Severe Weather

Snow - or a lack thereof - is a perennial January conversation. We put online Doppler radar maps in motion to access a range of snow forecasts. For people, weather news underlies commuting times, power outages and snow sports that drive winter tourism. But for wildlife, winter weather spells survival or death for animals best-adapted to changing conditions.

Which animals win or lose during an open or low-snow winter?

Mammals with varying pelage - snowshoe hares and a diminutive and ferocious native weasel - the "ermine" with snow-white fur and a black-tipped tail - are not particularly well-camouflaged in forests devoid of snow.

You learned a remarkable property of H2O back in High School chemistry. Remember?

Normally, the density of compounds decreases as temperatures increase and molecules spread out. When temperatures fall, density increases as molecules become more tightly packed. Not true for ice – in fact, the exact opposite occurs!

In liquid form, each water molecule’s hydrogen is bonded to 3 other water molecules. In ice form, each molecule’s hydrogen bonded to 4 others. These hydrogen bonds form an open arrangement that is less compact than liquid water.

For wildlife, it's time to display winter survival adaptations … or a lack thereof. What strategy will you choose? Your options to deal with winter are limited to five basic strategies:

#1) Die - Annual plants and many adult insects die-off, leaving offspring as seeds, eggs or larval caterpillars or aquatic nymphs. People avoid this strategy; too radical.

#2) Don't live here - Leave. Songbirds, hawks, waterfowl, several bats, monarch butterflies and resident human "snowbirds" migrate south to warmer climes.

Nearly two days after an unseasonable snow storm, much of the Queen City remains without power.

PSNH estimates that around 31,000 of its customers in Manchester still don’t have electricity.

The difficulty in getting back power to the city comes from the fact that repair crews must work block by block to remove fallen tree limbs and other debris from the power lines.

City officials established a shelter at Memorial High School for those that were worst hit by the storm.

District Fire Chief Al Poulin says that the shelter will remain as long as necessary for those worst hit by the outages:

"Right now we have around 40 people in the shelter at 2:00 in the afternoon and we’re expecting many more tonight due to the lack of power being turned on.”

Public Service of New Hampshire is ramping up their efforts to restore power to hundreds of thousands of homes.

PSNH’s President Gary Long says that the storm knocked out more major power lines than any storm in the utility’s history.

Over the past two days crews have restored most of these lines, and now expect that power restoration to individual homes will accelerate.

Long: This snowstorm did more damage for this kind of event than we’ve ever seen by some reports in 140 years.

PSNH says that it has been difficult find crews to help restore power, because the storm hit such a large portion of New England.

For the third time this year, Governor Lynch is seeking federal money to help pick up the pieces after a major storm.

NHPR’s Sam Evans-Brown reports.

In a press conference today, the governor made an announcement that is almost starting to become routine.

LYNCH: I am in the process of preparing a request for a federal emergency declaration, and we expect that request to be submitted today.

Tom Getz of the Public Utilities Commission said that this storm cause more downed power lines, but fewer toppled utility poles, so he hopes that the cleanup will be faster than during the 2008 ice storm.

But even so he underlined that some isolated homes should plan to be without power for up to a week.

Public Service of New Hampshire is making modest progress as crews try to restore power to hundreds of thousands. It may take days before everyone has the lights back on. 

The heavy, wet snow and foliage in the trees is why so many homes and business are without power.

PSNH has crews fanned out across the state, including teams from Hydro Quebec and independent contractors.

Company spokesperson Martin Murray says it’s difficult to get as much help as PSNH would like.

“Because of its widespread nature, meaning its not just New Hampshire, its Massachusetts and Connecticut and others that have really been hit hard, we can’t turn to our immediate neighbors for help.”

Several dozen crews from Tennessee and Ohio are expected to bolster PSNH’s ranks.

Power outages have continued to climb as the day has gone on. But emergency officials believe the worst is probably over.

At its peak, utilities reported 315,000 customers had lost service.

That’s approaching the 2008 Ice Storm record of 420,000.

PSNH has said some customers won’t have power restored for a week.

But Department of Safety spokesperson Jim Van Dongen says he expects many homes and business should have the lights back in a few days.

“PSNH was looking at a couple of major transmission lines being affected. So if you take a big line and you get that back up you will get a lot of people back on line all at once.”

