did Buffalo get a warning?

i was working in the basement today sorting out a heap of camp gear when a buddy in Rochester NY called to see if had heard the news about the storm in Buffalo NY.i'm in Minneapolis and while it's cold we don't have much snow and was not around a TV.
well i had no idea the lake effect snow shut down the area on the east side of lake Erie.thats nothing new that area gets pounded by snow off the lake when things are just right.
so the question is with the huge blob of cold that was in Minnesota and moving east crossing the great lakes were there any heavy snow warnings out? did folks have a chance to make milk and bread runs a day or so before this hit.
the coasts get hurricane warnings and the Midwest tornado but did Buffalo get a warning,not that i heard of on the news or national weather reports.from what i saw it looks like people got caught off guard.
that something to think about if your planning to "weather" out an emergency.

Surely one of the local weather-guessers saw the possibility of snow in the forecast, or do they not do their own forecasts and just read the teleprompter... Sorry, I slipped back into the '60's for a moment...

I happened to spend a lot of time watching the Weather Channel and they were full of warnings about lake effect snow in the days leading up to the event - not just talk by the Nice Lady, but graphic depictions of the result of cold air blowing across relatively warm water.

I learned enough so that it is exceedingly improbable that I will relocate from So Cal to Buffalo without buying a good pair of skis and matching snowshoes....

I'm also in southern California, and I heard it was coming too.

If I lived in the North I would try to always be prepared for that sort of thing. Even here I always have milk and bread in the freezer--so no milk and bread runs for me.

Sounds like Buffalo was split in two regarding the snow--heavy, heavy snowfall in the south and not much to the north.

Check out the time-lapse video of the "snow wall" that dumped so much snow on Buffalo here. The time-lapse of the weather radar on that webpage is freaky, too. Literally looks like a conveyor belt of snow running over southern buffalo.

my niece lives in buffalo, I'll ask her and let you all know

Here's what my niece had to say:

Initially they were predicting 1-2 feet (which isn't a major situation here). After we quickly passed that amount they switched it to 3-4 feet and once we again passed that mark they predicted 5-6 feet. We got an additional 8 inches last night, but I think this storm is done for us.

Growing up in Minnesota, we were always prepared to hunker down in a blizzard for a while. But then again, we were always prepared for everything (parents lived through the Great Depression, it changed their souls).

I wonder how many people are trapped with nothing inside their houses/apartments? A lot of younger people probably are as they grew up in mild winters and false senses of security. The middle-aged folks probably remember hugh snowdrifts and so prepared...but I'm just guessing.
-Blast, warm and cozy in Texas!

Buffalo, and most places downwind of the great lakes, get some lake effect snow most every year. It gets dramatic when the cold winds hit while the water is still warm. Buffalo has been the butt of excessive snow jokes for a long time, though Syracuse and Clay are even worse (http://www.city-data.com/top2/c464.html). The Army moved its cold weather training operation out of Alaska to Watertown/ Fort Drum years ago-because Western NY just sucks that bad. Most residents of the niagara frontier are painfully aware of the snowy possibilities, but the municipalities are also quite proficient at snow removal, cuz they get to practice. a lot.
In most respects, I prefer blizzards to hurricanes. It is the experience of freezing rain that sent me scuttling south.

well i guess you don't sound the warning sirens for a snow storm.

Well, in my neck of the woods they issue such warnings via TV, radio broadcast, news papers and sometimes email in the office. People are very disciplined and act accordingly. They start the drive to the office at a time that would require hurry, make sure they still have the summer tires on and refrain from brushing the snow from the car. That leads to an annual peak of traffic accidents and people showing up hours late for work. Besides snow in winter is not really a surprise - neither here nor in Buffalo as it seems.
Humans are just wired that way.
BTW: We get an annual TV coverage from the chaos at the start of winter in the USA as well. Some things just seem to be same in every country.