Videos: Remembering The Great Snow Squall Of 2019

Where were you when the great snow squall swallowed the city back in January 2019? It feels like it was only 15 minutes ago that we were engulfed in a full-blown snow squall micro-blizzard that made New York City VANISH in a shroud of white. How young we were back then! How many dreams we had! It's now been over 30 minutes since the storm that rocked the city. Below, we take a fond look back at the historic event, and the people whose lives were forever changed.

"I didn't see it because my window overlooks the dark, protected garbage courtyard," my colleague Jen Carlson, who had to work from home today, recalled with a far-away look in her eyes (I assume, she messaged this to me online). "Is it still happening?"

There was a chill in the air that harrowing day—perhaps due to climate change/global warming/the increasingly extreme weather shifts that will most likely destroy life on Earth as we know it one day? Who could say!—and the temperature started dropping precipitously by the early afternoon. Suddenly around 3 p.m., after we had been told all week to expect snow to begin around this time, reports began coming in that snow would soon begin around this time.

We were warned there was a chance of whiteout conditions. We were warned it was gonna get hella goofy out there. We weren't ready.

"I told [John Del Signore] I was 'having a hard time envisioning escalation to whiteout conditions, tbh,' given the strength of the flurries just 20 minutes ago," said squall skeptic Claire Lampen, who had reported on the storm earlier in the day, and who hasn't left her apartment since the storm hit. "And then I looked up and out over a wall of howling white. That is my memory of The Great Squall."

Nature's fury was only just beginning. By 3:30 p.m., the storm had developed to such an extent outside, dozens of my coworkers crowded around the window behind me, making it extremely difficult for me to see over their shoulders without having to ask them politely to move over.

The worst of the storm was truly underway now.

"Moments before the squall we had the blinds down," a clearly traumatized Paula Mejia told me. "I'm on the phone with the Health Department, then all of a sudden I look out the window...and the street is gone. Then it's back?"

"One minute I’m transcribing an interview with the guy who heckled Howard Schultz, and the next moment everyone in the newsroom is running toward the windows with their phones out," said Jake Offenhartz, who was trembling as he spoke. "I saw sheets of snow lashing the nearby buildings, followed by what was basically a total whiteout—that’s the squall part, I’m told. Did it last for a minute? Two minutes? Who can remember. The squall was as impressive as it was fleeting. Still should have gotten a work from home Squall Day, imo."

John Del Signore was one of those coworkers shouting profanities and climbing over me for a better look at the squall. He captured the haunting video below of the micro-blizzard at its peak, and has given us permission to share it with you today.

"Back in those days the Facebook photo app Instagram was still wildly popular, even though we all knew they were mining our data, destroying democracy, and turning us into vapid phone-addicted zombies, myself included," recalls Del Signore, former editor-in-chief. "So my first reaction when the Great Squall blew through was to throw open the window to get a video for my Instagram—I had no idea THIS was the Instagram post that would change my life forever, going viral and pushing my follower count into the millions. #SquallDay2019 was the day I went from humble Internet content creator to highly-paid Influencer raking in upwards of $500,000 for a single Instagram post. Yes, yes, in hindsight it was a mistake to invest everything in beachfront Miami real estate. But at the time we all thought that Squall was proof climate change was a hoax! My bad, civilization. But believe it or not, sometimes when I'm waiting on line for my Trump Water ration at the John Bolton Bunker Safety & Reeducation Center District #8293, people still recognize me and even 'like' me IRL, as we used to say. Wait, you're not recording this, are you?"

Minutes later, it was done. The snow stopped completely, the sun emerged from behind the marshmallow clouds, and an eerie calm settled over the city, much like when the credits started playing at the end of an episode of Twin Peaks.

Christopher Robbins inhaled sharply as we pieced together his memories of the day: "As the snow and wind began to envelop my surroundings, and as the last lights on the skyscrapers were painted grey, I came upon the perfect beginning to my 'Leaving NYC' essay. But just as I sat down to write it, the squall was gone. So I guess I'm staying."

For any parents out there, watch out for my children's book based on the storm, The Squall That Swallowed The City, coming in February 2019.