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Fmr. Minn Residents Almost Miss Home After Massive East Coast Snow

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) – By now you may have seen the video.

Seventy seven inches of snow in less than 48 hours.

Buffalo, N.Y.'s winter wonderland has many layers, layers that are providing many headaches for people like Lisa McEwen.

"I'm in my living room right now and this is all you see outside. The bay window, just a wall of snow. And that's what it's like everywhere," McEwen said.

While the McEwens have done their best to dig out of the "snowmageddon," roads are still impassable.

They've been trapped at home since Monday.

Luckily, the heat works and they have food.

But the former Minnesotans thought they had left the bad winters behind when they moved to the Buffalo area in July.

"I'm 20 weeks pregnant so all I want is a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos. I can't get to a grocery store or a gas station to save my life to get them," McEwen said.

"Some of these suburbs picked up from this storm alone picked up what they would typically get in the entire winter season," WCCO meteorologist Chris Shaffer said.

Shaffer said getting over five feet of snow in a storm is almost unheard of.

And it's all lake-effect snow.

Cold air from Canada passing over warmer waters resulting in excessive snow totals.

It can happen in Minnesota.

"Duluth gets it. There have even been micro examples over Mille Lacs. Where if it's coming down from the northwest, the southeastern shores will pick up a healthy snow total," Shaffer said.

But nothing like what's happened around Buffalo.

For McEwen it's almost enough to make her want to move back here to have a better winter.

"There are people who are trapped in a Wal-Mart. The Wal-Mart managers have let them pull out bean bag chairs. They are cooking on a George Foreman and watching movies in the electronics department. There was a baby born at the local fire hall and there just happened to be a pediatric nurse there. Lots of stories and lots of stories of goodwill," McEwen said.

McEwen said that while the snowstorm may be over, the bigger fear now is that temperatures around Buffalo could reach 60 degrees this weekend.

With up to eight feet of snow on the ground in areas, that could make for some serious flooding.

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