MONTREAL, JAN.7, 1998 - Pedestrians make their way past broken branches as clean-up operations begun in Montreal after the 1998 ice storm. Efforts may be in vain as forecasters called for another 20mm of freezing rain to fall. (CP/Ryan Remiorz)

MONTREAL,JAN.7, 1998 -City workers cut away broken branches as clean-up operations begin in Montreal after 1998's ice storm. Efforts may be in vain as forecasters called for another 20 millimetres of freezing rain to fall. (CP P HOTO)1998(stf-Ryan Remiorz)

CBC Montreal Feature - The Ice storm of 1998:

On January 5th we stayed on the air at CBC Radio Montreal later than usual because of the worrisome weather - freezing rain. We weren't yet in the spiral that became known to all of us, francophone and anglophone alike, as 'le verglas'. We had stayed late to provide Quebecers with first-hand information: reporting on dangerous driving conditions, power outages and road clearing. We knew the forecast for the day ahead - more freezing rain - but for the small circle of reporters, here that night, we had no idea we were heading into the most extraordinary broadcasting experience of our lives.

Never - I say that emphatically - have we been so connected with our audience. Text messaging and emailing are effective ways to stay in touch with listeners today. But in my view, it's not the same. There was an urgency to our communication and an immediacy I have never felt before or since. We were one big telephone party line - all talking directly to each other. We'd get a call from somebody needing firewood, we'd say it on air and somebody else would call in to say they had a truck full of firewood headed that way.

Some reports, images, conversations will stay with me always. Our reporter in the 'Triangle of Darkness' was Ron Lavallee. He spent day after day travelling from blacked out farm to blacked out farm. He would share with us the deep-seated worries of farmers, their struggles to keep their families warm and their herds alive. I remember the calls from Cote-St-Luc and area from the caregivers at a home for elderly Jewish people who were being forced to leave because of no heat. They told us how the seniors - some of them Holocaust survivors - recoiled at being told to line up to board buses. I remember the story of a lovely older couple from the Town of Montreal who were using a fireplace to keep warm and died in a house fire.

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