GEDDES, N.Y. \u2014 By 7 p.m. Wednesday, the New York State Fair sounded nothing like a typical night at the fairgrounds.<\/p>\n
Vendor shutters were closed, signs had been taken down and the crowds that normally fill the midway were gone. Aside from state troopers and announcements over the PA system telling the remaining people to head toward the gates, much of the fairgrounds was quiet.<\/p>\n
Fair officials closed the grounds at 6 p.m. as another round of potentially severe weather approached Central New York, ending a day that had already included flash flooding and a temporary shutdown.<\/p>\n
Earlier Wednesday, one to three inches of rain fell across much of Onondaga County in a short period of time. Water covered portions of the fairgrounds, including Restaurant Row, and videos showed garbage cans floating through flooded areas.<\/p>\n
The Fair temporarily stopped allowing people into the grounds around 11:30 a.m. while crews assessed hazards. The gates reopened roughly an hour later after much of the water receded.<\/p>\n
But by late afternoon, vendors were preparing to close again.<\/p>\n
Fair officials told vendors that forecasts indicated the incoming storm could be more intense than the storm that moved through earlier in the day. Vendors were advised to secure their stands and merchandise and were told they would not be penalized for closing before the 6 p.m. deadline.<\/p>\n
For Dawn Nitti, who works at Mac & Tot, that meant making sure nearly everything in the stand was secured before leaving.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo we have to close all our awnings down and make sure everything\u2019s strapped down so it doesn\u2019t blow away, make sure the coolers are locked and that all the gas is off and all the electric is off so we don\u2019t lose anything,\u201d Nitti said. \u201cAnd batten down the hatches.\u201d<\/p>\n
Across the fairgrounds, workers could be seen bringing signs inside, closing concession windows and securing equipment as the normal dinner rush was replaced by preparations for the storm.<\/p>\n
Emma Galvin, another vendor employee at the Fair, said her biggest concern was simply making sure everyone made it through the night safely.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was hoping nothing real serious happens,\u201d Galvin said. \u201cNothing, nobody gets hurt or anything. And we can have a good day tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n
The weather also forced changes to Wednesday\u2019s entertainment schedule. Priscilla Block\u2019s Chevy Court performance was moved from 6 p.m. to 4:30 p.m., while Tori Kelly\u2019s Suburban Park show was moved from 8 p.m. to 5 p.m.<\/p>\n
Fair Director Julie LaFave said officials have protocols in place when weather or other hazards force them to close the gates.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a protocol in place for when we close the gates,\u201d LaFave said. \u201cWhen we send out that message, our state troopers go to those gates and assist so that we don\u2019t have any chaos there or any potential for injury.\u201d<\/p>\n
LaFave said earlier Wednesday that crews had encountered standing water and electrical equipment in water while inspecting the grounds after the morning storm.<\/p>\n
The National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center issued a tornado watch for parts of Upstate New York through 11 p.m. Wednesday, while areas near and south of Syracuse were under a flood watch into Thursday morning.<\/p>\n
By the time the 6 p.m. closing deadline arrived, the transformation was hard to miss.<\/p>\n
A fairgrounds normally filled with food, music and thousands of visitors had emptied hours ahead of schedule \u2014 vendors packed up, windows closed and the PA system repeatedly reminding the few people left that the Fair was closed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"GEDDES, N.Y. \u2014 By 7 p.m. Wednesday, the New York State Fair sounded nothing like a typical night…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":337654,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[9,11,10,49,51,50],"class_list":["post-337653","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-new-york-state","tag-new-york-state-headlines","tag-new-york-state-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/337653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=337653"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/337653\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/337654"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=337653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=337653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=337653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}