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Americans are facing freezing conditions and rolling blackouts this Christmas. Watch the ITVX report
At least 18 people have died in a major winter storm that has swept across the United States, knocking out power to hundreds of thousands over Christmas.
Millions of Americans are hunkering down amid blinding blizzards, driving rain, flooding and life-threatening cold during the holiday season as Storm Elliott batters the country.
By Christmas Day, the death toll had risen to at least 18 as the arctic spot trapped some residents inside homes with piles of snow and cut power to hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses across the United States.
More than 2,360 domestic and international flights were canceled on Christmas Eve, according to tracking site FlightAware, as deep snow-laden roads also hampered holiday weekend travel.
Meteorologists said a bomb cyclone, when atmospheric pressure drops very quickly in a strong storm, had developed near the Great Lakes, causing blizzard conditions, including high winds and snow.
Watch ITV News report as Storm Elliott’s treacherous storms sweep across the US, as families struggle to travel on their Christmas holidays
Mark Poloncarz, executive of Erie County, Buffalo’s home, said it was taking ambulances more than three hours to make a single trip to the hospital and that the blizzard may be “the worst storm in the history of our community.”
Two people died Friday at their homes in suburban Cheektowaga, New York, when emergency crews couldn’t get there in time to treat their medical conditions, he said, and another died in Buffalo.
“We can’t pick everybody up and take you to a warming center. We don’t have the capacity to do that,” Poloncarz said. “Many, many neighborhoods, especially in the city of Buffalo, are still impassable.”
On Saturday, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said Buffalo Niagara International Airport would be closed until Monday morning, and nearly all of Buffalo’s fire trucks were stuck in the snow.
“No matter how many emergency vehicles we have, they cannot overcome the conditions as we speak,” Ms Hochul said.
Stormy conditions knocked out power from Maine to Seattle, while a major electric grid operator warned the 65 million people it serves in the eastern United States that shutdowns may be necessary.
This satellite image provided by NOAA shows weather systems across North America on Saturday.
Pennsylvania-based PJM Interconnection said power plants were struggling to operate in the cold weather and asked residents in 13 states to refrain from using electricity unnecessarily.
Meanwhile, in North Carolina, 265,000 customers were without power Saturday afternoon, according to the Power Outages website.
Among them was James Reynolds of Greensboro, who said his best friend and housemate, a 70-year-old man with diabetes and severe arthritis, spent the morning next to his kerosene heater.
A car is buried in the snow in western New York. Credit: AP
States where deaths have now been reported include Ohio, Kansas, Vermont, Colorado, Wisconsin, Michigan and Kentucky.
Officials have said the storm is nearly unprecedented in its reach, stretching from the Great Lakes near Canada to the Rio Grande along the Mexican border.
About 60 percent of the U.S. population faced a winter weather warning or advisory as temperatures fell sharply below normal, the National Weather Service said.
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