The storm – dubbed “Snowzilla” – killed at least 18 people after it walloped several states over 36 hours on Friday and Saturday, affecting an estimated 85 million residents who were told to stay off the roads and hunker down in doors for their own safety.
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People dig out cars on a sunny day following a blizzard on January 24, 2016 in the Brooklyn borough of New York City.
Limited flight operations were to resume from Reagan National and Dulles International airports in the USA capital on Monday, a day after officials battled in NY to get some aircraft off the ground.
The air travel picture remained complicated after 7,000 weekend flights were canceled: United Airlines said limited service might begin later Sunday in New York City, but airports in the Washington D.C. area were likely to remain closed Sunday, and other airlines began cutting Monday service. The roof also fell in on a barn outside Frederick, Maryland, which got a total of 33.5 inches. Meanwhile, more than 150,000 people were left without power across the country through Saturday evening.
Much of the East Coast is set to remain coated in snow today, with the US National Weather Service issuing special warnings for drivers about the potential for black ice on the roads.
The entire region seemed to breathe a sigh of relief that the worst was over.
Intrepid dog walkers and the occasional jogger were the first to take to the streets, but as the sun got stronger and New Yorkers finished shovelling their sidewalks, the parks filled up.
The same low pressure system, which has threatened to drop more than 100cm of snow in certain areas of the USA, is heading across the Atlantic, but will be extremely modified by the time it reaches British shores. A woman’s vehicle fell down a 300-foot embankment in Tennessee, and a transportation worker was killed in Kentucky while plowing highways. One person died in Maryland and three in NY while shoveling snow. A few locations surpassed one-day and two-day snow records, said the National Weather Service.
Peter Hoeppe, head of reinsurer Munich Re’s Geo Risks research unit, said in a statement that it was too early to estimate possible losses from the storm.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo declared a state of emergency, as did 10 other governors. A state of emergency imposed by Cuomo was still in place.
The weather service reported that the storm produced powerful winds as high as 75 miles per hour at Dewey Beach, Del., and Langley Air Force Base in Virginia, according to the Associated Press.
With the storm finally tapering off overnight, officials in NY lifted a travel ban at 7:00 am Sunday (1200 GMT), restoring access to roads throughout the city and in Long Island and New Jersey. The school system is responsible for almost 49,000 students.
A spokeswoman for the New York Stock Exchange said the market planned to open as usual tomorrow.
On the Upper West Side of Manhattan, grocery store shoppers picked their way through brown slush and over compressed snow and ice as they balanced their bags in their hands.
Coastal flooding from a winter snowstorm inundates houses along New York Avenue, Saturday, Jan. 23, 2016, in North Wildwood, N.J. Baltimore-Washington International Airport notched a record 74.2cm; the deepest regional total was 106.7cm at Glengarry, West Virginia.
Major airlines also cancelled hundreds of flights for Monday.
Although the majority of the city has been cleared out, the mayor was questioned on the city’s response to Queens – which residents are saying their streets are still under snow.
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The House of Representatives opted to remain out of session for the coming week due to the severity of the winter storm – with no votes set until February 1. The Pentagon cancelled all its events.
