The Shadow
Many residents of the Alleghany Highlands spent their days leading up to Christmas with frozen pipes without electricity after Winter Storm Elliot visited the Alleghany Highlands.
While very little snow fell, high winds and “bone-chilling” temperatures that dropped to 2 F just prior to Christmas resulted in frozen pipes.
High wind felled many trees, some that damaged power lines, structures and vehicles.
As Elliot passed through the Alleghany Highlands, high winds uprooted a huge tree that split apart a chicken coop before it crashed onto the resident’s car and truck parked next to it.
As the storm continued eastward, New York received as much as four feet of snow in places, prompting President Joe Biden to declare an emergency in the state in order to free up federal assistance.
The widespread high winds, freezing temperatures, and snowfall resulted in 17,000 cancelled flights, the stranding of thousands of travelers, and the killing of 56 prior to Christmas Day.
Christmas Day in the Alleghany Highlands was sunny and cold with no snow left, only ice patches kept in place by plummeting temperatures that prevailed for three days during which the wind chill factor fell below zero F at times.
In the Midwest, thousands were left without power as the temperature dropped to as low as -40 F.
At press time on Dec. 27, thousands of Americans from the Midwest through the Appalachians and the Great Lakes area on to the East Coast were still without power.
The residents in the Alleghany Highlands were experiencing warmer temperatures on Tues., Dec. 27, including a high of 38 F on a sunny afternoon while thousands outside The Alleghany Highlands were working to recover from one of the worst storms of the 21st century to strike the U.S.
