Ten months after their wild-card playoff game against the Pittsburgh Steelers was postponed due to blizzard conditions, the Buffalo Bills are set to host another dangerously wintry scene on Sunday. About two feet of snow has fallen in Orchard Park, New York, as of Sunday morning, and there could be more ahead of the team’s Week 13 matchup with the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday night. A lake-effect storm warning is in place for the Buffalo area through Monday evening.
The Bills shared images on social media of the stadium and playing field covered in snow.
Snowplows began circling the Bills’ Highmark Stadium on Friday, as Spectrum News 1 reported, while the team also began recruiting volunteer shovelers, as it did ahead of January’s weather-affected postseason game. A video posted by Spectrum News 1’s Andy Young just hours before kickoff shows the stands still buried in snow.
Area leaders also cautioned against heavy travel surrounding Sunday’s game.
“This is going to be concerning for people trying to travel to the football game,” Erie County executive Mark Poloncarz said at a news conference, via Spectrum News. “We do not expect the game to be postponed or anything like that. The game will go on. [We’ve] had games that are colder … [But] people need to be prepared. It’s the first real cold of the season. We haven’t had anything like this all year.”
The National Weather Service anticipates “whiteout conditions” between Saturday and Monday, which will make “travel treacherous and potentially dangerous.” Lake-effect snow can produce a wide range of weather, per The Weather Channel, including “bands of locally heavy snow with greatly reduced visibilities to dry conditions just a few miles away.”
The Bills are scheduled to kick off Sunday’s game against the 49ers at 8:20 p.m. ET.
Here’s a look at the weather report (per weather.com):
Time: 8:20 p.m. ET
Location: Highmark Stadium (Erie County, New York)
Chance of precipitation at kickoff: 24 percent
Temperature at kickoff: 27 degrees, feels like 18 degrees
Wind factor: 11 mph
