A man dressed as Elsa from Disney’s “Frozen” single-handedly pushed a stuck Boston Police van out of the snow during Tuesday’s blizzard and video of the moment has gone viral on social media.
The video was recorded Tuesday night outside of “The Gallows” bar in Boston’s South End by Christopher B. Haynes and posted to Facebook, where it has been viewed more than 450,000 times and shared more than 15,000 times in two hours.
The man, 37-year-old lawyer Jason Triplett, told People his “escapade” was the result of cabin fever during the storm.
“Everyone will be over it by noon,” Triplett told the magazine. “But if this is my 15 minutes, I would like to leverage it to meet Adam Rippon.”
You can watch the video below:
A drag queen dressed as Elsa just single-handedly freed a stuck police wagon from a blizzard in the middle of March. If that sentence doesn’t perfectly encapsulate the spirit of Boston, I don’t know what does.
Video credit: Christopher Haynes
The video shows “Elsa,” wearing the princess’s blue dress and with a long blond braid hanging down her back, directing the police van as its wheels spin in the heavy snow. “Elsa” then gets behind the van and begins pushing it forward. The wheels continue to spin as the van moves forward and “Elsa” then lifts up the dress to dig in.
People inside the bar can be heard cheering “Elsa” on as the van is pushed out of the snow and back on the road. The heroic princess then curtseys in the street toward the bar as the video ends.
“Yup, that just happened. Drag ‘Elsa’ just single-handedly pushed out a stuck police wagon,” Haynes, who runs a PR company, wrote on Facebook. “Only in the South End and The Gallows.”
Sarah McGonagall, who shared the video on Twitter, wrote, “A drag queen dressed as Elsa just single-handedly freed a stuck police wagon from a blizzard in the middle of March. If that sentence doesn’t perfectly encapsulate the spirit of Boston, I don’t know what does. If anyone know the identity of this glamorous superhero, please asked them to get in touch with me so I can credit them for their incredible act of bravery!”
Triplett also posted a video of himself walking down a snow-covered street in the Elsa costume:
The Disney Blog tweeted, “This scene in #Boston is almost certainly exactly what Disney’s animators were thinking when they envisioned the snowy powers of Elsa from #Frozen.”
Some on Twitter have called out the other bar patrons for not giving “Elsa” a helping hand.
“The cold never bothered her anyway. But hey, people inside, do you only do moral support/cheering, or do you do anything physical? Elsa may be tough, but she still needs a helping hand from time to time. Great job, Elsa, whoever you are,” Southern Muse wrote.
Haynes told People, “He was like ‘I wanted to blend in tonight so I threw this on.’ Nobody even knew this cop was stuck, but he ran out to help.”
The bar’s manager, Allegra Wolff, told People that a police officer came into The Gallows to get burgers and then left, but got stuck in the snow.
“We were super busy, and Elsa and some of her friends came in and were dancing around having cocktails,” Wolff told People. “Elsa was the first one to run and prance out and help. It was amazing. He started pushing with all his might, and finally got the car unstuck.”
Triplett told Fox 61, “I bought this costume last year during a snow storm because I thought it would be hilarious to walk around Boston in an ‘Elsa’ costume during a snow storm. It turns out I was correct, it is really funny to walk around Boston in an ‘Elsa’ costume during a snow storm. I saw the police paddy wagon started to get stuck and so I just ran outside to help push it out of the snow. I really didn’t think it would be a ‘thing.'”
Boston Police Officer James Kenneally, a spokesman for the department, told the Boston Globe, “The officers involved were especially grateful for the help and would like to thank the Elsa-impersonator for the assist.”
More than a foot of snow fell Tuesday in Boston as the latest blizzard followed two nor’easters that have pounded the city in the past two weeks. City schools will remain shut down Wednesday and people are being asked to stay off the roads while cleanup continues, since “Elsa” can’t be everywhere to help stranded motorists.
“There’s been little traffic on the roads and ridership on the T has been light,” Governor Charlie Baker said at a press conference Tuesday. “We appreciate everybody staying home and off the roads as the storm continues.”