Buffalo grandmother was found dead a few hundred feet from her home after going out amid blizzard

The death toll from a deadly winter storm in northern New York has officially risen to 39 on Thursday, after a Buffalo grandmother was found dead just a few hundred feet from her home after she decided to brave the wild weather to gather supplies.

In a series of tweets on Thursday, Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz said the northern New York county has officially recorded 39 deaths from the deadly blizzard.

Of those, 31 occurred within the city of Buffalo — which was left devastated by the storm, while the eight others occurred in surrounding towns.

Seventeen of the victims were found outside in the freezing cold, 11 were found dead inside their homes after the storm knocked out power to thousands of people, while four were in their cars and four others had heart attacks while shoveling or plowing the more than eight feet of slush.

Three others died because emergency crews could not get to them on time, after hundreds of cars were left abandoned on city streets and a driving ban was put in place.

Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz said the northern New York county has officially recorded 39 deaths from the deadly blizzard

A majority of the deaths were from people who were found dead outside during the devastating storm — though three deaths occurred because emergency crews could not reach the victims on time

Poloncarz said on Thursday that the county has now spent $5million on private contractors to help with storm cleanup, $1 million of which will be allocated directly to Buffalo alone.

But as the city starts to reopen its streets following the deadly storm, Poloncarz said, an emergency operations center that was set up to deal with the storm will be winding down its efforts.

Still, he noted there is 'a lot of work to be done,' writing: 'The National Guard and our emergency crews will remain in the area and on the roads, so please make sure to give them room — some of these vehicles are very large and not typically on streets.'

The county executive added that the Erie County Sheriff's Office and 'all county departments will be doing an evaluation of resources and action plans to make sure every response is always better than the last one.'

Buffalo city and county officials have been receiving flack over the past few days for their failure to sufficiently prepare for the storm.

But officials have said they warned residents about a 'potentially deadly storm' making its way to the area, and instituted a travel ban.

Critics say that ban came in too late for employees who were asked to go to work, as residents worked to stock up on supplies for the holiday weekend and were left in dangerous and life-threatening conditions.

Monique Alexander, 52, for example, left her home on Christmas Eve telling her daughter, Casey Maccarone, she would be 'right back.'

After a few hours, Maccarone said she still had not heard from her mother and grew increasingly worried.

That is when she reached out to other Buffalo residents online — and found out her mother did not make it. Her body was later recovered just a few hundred feet from their home.

Monique Alexander, 52, decided to brave a devastating winter blizzard on Christmas Eve when she died in the storm

A historic storm battered the city, covering Buffalo in nearly 100 inches of snow and leaving 37 people dead  in its wake

Maccarone told CNN she was already feeling anxious watching the news about school and business closures when her mother told her she wanted to go out at around 3pm on Christmas Eve.

Alexander did not share where she was going,  but Maccarone assumed she was trying to get to the stores before they closed.'

She had braved storms before and walked everywhere, Maccarone shared.

'She always felt like Superwoman and invincible, so I'm assuming that she just thought she could handle the conditions,' she said, adding she could never 'really tell my mom anything — she's going to do what she wants to do.

'I'm assuming she thought she was strong enough for it.'

But as the hours ticked by, Maccarone became increasingly worried about her mother.

'We were waiting for her to come home,' she said of herself and her children, who have been living with Alexander since August.

Eventually, she said, she decided to ask others in a community Facebook group whether they had seen her mother.

About 15 minutes later, CNN reports, a stranger messaged her and described her mother's coat and blue jeans.

Maccarone said she confirmed to the man that that was her mother, and asked him where he had seen her.

He instead asked, 'Can I call you,' and immediately broke down into tears on a videochat.

The stranger told Maccarone he had been in the storm when he saw her mother in the snow, and moved her body under the awning of a business where she would not be buried in the deep slush. 

'I knew something was wrong right away,' Maccarone said. 'So I kind of accepted it instantly, but it's hard knowing she was outside for so long, too, because there were no emergency responders allowed to come inside' amid a city-wide travel ban.

Members of the National Guard were later able to retrieve Alexander's body, just a few hundred feet from their home.

Maccarone said the family lost its rock, and someone they could call on for everything.

'My kids, they lost their grandmother — and that was her most important role in her life, being a good grandmother,' Maccarone said. 

'And now, they just have memories.' 

