Governor Hochul: "Take it seriously, get out today and buy your groceries and batteries, and prepare for possible power outages depending on whether the wind velocity kicks up. And again, be ready to check on neighbors and do what we do best in Buffalo, you know, weather the storm."

Hochul: "And that's why as Governor, as someone who managed these storms for many, many years, I want to make sure everyone's prepared, that they know that we are literally declaring a State of Emergency that's going to take effect at 10:00 AM tomorrow. So people are ready for that."

Hochul: "I'm arriving late tonight and bringing in all the resources - the head of the DOT, the head of Emergency Services, the head of the Throughway Authority will - and the State Police - will all be on the ground with me to make sure that we take care of people's safety, get the roads cleared as soon as possible."

Earlier today, Governor Kathy Hochul was a guest on WBFO Radio with Dave Debo.

A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks is available below:

Dave Debo: How bad is this looking based on the information you are seeing?

Governor Hochul: This is a very serious storm. It could be life threatening. It is what we call a major impact, multi-day winter storm. And it's not that we haven't seen these storms before, but we've learned a lot from lessons of the past. And that's why as Governor, as someone who managed these storms for many, many years, I want to make sure everyone's prepared, that they know that we are literally declaring a State of Emergency that's going to take effect at 10:00 AM tomorrow. So people are ready for that.

As well as, we're taking steps to learn from the lessons of the past when a tractor trailer can jackknife and paralyze the throughway. We are closing the throughway tomorrow at 4:00 PM to all commercial traffic from the Pennsylvania border to Rochester. So that's how seriously we're taking it, as well as deploying hundreds and hundreds of personnel and snowplows and generators to Western York because we're anticipating, again, a major event storm that we want people to be aware of.

Take it seriously, get out today and buy your groceries and batteries, and prepare for possible power outages depending on whether the wind velocity kicks up. And again, be ready to check on neighbors and do what we do best in Buffalo, you know, weather the storm.

Dave Debo: And the throughway — let me say that again, I'm sorry. And the throughway measure you just mentioned, that is specific to commercial vehicles? Will regular vehicles be able to drive there?

Governor Hochul: They will as long as we have visibility. Again, the commercial traffic is more related to trying to prevent the situation we saw a number of years ago where you had a jackknifed trailer shut down the throughway for, you know, dozens of miles. People were paralyzed, stuck there for days. And we have to be ready for, you know, to prevent that. Now we learned the lesson, we have to be more proactive. So that's why we're closing to commercial traffic, but if the visibility becomes a problem, then there will be announcements, you know, in plenty of time to let people know that the entire throughway is closed.

We're also going to be keeping an eye on the skyway, ready to close that down if necessary, but not at this time. And we're coordinating very closely with the City of Buffalo, the county of Erie. We'll have our Emergency Operations Center up and running. I'll be doing briefings from there, starting at 10:00 AM tomorrow. I'm arriving late tonight and bringing in all the resources — the head of the DOT, the head of Emergency Services, the head of the Throughway Authority will — and the State Police — will all be on the ground with me to make sure that we take care of people's safety, get the roads cleared as soon as possible.

And one thing about the roads - despite our best efforts, people should anticipate that many of the roads will still be impassable on Friday and Saturday because it's almost impossible to keep up with three inches of snow an hour. So we'll be supplementing the City of Buffalo, helping them on the major roads, let them do the smaller arterials. But, it's going to be what Buffalonians are used to, even a number of years ago in 2014, we had a storm similar to this and people just staying home, checking on neighbors and being smart about it is the best way to get through.

Dave Debo: Tell me a little bit - you've talked about lessons of the past - tell me a little bit about any prepositioning of plows or equipment that could be underway right now.

Governor Hochul: That's why they're already here. Western New York has over - we added 31 more plows in addition to 324, so plows are on the ground. The generators are on the ground. The personnel, we have over 500, almost 600 people on the ground right now that are ready to just, you know, be operating the mechanics in case there's a breakdown, to be able to drive the snowplows.

So we have stockpiled plenty of salt and fuel, 42,000 tons of salt. And again, our operations - our Emergency Operations Centers are already activated. So, we're focusing on just being very proactive. But again, Mother Nature can be wildly unpredictable, and I just think everybody staying home is the best answer. So today's the day to prepare for it.

Dave Debo: Governor, thanks for your time.

Governor Hochul: Alright. Thank you. Bye-bye.