dec08-2

Behind Merrifield Hall at the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks as the ferocious Blizzard Ali continues to rage on. The temperature at the time of this photo was -13°F (-25°C) with a wind of 31 mph (50 km/h) producing a wind chill of -44°F (-42°C).

The Grand Forks Herald has a long-standing tradition of naming the blizzards that strike the newspaper's circulation area. As this was the first blizzard of the winter of 2008-09, it got a name starting with A. Moreover, it was named Ali after Ali Karpenko, a Grand Forks youth who led an effort to place playground equipment designed for children with developmental disabilities in a local park.