At least 24 people have died across the country as a result of a blizzard, and more deaths are likely to occur as some citizens were trapped inside their homes and vehicles while thousands more homes and businesses lost electricity.
According to the National Weather Service, temperatures fell sharply below average from east of the Rocky Mountains to the Appalachians, and almost 60% of the US population was under some type of winter weather alert or warning.
CNN reported 26 deaths overall, while the US-based NBC News reported 28 deaths thus far in weather-related incidents across the nation.
As of early Sunday, 1,346 domestic and international flights have been canceled, according to flight tracking website FlightAware.
The storm’s size has been almost unheard of, spanning from the Rio Grande near the Mexican border to the Great Lakes near Canada.
On Christmas Day, a catastrophic blizzard hit Buffalo, New York, with all of its fury, trapping people in their automobiles, disrupting power, and necessitating the closing of the airport until Monday.
The Buffalo Niagara International Airport received 43 inches (109 centimeters) of snow, according to the National Weather Service, as of Sunday morning.
According to officials, the number of storm-related fatalities in the Buffalo region increased from three to seven overnight.
“This will be remembered as Buffalo’s worst storm ever. We’re still in the thick of a historic event, according to New York Governor Kathy Hochul.
Sunday’s daylight revealed thousands of residences, some decorated for the holidays without lights, and cars nearly hidden by 6ft (1.8 meters) snowdrifts.
Forecasters warned that extra one to two feet of snow was predicted in certain regions through early Monday morning amid wind gusts of 64.37 km per hour, with snow whirling down undisturbed and impassable streets (40 miles per hour).
Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz tweeted, “This is not the Christmas any of us planned for or expected, but try to have as pleasant a Christmas as possible today.
In the US, cities from Maine to Seattle lost electricity as a result of the storm. But around the nation, heat and lighting were gradually being restored.
Less than 300,000 people were without power on Sunday morning, down from a peak of 1.7 million, according to PowerOutage.us. Rolling blackouts, according to officials, would last for a few days.
Meanwhile, according to police, a passenger bus accident on a highway in western Canada left more than 50 passengers hospitalized.
The accident on Saturday night has not yet been given a cause. It happened on a highway about 200 miles (330 km) east of Vancouver in a part of British Columbia that has experienced several days of bad winter weather.
Interior Health, the regional health authority, tweeted that 53 patients were being treated at three hospitals but that it was still too early to disclose specifics about patient situations.
According to a tweet from the provincial transportation agency, a section of the highway that was affected by the collision remained closed until Sunday morning.
The incident happened as North America was being battered by severe weather, which slowed down travel and resulted in a number of fatal accidents during one of the busiest travel seasons of the year.
