Snowstorms chill U.S.

Press, 6 March 1985, Page 10

Snowstorms chill U.S.

NZPA-AP New York Ten people were dead or missing yesterday as storms virtually shut down the upper Midwest of the United States.

Up to 74cm of winddriven snow closed airports, and highways, idled schools, businesses, and Government offices from the Dakotas into Michigan. Ice and snow ripped down power lines, blacking out thousands of customers across the region, and the

roof of the Silverdome stadium at Pontiac, Michigan, collapsed for the second time in 10 years. In Minneapolis workers climbed the Hubert H. Hum-

phrey metrodome to shovel snow off the dome to avert a third collapse in that stadium’s history. Two days after South Dakota law-makers rushed to end the main portion of their 1985 session, 70 of the 105 members of the legislature were stranded in

Pierre, where at least 42cm of snow had fallen by yesterday. The collapse of the Silverdome in Pontiac “looked just like an avalanche”, said

the Detroit Lions quarterback, Gary Danielson, who was practising with two other members of the National Football League club when wet snow ripped at least seven holes in the 80,000-seat stadium’s glassfibre and Teflon roof. Noone whs injured.