Dangerous Situation, Ice Storm '98

I was in a pretty dangerous situation during Ice Storm '98. My husband drove a cube van. He sub-contracted for Canada Post in order to deliver mail from Kingston, Ontario to Maberly, Ontario.

Ice Storm '98 was the first time that I had experienced an ice storm. Ice Storm '98 knocked out power to areas throughout eastern Ontario, Quebec and some of the northern states in the United States. In some places the power was out for more than a few weeks.

My husband had to deliver the mail during that storm. Remember that old saying, "neither rain, nor sleet, nor snow". Well, I can tell you that saying is real because I had to experience it first-hand. My husband thought it would be safer if my daughter and I went with him in the van. I agreed because I didn't really want to weather that storm alone and my daughter was a little scared too.

We started our morning at 1:30 in the morning. We drove to Kingston, which was an hour away. The roads were sheer ice and the trees were covered in ice too. Even though it was a horrific storm, you couldn't help feeling the sense of magic as you looked out into the ice covered fields and saw the trees glistening with ice. Unfortunately, a lot of the trees were so covered in ice that they just snapped off. A lot of damage was done to the trees during Ice Storm '98.

Once we got to Kingston, we helped my husband load up the van with heavy mail bags and boxes. A few hours later, we were on our way up north to deliver the mail to the closed post offices. Yes, that is corerct. My husband had to drive through that storm and when he got to the individual post offices along his route, they were closed and remained closed until the storm was over.

It was really dangerous driving the van through that ice storm. The weight of the ice on some of the trees had knocked the power lines down. Some of the power lines that were knocked down were sparking because they were still live.

It was very slippery driving up the highway. My husband had to be very careful at each intersection and at each stop. A few times the van started to skid on the ice. Besides the van skidding on the ice, we had to be very careful walking. One little slip and you'd be flat on the ice.

During that ice storm, it was best to stay indoors if you could. That was not possible for my husband. Ice Storm '98 was the worst storm that I had ever seen. It is one that I will never forget, ever.