Bone-chilling temperatures settle over East

MONTPELIER, Vt. — Northeasterners got socked Thursday with the same subzero temperatures and biting wind that brought teeth-chattering misery to the nation's midsection for much of the week.

"This is Vermont," said Bradley Reed, fire captain in St. Johnsbury, where it was 18 below early Thursday. "Sometimes, it's worse than this. We take it for what it is and hope and pray we get the warmer weather soon."

The fire department had to take steps to make sure that stored water inside firetrucks didn't freeze up, he said.

In northern Maine, a low of 38 below zero was recorded at Depot Mountain in a sparsely populated area near the border with Canada, and it was 32 below in Fort Kent.

It was cold enough to shut down Vermont's Bolton Valley ski resort and the Big Rock ski area in Presque Isle, Maine. But for many, it was business as usual, although perhaps at a slower pace.

"You pretty much have to grin and bear it. We've been cold before," said Justin Dubois, manager of Quigley's Building Supply in Fort Kent, Maine. "In all honesty, 30 below doesn't seem a lot different from 20 below. They're both very cold."

Asked what Floridians might think of the extreme cold, he responded, "You have to understand that we don't have hurricanes and tornadoes — but we do get 200 inches of snow and cold weather."

In Michigan, the temperature in Pellston, in the northern Lower Peninsula, dropped to 25 below zero overnight, while in upstate New York, low temperatures Thursday morning included 2 in Buffalo and 25 below zero in Massena. New York City, where light snow fell overnight, saw lows in the teens.

The extreme cold was especially hard for outdoor workers like Allen Lockrow, who was up before dawn to deliver food and supplies to restaurants around Albany, N.Y.

"You wear a lot of clothes, a T-shirt, four layers of sweat shirts, a fleece and a coat," Lockrow said as he made a delivery at an Albany mall. He also wore two pairs of socks under his work boots and ear muffs under his hat.

The deep freeze was part of a snow and arctic system that stretched from Montana to northern New England and dipped as far south as North Carolina.

The air temperature was 29 degrees below zero in Glenwood, Minn., on Thursday morning, with the wind chill making it a staggering 54 degrees below zero. It was 20 degrees below zero at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, with a wind chill of 37 below.