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Sleet Storm Stella's Epic Meltdown In NYC: A Very Real Photo Retrospective

Because our grandchildren deserve to know what New York City really looked like on March 14, 2017.

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NEW YORK, NY — In the days leading up to what would be Winter Storm Stella's epic meltdown in NYC, federal weather forecasters predicted she'd be blizzard of historic proportions. Stella would most likely, they said, hurl at least 17 inches' worth of snow down on the city — already enough to shatter the previous record for an NYC snowstorm in the month of March — and possibly bury the city in as many as 24 inches of snow.

That is not what happened Tuesday.

Instead, reportedly due to a fateful, last-second lurch toward the coastline on Stella's part that allowed a “tongue” of warmer ocean air to melt her snowflakes into sleet on their journey down to Earth, only 4 to 8 inches of snow built up on city streets.

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It's a stretch, even, to call it snow. By the time most New Yorkers ventured out into the world Tuesday morning, the 4 to 8 inches of wannabe wonderland had been bludgeoned into cruel, pocked, muddy deformity by sheets upon sheets of semi-frozen rain and sleet.

Really, the only thing history-making about Winter Storm Stella was her historic ugliness.

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No Instagram filter could fix her. And if one tried to fix her with a filter, one was kind of missing the point. So here, in the name of science, in the spirit of all that is honest and archival, is the realest footage we could find of Stella's daylong residency in NYC. (Got any pics of your own to add? We are so here for them: simone.wilson@patch.com.)

Pile of nasty #slush
A post shared by Fat Endomorph (@wesleyengdotcom) on Mar 14, 2017 at 3:43pm PDT
Frozen phones #nyc
A post shared by Evangelina Palacios (@eviilits) on Mar 14, 2017 at 4:32pm PDT
Grocery shopping lol #nyc #bedstuy #brooklyn
A post shared by Tanya (@tanya_hendriks) on Mar 14, 2017 at 4:36pm PDT
Bart chillin' on a cab #bart #bartsimpson #thesimpsons #yellowcab #nyc #newyork #snow
A post shared by Bart on the Road (@bartontheroad) on Mar 14, 2017 at 4:38pm PDT
The #snow #struggle in #NYC is real y'all... @NYTVideo #WSHH
A post shared by WorldstarHipHop (@worldstar) on Mar 14, 2017 at 4:39pm PDT
#manhattan #winterstorm #noreaster #snow #slush #westvillage
A post shared by Joanne Mariner. (@jgmariner) on Mar 14, 2017 at 7:44am PDT
#slush not snow. #timessquare subway steps on a snowy day. #nosnowday #nycsubway
A post shared by Gal Galone (@galgalone) on Mar 14, 2017 at 7:59am PDT
Someone really, really, really doesn't like this cold wet stuff. #snow #slush #wetdogs #dogs #lincolnpark #capitolhill
A post shared by James Grimaldi (@jamesvgrimaldi) on Mar 14, 2017 at 10:21am PDT
#slush #blizzard #nyc Not exactly the major event all expected here.
A post shared by steelstatue (@steelstatue) on Mar 14, 2017 at 10:46am PDT
The worst part of city snow. #snowyday #slush #yuck #corners
A post shared by @yvonne.caruthers on Mar 14, 2017 at 1:32pm PDT
Poetic justice! #parking #snowyday #snowemergency
A post shared by @yvonne.caruthers on Mar 14, 2017 at 1:31pm PDT
The day the music died
A post shared by Teresa Campos Costa (@teresadeville) on Mar 14, 2017 at 4:21pm PDT
#newyork #nyc #streetsofnyc #yellowcab
A post shared by Yuliya (@yuliyak__) on Mar 14, 2017 at 4:33pm PDT

Here's the full story on the Staten Island slush ponies. Lead photo by Simone Wilson/Patch

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