over the Arctic Ocean during January, and this moved the polar vortex to southern Canada, south of its normal location. Strong northwest flow between the ridge and the trough resulted in a strong northwest flow in between, which ushered Arctic air into the central and eastern United States. The circulation helped cause record cold for the winter over many portions of the eastern United States, with the Ohio Valley averaging more than below normal. The severe winter was not limited to the northeastern United States; snow was observed in Miami, Florida, on January 20, and snow mixed with rain occurred in the Bahamas. In contrast, Alaska was exceptionally mild: Anchorage averaged above normal and was in fact warmer for the month than Atlanta half the distance from the equator, whilst it was the warmest January since at least 1937 for the whole state except the North Slope and the Aleutian Islands. The Pacific Northwest, located under the strong ridge, experienced unprecedented drought, with all 29 climatic divisions of Washington, Oregon and Idaho experiencing their driest October to February period on record. In western New York Antecedent weather During June through September, the Buffalo National Weather Service (NWS) office recorded of rain, which is wetter than the 1961–1990 average of . In western New York the previously described pattern resulted in snowy and cold weather in the months leading up to the blizzard. Buffalo was a city of about 463,000 people with about 1.5 million in the metropolitan area, the second most populated city in New York State. The first trace of snow of the winter at the Buffalo NWS weather station in Cheektowaga, New York, occurred on October 9, while the first accumulating snow was on October 21. Elsewhere in western New York, lake effect snow was observed in two periods, with up to on October 17–18 and up to on October 21–22 (O'Connell 1977). By the last day of October, Lake Erie was , the coldest it had been on that date. November's air temperature in Buffalo was the coldest in nearly 100 years (since 1880), with an average temperature of . November's average temperature was about below normal. The first three weeks of November were quite dry in Buffalo – only of precipitation – and November as a whole was drier than normal. During late November, some heavy snow occurred, including on November 30 – up to in