Van Dongen says the state is aware of several shelters that have opened around the state.

More than 250,000 customers around New Hampshire are waking up to no power this morning. Last night’s storm has wreaked havoc on the state’s power system.

Unitil reports 40 thousand of its customers in New Hampshire have lost service as 35-40 mile an hour winds along the Seacoast took down power lines in towns like, Seabrook, Hampton and Exeter.

PSNH, the state’s largest utility, has some 185,000 customers without power this morning.

Company spokesperson Mike Skelton says Manchester and Nashua have been hit the hardest.

“Currently in Manchester we have about 32,000 customers out. And in Nashua we have 28,000 customers out.”

National Grid is reporting is that Salem and Windham have large outages.

The New Hampshire Division of Homeland Security announces that the American Red Cross has opened five regional shelters in the state.

Londonderry: Londerrry High School, 293 Mammoth Road

Manchester: Memorial High School, 1 Crusader Way, Opens 5pm Sunday

Nashua: Nashua High School North, 10 Chuck Drudging Drive

Newton: NewtonTown Hall, 2 Town Hall Road

Rochester: Rochester Community Center, 150 Wakefield Street.

Hooksett: Cawley Middle School, 89 White Hall Road, Opens 6pm Sunday

Newmarket: Newmarket Community Center, 2 Terrace Drive

All shelters are pet-friendly, except Rochester and Newmarket People bringing pets should bring food and supplies for their pets.

More than 250,000 customers around New Hampshire are waking up to no power this morning. Last night’s storm has wreaked havoc on the state’s power system.

Unitil reports 40 thousand of its customers in New Hampshire have lost service as 35-40 mile an hour winds along the Seacoast took down power lines in towns like, Seabrook, Hampton and Exeter.

PSNH, the state’s largest utility, has some 185,000 customers without power this morning.

Company spokesperson Mike Skelton says Manchester and Nashua have been hit the hardest.

“Currently in Manchester we have about 32,000 customers out. And in Nashua we have 28,000 customers out.”

National Grid is reporting is that Salem and Windham have large outages.

It’s been almost a month since Tropical Storm Irene caused major floods around New Hampshire.

For most of the state the storm is a memory and life has returned to normal.

For one neighborhood in Conway, however, the storm was just the beginning.

Transvale Acres is a hardhat zone.

SFX: Hammer pounding

The Conway neighborhood was hit hard when the Saco River flooded.

The water knocked houses off foundations, crested over cars and left people homeless.

But the construction sounds aren’t just from people rebuilding.

They’re also from people tearing apart their homes.

SFX: Saw

Dana Ferren used to live here.

His trailer was knocked off its foundation by the flood.

Now he’s chopping it up to sell for scrap.

By Erik Eisele

It’s been over a week since tropical storm Irene flooded parts of the White Mountains, washing out bridges and roads.

The flooding damaged millions of dollars of infrastructure, but in some places it was more than highways that suffered.

When Irene swept through northern New Hampshire it dumped more than six inches of rain in some places.

People found themselves stranded, either unable to leave their homes or unable to get back to them.

Some found they had nothing to come home to.

“Everything’s gone. I haven’t even been in there yet. I’m afraid. I looked through the windows and said I’m not going in there.”

In White River Junction, a melange of fascinating businesses face challenges recovering from Irene...but not nearly so great as the obstacles facing residents of West Hartford, many of whom lost their homes to the raging White River.

Just over the border from New Hampshire in Vermont, the Upper Valley town of Hartford was ravaged by flash floods from Hurricane Irene.

Business owners and residents in the villages of White River Junction and West Hartford who have lost everything are doing what they can to dig out from the mud and debris.

But the long journey to rebuild their lives is just beginning.

Sound: (footsteps, banging)

Three rivers in the northern part of the state set new records thanks to Irene. On Sunday the water flow was more than 100 times normal for the Saco and more than that for the East Branch of the Pemigewasset and the Pemi. 

During Irene’s visit anyone who looked at the torrents called the Saco, East Branch of the Pemigewasset and the Pemigewasset probably guessed that the horrifying amount of water tearing past was a record.

And that was the case, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

“The Saco River, over 89 years of data collection, we had the highest recorded flows in the Saco.”

That’s Keith Robinson. He is the director of the USGS water-science center covering New Hampshire.