Nassau workers return from storm-wracked Buffalo

More than a dozen Nassau County employees who spent the past week clearing snow-covered streets in Buffalo, which was devastated by a massive winter storm, returned home to a hero's welcome Friday night.

A caravan of Office of Emergency Management and Department of Public Works vehicles arrived in Christopher Morley Park in Roslyn shortly after 5 p.m., escorted by Nassau police motorcycles and cheered on by throngs of county employees and members of the Roslyn Volunteer Fire Department.

John Imbriale of Hicksville, who works in logistics for Nassau OEM, said the work that he and his colleagues performed was challenging but worthwhile.

"It was definitely a good way to spend the week," Imbriale said shortly after ending his nine-hour trek from Erie County. "We were able to help out fellow neighbors. That's what we do."

Roads finally began to reopen Thursday in Buffalo, which was besieged by up to 4 feet of snow and hurricane-force winds last week. Whiteout conditions paralyzed emergency response efforts and left thousands stranded without power for days in their homes, or in their vehicles.

At least 40 deaths in Western New York, most in Buffalo, have been attributed to the blizzard.

Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman said the 18 county employees who volunteered for the "humanitarian mission" made the county and its residents proud.

"You had to go up to a place that many of you have never been before," he said. " … And you had to assist with plowing in the most difficult of circumstances. The conditions up there were dire. People were in terrible shape. People couldn't get their medicine. They couldn't see their physicians. They had no food. People were stuck in cars for days."

The staff and resources deployed to Buffalo on Monday also included payloaders, trucks, tractor-like vehicles, a large generator and an air pump, and were sent at the request of Gov. Kathy Hochul and Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz. 

County workers cleared roads in 31 neighborhoods, allowing streets to reopen and utility companies to help restore power, officials said. 

The employees, Blakeman said, would leave their Rochester hotel, 74 miles east of Buffalo, around 7:30 a.m. and return 12 hours later. 

Nassau employees were not the only Long Islanders in the region. Two dozen state employees from Nassau or Suffolk also were dispatched, officials said. And roughly a dozen Suffolk County Department of Public Works members assisted in the effort, according to Christian Limbach, vice president of the Suffolk Association of Municipal Employees labor union.

Christopher Fedele, assistant superintendent of highways for Nassau's Department of Public Works, said the roads were largely impassible, even for their heavy vehicles.

"There were long days," he said. "We started early. We worked all day and didn't really break much for lunch because there weren't a lot of places open. We just kept going, and get back to the hotel late, grab something to eat and start the next day."

Fedele, who was anticipating spending Christmas week working light-duty locally, said the work was truly meaningful.

"If we can help people out who really, really need it," he said, "I'm happy to do it."