Last week’s blizzard made roads impassable and froze the Long Island Rail Road in its tracks — but thanks to Capt. Earle Ferenczy, the Staten Island Ferry never ran more than six minutes behind schedule.
“There were near-whiteout conditions, similar to the worst fog,” Ferenczy, 54, recalled of the first of seven runs he made in the wind and snow late Sunday night into Monday morning.
“It is literally like operating with your eyes closed,” he said.
Lady Liberty vanished from view and the skyline turned paper white as the John A. Noble pushed across the harbor.
With three cups of coffee to keep him focused during his midnight-to-7 a.m. shift Monday, Ferenczy depended on radar more than his eyes — ever thankful there were no small vessels whose skippers were crazy enough to be out in the storm with him.
“The whole crew was a little bit more on edge, he said. “The winds affected us most during docking, because the more we slow down the boat, the more the wind pushes us around.”
With 30 years of experience at sea — 15 as a Staten Island Ferry captain — Ferenczy said that he’s been through every imaginable weather condition and that last week’s storm “wasn’t out of the ordinary.”
“It’s not like a nice, sunny day. You have to focus a lot more,” he said. “Not to say we let our guard down on days like that, but the work is just much more intense, and fatiguing.”
“The passengers we carry tend to be non-emotional. New Yorkers, in general, just take things for granted,” he said. “They just assume that it is always going to be running.
“All we kept thinking is, ‘What on earth are these people going to do when they get off the boat?’ ”
Although the city’s sanitation workers have come under fire since the storm, Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan gave her ferry crews high marks.
“The men and women of the Staten Island Ferry were at their best last week, when Mother Nature was at her worst,” she said.
It wasn’t until he finally finished his shift that Ferenczy’s real ordeal began + because navigating the harbor was a breeze compared with the streets, he said.
“My trip home to New Jersey usually takes one hour, but it took three,” he said. “It was slippery out there on the road, and I ran into quite a bit of trouble.”