowbound for so long.

For much of the day, Washington resembled an Arctic outpost, with scattered pedestrians trudging and even skiing down boulevards barren of cars.

Shultz Appearance Canceled

Secretary of State George P. Shultz canceled an appearance before the Senate Armed Services Committee. The offices of California’s senators, Democrat Alan Cranston and Republican Pete Wilson, were closed, and phones were answered by recorded messages explaining the storm conditions.

Airlines reduced their schedules across the region. Dulles International Airport was closed all day, while smaller National Airport began intermittent service at mid-morning. Philadelphia’s airport was opened and closed throughout the day, and New York-area airports limited operations.

National Weather Service chief Washington forecaster David Gustin said the capital had never before been hit back to back by such powerful storms. Temperatures ranged near 20 degrees, pushed down by gusty winds. Precipitation ended at midday as the storm moved north through coastal New Jersey, New York and New England, with gale-force winds driving the snow.

Trapped in Casinos

Gusts reached 50 m.p.h., and snow drifted to four feet in Atlantic City, N.J., one of the cities hit hardest by the storm, which moved across the Gulf states and up through the Carolinas as it built in intensity. Atlantic City roads were closed to routine traffic, trapping hundreds of Super Bowl revelers and gamblers in boardwalk casinos.

“There’s not much to do except eating and gaming,” Harrah’s spokeswoman Alice Parker said. Of the two choices, the hotel adjusted the odds this way: One of seven hotel restaurants was serving Monday afternoon, but four of eight gambling pits were operating.

“My car was stuck on four occasions. There was no one around and the snow was blinding with visibility near zero. It was scary,” said Jim Eberwine, who eventually made it in for his shift at the Atlantic City office of the National Weather Service.

Complicated by Strike

In New York City, officials appealed to commuters to leave their cars at home and take public transportation--a task complicated by the continuing Long Island Rail Road strike, which entered its second week.

Conditions in New York were not as severe as the winter’s inaugural storm last Thursday. Commuters reported conditions as “nightmarish” in places but surprisingly easy in others, perhaps because the storm warning thinned out traffic.

“The Northern State Parkway was deserted. We got in in an hour and 10 minutes,” said Jo Guercio, a secretary to Manhattan Dist. Atty. Robert Morgenthau. “Last Thursday night it took us six hours to get home.”

Staff writers Penny Pagano in Washington and John J. Goldman in New York contributed to this story.