A powerful blizzard dropped more than a foot of snow (30cm) across parts of the US Northeast yesterday, bringing travel to a near standstill for millions of residents as the treacherous conditions closed roads, shut down train service and forced the cancellation of some 5,700 flights.
Thousands of homes and businesses were without power and officials, including New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, ordered residents to stay off the roads so emergency crews could clear the streets. Many schools were closed throughout the region.
“I’m urging every New Yorker to please stay home,” Mamdani said.
More than 15 inches of snow had fallen on New York City’s Central Park by 8am yesterday and another five to six more inches were expected to fall before the storm tapers off, said Bob Oravec, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service’s Weather Prediction Centre.
Winds can blow snow drifts several feet high. “It’s a pretty big storm and it’s definitely a blizzard” with wind gusts of 40 to 60 mph from Delaware to New York City to Boston, Oravec said. “It’ll probably take a week to dig out.”
Boston has received about six inches so far, but much of Delaware and Southern New England has already received 12 to 18 inches, and Philadelphia has already received a foot of snow.
Because of the high winds, the snow storm meets blizzard criteria: Blizzards have gusts of 80kmph winds or greater, sustained over three hours or more, Oravec said. Stony Brook Village on Eastern Long Island and Nantucket Island had among the highest gusts reported, topping 130kmph.
Airlines had cancelled more than 5,700 flights by yesterday morning and delayed another 900, according to the tracking site FlightAware.com. More than 1,600 flights for today have already been cancelled, according to the site. Most of the cancellations and delays were in the Northeastern US, including New York’s John F Kennedy International and LaGuardia airports, Boston’s Logan Airport, and Newark Liberty International Airport.
New York Governor Kathy Hochul said she had activated 100 National Guard members to assist in Long Island, New York City and the Lower Hudson Valley – areas expected to bear the brunt of the heavy snow and coastal winds.
The storm forced closure of the UN headquarters complex in Manhattan yesterday.
Parts of the Northeast could see up to two feet of snow and wind gusts could reach 150kmph, raising the risk of falling trees and power outages.
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