It’s the storm of the century of the year!
A major blizzard — so major that meterologists gave it the name Winter Storm Stella — is set to blanket Brooklyn in snow and blast the borough with winds on Monday night and through Tuesday, and officials are advising you to stay put.
“Be out as little as possible,” said Mayor DeBlasio, known desirer of streetcars, in a briefing on Monday afternoon.
Snowfall is slated to begin around 3 am and continue throughout the day before tapering off Monday night, with as much as 2–4 inches of white stuff an hour coming down from 6 am–noon, and temperatures in the low 30s in the day and 20s on Tuesday night.
Expect “substantial” service changes to subways and buses, but if you have to travel, public transit is still safer than your car or feet, said Hizzoner — and forget about flying somewhere warmer, say experts.
“If you try to fly by air tomorrow, forget it — not happening,” said AccuWeather senior meteorologist Tom Kines.
More than 1,800 flights into and out of New York City airports — including more than 400 at Kennedy, more than 500 at LaGuardia, and more than 800 at Newark Liberty — are cancelled as of Monday evening, according to the website FlightAware.
Public schools and those run by the Diocese of Brooklyn will be closed, and all colleges and universities also announced plans to shutter. But forget about hunkering down for an impromptu study session — Brooklyn Public Library’s branches are also checked out for the day.
Alternate side parking rules are suspended for both Tuesday and Wednesday, as is trash collection.
To prepare for the onslaught, the city’s Sanitation Department is readying its fleet of 689 salt spreaders and 1,600 snow plows, and has stockpiled 283,000 tons of salt — roughly the weight of three aircraft carriers.
Stella is being called a “monster” storm, but it might not be a record, Kines said — the most epic March snowstorm on record for the area happened in 1888, when 21 inches of snow fell from March 12–14.
