Alexander Lee
Editor-in-chief

Last Saturday night on October 29th, an unexpected snowstorm hit the eastern New England area, including our town of Westford. There was about a foot of accumulation, and the storm caused massive a number of power outages all across town.

Since it was only October, many trees still had most of their leaves. During the storm, these leaves caught more snow, which forced greater tension onto the trees’ branches. When these branches inevitably snapped, they landed on power lines, causing significant damage around the New England area.

The storm was especially harsh in Westford. On Saturday night, National Grid reported that over ninety percent of our town was powerless. However, as the days passed, more and more homes gradually were restored. By the end of Tuesday November 1st, the powerless rate was down to 54%, and by Thursday evening, that number dropped to 10%. For this reason as well as safety concerns, Westford Public Schools were closed Monday through Thursday

One of the major themes of the snowstorm was that it taught us just how much our society values electricity.

For me, the storm was a very interesting experience. Life without power was frankly awful. First of all, I couldn’t shower. It’s horrible knowing that you can’t clean yourself even if you wanted to. Bathing is something we truly take for granted in our lives. Also I couldn’t use my computer, my home-phone, or my cell-phone once it ran out of batteries. There was no heat either! I had to sleep with five layers of sheets just to stay warm. In addition, once it was pitch black around nine o’clock, there was nothing to do but go to sleep. Having no power made for a dull, tough life.

One of the main ways of communication was through the Westford Police Department Facebook page. I used the sight to get updates on school, power, and the state of the town. But other than this, the storm mainly caused limitations on contact with the outside world.

Furthermore, the storm also caused a lot of WA students to check in at hotels or stay at friends’ houses. Senior Aditya Shankar said,

“I stayed in Courtyard in Andover hotel because we knew we were not going to have power back anytime within the next five days. Our house was forty degrees and none of our friends had power at that point.”

The other side of the storm lies around the controversy of the number of snow-days it has created. As a senior, I along with my fellow members of class of 2012 was thrilled with every snow-day that was declared because as seniors we don’t have to make up any of the days. However, I think that although the underclassmen were definitely also happy when the snow-days were announced, they also still held some reservations because they have to make up these days at the end of the year.

Currently, underclassmen have to make up five days (4 snow days + 1 missed freshman orientation day), which is already the allotted capacitance for our school. It’s only November; anymore snow-days, which are very likely, will cause significant conflicts in our school’s schedule.

Parents and students are already speculating possible solutions to this. Some say to get rid of February or April vacation, other say to have occasional Saturday school, and others suggest for some extended school days.

Here’s what Sophomore Vice-President Dan Bugos thought the best solution was, if necessary,

“I think the best solution would be to take a couple days out of vacation or the entire vacation all together and if that includes any extra days then we could just end school a day or two early”.

In addition to these things, teachers have also been affected by the storm. The days off threw the last days of first term into confusion. Though the term was supposed to end Thursday, November 3rd, it ended on Tuesday November 8th, and assessments on the 9th and 10th would still be allowed to go on first quarter.

The days off affected every teacher’s plans, especially those of AP classes. Though the snow-days may move the end of the year back, the AP exams did not change, and thus now there is less time to prepare.

The Halloween Storm has definitely caused numerous problems in our lifestyle, schedule, and school, and thus it will go down as one of the most memorable events of this year.