Alexander's body was found by National Guard crews just a few hundred feet from her house. Crews are pictured here going door to door to check on residents

A loader makes its way along South Park Avenue to assist with the mammoth clean up

Death toll from deadly storm rises to nearly 40 in upstate New York county

Alexander is among the nearly 40 residents who have died in the brutal winter storm, which dumped nearly 100 inches of snow on the city.

There are still multiple unidentified bodies, with the potential for the death toll to rise in the coming days as National Guard troops go door-to-door to check on those who were stuck inside their homes.

'It's a horrible storm with too many deaths,' Poloncarz said, as he praised first responders, without whom, he said, 'more people would have died.'

Among the dead are William 'Romello' Clay, 56, who was found lying face down in the snow at the intersection of Bailey and Kensington Avenue on Christmas Eve.

He had earlier been reported missing at around midnight on December 23, after leaving his home in the treacherous winter conditions to get to a store, loved ones have said.

They claimed online that he my not have been on his medication when he left the home. 

A 22-year old woman, Anndel Taylor, also died over the holiday weekend after spending 18 hours in her car while trying to wait out a historic snowstorm.

Among the victims of the brutal storm are William 'Romello' Clay, 56, who was found lying face down in the snow, and Anndel Taylor, 22, who spent 18 hours in her car while trying to wait out the storm

The student nurse had sent videos to her family as she waited, showing the snow piling up outside her car.

She also texted them, sharing her frustration at emergency services who left her on hold for extended periods of time. 

At 6.39pm, she wrote: 'I'm still here, been here since 3. The car I'm driving, muffler damn near on the ground already, then snow up to the tires... I'm mad irritated.' 

Two hours later, a relative checked in with Taylor on the group chat again, who responded to say she was 'unfortunately' still stranded and would likely have to spend the night.

She told them she had heating, adding: 'It looks like I'm going to sleep here. I don't know how long this gas will last. I'm livid bro my door damn near covered [sic].'

It was then that her family started panicking, questioning if the police had really been 'on their way for two hours'.

'Can no one get you?' her sister asked.

Taylor was told police had attempted to rescue her, but got stuck on the way. At that stage she had been on hold again to authorities for 22 minutes.

Her sister said: 'Unprepared in a state known for it!'

At 8.59pm she told her siblings she was still on hold and was waiting to be connected to the fire department. 

'All might be out, they said they're sending someone,' she wrote at 9.09pm. She said if nobody had come by 11pm she'd consider getting out on her own.

'I swing it open every now and then when the wind stops, but just now it was mad hard for me to get it open. 

At 9.37pm she sent a message which read: 'They don't gaf (give a f**k) man. I'm talking to them now so I know how to go about the night... If the car stay running in them morning I'm going to walk, snow at my thighs.

'Walk when I wake up,' she wrote at 11.56pm. Her family told her to go to sleep and contact them when she woke up. 

She later sent another photo showing the snow had 'reached my stomach line'. It was her final message

Taylor's body was ultimately found at 9pm on Christmas Eve, but she was not removed from her car until 7pm on Christmas Day. 

Anndel Taylor repeatedly reassured her family help was on the way after her vehicle was stranded in snow Friday afternoon on her way home from work 

Abdul Sharifu, 26, a refugee from Congo, is also among the dead. 

He had left home on Christmas Eve to buy milk and food, only to be discovered days later lying dead on the sidewalk.

Sharifu grew up in war-torn Congo, where he lost both of his parents, according to the Washington Post.

He and his cousin ultimately fled the country as young boys, spent years at a Burundi refugee camp and eventually reached the United States in 2017. 

Sharifu was placed in Buffalo, where he met Gloria, whom he would later marry. She is now expected to give birth to their child sometime this week, according to a GoFundMe set up for his funeral expenses.

It says that when Sharifu never returned home, his friends and neighbors fanned out and searched for 12 hours, visiting grocery stores, corner markets, hospitals and jails for their missing friend.

Finally, on December 26, they received a call about his whereabouts.

'Abdul suffered as he froze to death in the street during a terrific winter storm,' reads the online fundraiser, which has netted nearly $43,000 for his funeral expenses.

The dead also include Abdul Sharifu, 26, a refugee from Congo, left, and Stanislawa Jozwiak, 73, of Poland

Another immigrant, Stanislawa Jozwiak, 73, of Poland, had been driving to the market across town on Friday when her car slid off the road, according to the Post.

