Trees cracking like rifle shots under crushing ice.

Warming shelters crammed with shivering people, driven from powerless homes.

Bleary-eyed women and stubble-chinned men, some in bathrobes, and small, teddy-bear-clutching children crowding any open restaurant that promised a hot meal.

Trees fallen on cars, cars in ditches, road closures. Closed schools. Ice that tinkled as homeowners knocked it from beleaguered trees and bushes.

Finally, the buzz of chainsaws and the cheering sight of neighbor helping neighbor pick up the pieces after the worst was over.

Just a few of the many images and sounds that last week’s fierce snow and ice storm has seared into the city’s collective memory

According to Puget Sound Energy, at its peak the storm that began during the early morning hours of Jan. 17 knocked out power to more than 400,000 customers. As of 11 p.m. Tuesday, PSE had restored power to 404,000 homes and businesses, but some 12,000 customers were still without electricity, almost all of them in King, Pierce and Thurston counties. More than 1,000 line workers, aided by tree-cutting crews, damage assessors and others were working to restore power. Virtually all of the remaining customers who had lost power from the storms should have had their electricity restored by Wednesday.

Lea Hill resident Nick Kocher was one of the last to get his lights on again. His condominium was still without power Monday afternoon.

“My wife and I have been spending time with friends,” Kocher said as he and his dog, Chloe, picked their way through the detritus of storm-battered Isaac Evans Park. “We got hold of a generator and a space heater. We got the fireplace going. We sat in our cars charging our cell phones and computers.”

The sheer quantity of fallen tree branches at the park surprised him.

“I lived in Scandinavia my whole life, and I haven’t seen anything like this,” Kocher said. “I mean, it’s insane. It’s the first time I’ve been down to the park since this happened, and it’s shocking. I’ve been in tornadoes before, and that’s what this looks like.”

Even old-timers couldn’t recall anything like it.

Auburn native Rob Hancock, homeless for about seven years, was one of the people taking advantage of the City’s warming shelter at Veterans Memorial Park. He showed up there when the shelter at Les Gove reached capacity.

“It’s been great,” Hancock said. “Without it — I’m not kidding — I would have had literally no place to go. There’s coffee and food, blankets, cots, man, they got it all.”

Hancock thanked the Auburn Food Bank and the city.

“It’s a blessing,” said another man who would only identify himself as Don. “Everybody in this community has helped this time. There’s a meal every day of the week.”

‘Trial by ice’

With Auburn Mayor Pete Lewis away at the National Mayor’s Conference in Washington D.C., newly minted Deputy Mayor Nancy Backus was in charge. It was, Backus said, “a trial by ice.”

“I was in contact with Pete Wednesday night and Thursday morning at 4 a.m. We were emailing back and forth, and he said, ‘I may need you to go to City Hall at some point.’ I quickly showered, because no one down here would want to see me without that, and it was about 7:30 a.m., so we just started telling people who were asking if they should come in to work that if they were worried, stay at home.”

Backus took her turn on the phones.

“I got to hear what people had to say and what their concerns were,” Backus said. “They were just wanting to know when they were getting power back, how the roads were, what roads were closed. The first day especially, everybody was just really kind. The second day they were a little bit stronger in wanting to be heard. Still as long as somebody was acknowledging that there were issues and that they were being taken care of, they were OK.”

One poignant call, Backus said, came from a woman whose husband had just passed away and wanted to know what to do about his funeral.

Backus praised City crews for doing “a tremendous job” sanding streets and sidewalks, helping with downed trees and fallen limbs, doing whatever was needed.

Facilities spared

Daryl Faber, director of Auburn Parks, Arts and Recreation, said no City facilities other than fences sustained structural damage.

Doug Lein, economic director of the City of Auburn, said the overall impact on business won’t be known until the next sales tax report is issued in February.

For some businesses that had power, if only briefly, there was money to be made in the storm-induced homelessness. By nightfall Wednesday, a number of hotels with power had put up the no-vacancy signs.

Not everybody was so lucky.

“I talked to several of the hotels,” said Debbie Luce, director of the Auburn Tourism Board. “Comfort Inn was down and without power for two days. Four years ago when we had that last big storm, all the hotels had power, and we did fantastic.

“I just haven’t got a finished report on every single one of the hotels. But I’m sure that if they were out at Comfort, that meant Travel Lodge, and Guest House and Cedars were probably out also,” Luce said.

The Rainbow Cafe on East Main did a brisk business Thursday morning and afternoon, before the power went out on a large swath of the downtown. It would not come on again until 9 a.m. Saturday.

“It looked like a ghost town,” Luce said of the downtown.

Grocery stores, including Grocery Outlet and Safeway were forced to throw out perishables spoiled by the outages.

Jim Rottle estimated that Rottles Clothing and Apparel on East Main lost $8,000 to $10,000 to the storm.

“You don’t get that back,” Rottle said.

“I closed on Thursday because of the ice,” said Colleen Barry, owner of the Kitsch-En Restaurant. “I just wasn’t comfortable driving in the ice. Then Friday, it was just me working here all by my little self, with everybody showing up for breakfast. I was pulling my hair out. I had my usual customers get up and help.”

Barry said that she lost about $800.

One of her customers, Barry said, informed her he was “jonesing for an omelet,” caught a bus down Lea Hill — only to get there three minutes after the power died.

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INSERTED ICE SHOT PHOTO, Courtesy of Lindsey Maiorani