Her body was found inside the car on Christmas Day.

Jozwiak's daughter, Edie Syta, later told the Post it was possible her mother — who wasn't fluent in English — didn't understand the severity of the storm warnings.

'So many families are going to be broken,' she said through tears, 'And they're never going to look at Christmas the same.' 

Buffalo city and county officials face backlash for 'slow response' to storm

The fact that at least three of the victims died because emergency services could not get to them on time is not lost on residents, who are fuming at Buffalo city and Erie County officials for their response to the storm.

Officials have noted that they declared emergencies, warned residents of the impending storm and positioned crews and equipment well before the blizzard hit — but it came on quicker and stronger than they had been expecting, bringing with it hurricane-force winds. 

The National Weather Service had warned on December 19 that the storm would devastate the area, providing more details each day, WGRZ reports.

By December 20 an urgent advisory was in place warning of blizzard conditions and heavy snow, and by December 21, forecasters were calling it a 'once-in-a-generation' storm.

Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown said at the time that a 'potentially life threatening storm' was coming, and announced on Thursday that the city would be under a state of emergency once the storm arrived.

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul later expanded the emergency to the entire state, announcing that state equipment and personnel were standing by.

By Friday, the county upgraded a travel advisory to a ban — though critics say it came too late for those who were instructed to go to work.

Poloncarz later said the intent was to get overnight workers home, but the conditions deteriorated quicker than expected.

'If there's criticism that it wasn't done right, I'll take it,' he said. 

Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown had warned of a 'potentially life threatening storm'

New York Governor Kathy Hochul deployed the New York Army National Guard to the devastated city in the aftermath

But, WGRZ reports, some Buffalo residents — about 27 percent of whom live in poverty — bristled at instructions to 'stock up' on food and medicine ahead of the storm, saying it was unrealistic.

Others felt they still needed to go out and get gifts for Christmas, while still others questioned whether the city had enough specialized equipment to promptly handle the storm.

Then, after it hit, city officials struggled to keep up with the calls from the historic storm — as Fire Department trucks were stalled on the roads and emergency crews could not get past all of the cars left abandoned on the streets.

At one point on Saturday, almost every fire truck in Buffalo was stranded, along with numerous police vehicles. Residents were then told that emergency services weren't available. 

In response, Hochul announced she would deploy another 500 members of the New York National Guard to Western New York.

Erie County Sheriff John Garcia now says 'better equipment, more equipment' will help prevent another tragedy like this in the future, as two-thirds of the equipment that was dispatched to clear the snow got stuck in the slush.

'We never thought that it was going to be as bad as it was. So do we have to do better? Absolutely,' he said. 

Meanwhile, Poloncarz is now blaming the failures on the snow-removal efforts in Buffalo as he suggested that the county — which has more money and resources — take over the city's snow removal operations.

'The city, unfortunately is always the last one to open,' he said in a news conference Wednesday night. 'It's embarrassing to tell you the truth.'

In response, though, Mayor Brown said the city bore the brunt of the storm and its narrow residential streets posed challenges to clean-up efforts.

He suggested the County Executive, another Democrat, was 'crumbling' under the stress. 

'Some keep working, some keep trying to help the residents of our community,' he said, 'and some break down and lash out.'

Still, he denied: 'I don't have any feud.' 

What happens now?

 An EMS task force will be spending the next few days checking the locations of emergency calls that authorities could not reach during the storm.

National Guards troops will then be deployed to check every houses in neighborhoods that lost power, CNN reports.

'We are fearful that there are individuals who may have perished alone or people who were not doing well in an establishment, especially those that still don't have power,' Poloncarz explained.

As of Tuesday, they had rescued 86 people from hazardous situations, they announced. 

Buffalo police, meanwhile, have already finished going through the 911 calls from the early days of the storm, with Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia telling CNN that it was a 'tremendous' effort that resulted in a 'substantial' number of bodies.

He expects to find more, he said, as temperatures rise over the next few days. 

Flooding remains possible in Buffalo as snow begins to melt amid higher temperatures and rain 

Buffalo now faces a small risk of flooding as rising temperatures begin to melt the snow.

The city is also expecting to receive two inches of rain throughout the weekend, but the National Weather Service said 'it should take around an inch of rain from this system before flooding becomes a concern.'

To prepare, Hochul has now directed state agencies to help the affected communities with flood response resources, including generators, pumps and more than 700,000 sandbags.