U.S. winter storm claims at least 50 lives, over half in western New York

The death toll from the pre-Christmas blizzard in the United States has risen to 50, authorities said, with the toll in western New York at just 27 as rescue and recovery efforts continued Monday.

Dead people have been found in cars and houses, and in snowbanks, and some died while shoveling snow. Rescue and recovery efforts from the storm continued on Monday.

On Friday and Saturday, in one of the nation’s worst-hit areas, a blizzard lashed western New York, snarling motorists, knocking out power and preventing emergency crews from reaching residents in freezing homes and stuck cars.

President Joe Biden said his prayers are with the families of the victims, and on Monday offered federal aid to the hardest-hit state.

Heavy snow nearly covered cars Monday and thousands of homes, some decked out in unlit holiday displays, were dark due to a lack of power.

The storm is expected to claim more lives as it trapped several residents inside their homes and knocked out power to tens of thousands of homes and businesses.

Over half of the US population faces an advisory or warning

Scientists say a warming earth may be driving the storm’s intensity. That’s because the atmosphere can carry more water vapor, which fuels it, said Mark Serreze, director of the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado, Boulder.

Victor Gensini, a professor of meteorology at Northern Illinois University, compares a single weather event to an “at-bat” in baseball — and climate is your “batting average.”

“It’s hard to say,” Serreze said. “But the dice are a little loaded now? Really.”

There may be some relief this week from the extreme weather, which stretches from the Great Lakes near Canada to the Rio Grande along the border with Mexico, as forecasts call for temperatures in the U.S. to rise slowly, said Ashton Robinson Cook, a meteorologist with the Weather Service. National.

“Nothing like last week,” he said, adding that bomb cyclones – when atmospheric pressure drops rapidly in strong storms – have weakened.

In the meantime, recovery work continues. About 60 percent of the U.S. population faces some kind of winter weather advisory or warning, as temperatures drop sharply below normal from the Rocky Mountains east to the Appalachians.

On Monday, about 2,085 domestic and international flights were canceled as of noon ET, according to tracking site FlightAware. The site said Southwest Airlines had 1,253 cancellations — nearly a third of its scheduled flights and about five times more than any other U.S. carrier. An email to Southwest was not immediately returned and the Dallas-based airline had not updated its website on the situation as of Saturday.

Based on FlightAware data, there are cancellations and delays at airports across the US, including Denver, Atlanta, Las Vegas, Seattle, Baltimore and Chicago.

In Buffalo on a recent day, hurricane-force winds and snow caused whiteouts that crippled emergency response efforts.

New York Governor Kathy Hochul said almost every fire truck in Buffalo was stranded there, and implored people Sunday to respect those who are driving tires in the area. The National Weather Service said the snow total at Buffalo Niagara International Airport stood at 1.25 meters as of 10 a.m. ET Monday. Officials said the airport would remain closed until Tuesday morning.

With snow swirling down on untouched and impassable streets, the service also said Monday that up to 23 centimeters of snow could fall in some areas through Tuesday.

Two people died in suburban Cheektowaga, NY, on Friday when emergency crews were unable to arrive in time to treat medical conditions. Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz said 10 more people died during the storm, including six in Buffalo. Describing the blizzard as “the worst storm of all time,” he warned more deaths would be reported.

“Some were found in cars, some were found on the road in snowbanks,” said Poloncarz. “We know someone has been stuck in a car for over two days.”

The family got stuck in Buffalo on their way to Hamilton

Freezing conditions and power outages left people in Buffalo scrambling to get anywhere in the heat amid what Hochul called the city’s longest blizzard conditions.

Ditjak Ilunga of Gaithersburg, Md., was on his way to visit relatives in Hamilton, Ontario for Christmas with his daughter when the SUV got stuck in Buffalo. Unable to get help, they spent hours with the engine running, buffeted by the wind and almost buried in the snow.

At 4 a.m. Saturday, fuel was almost gone, Ilunga made the desperate choice to risk the howling storm to reach a nearby shelter. She carried six-year-old Destiny on her back while 16-year-old Cindy held her Pomeranian puppy, following in her footsteps.

“If I stay in this car, I will die here with my children,” Ilunga remembers thinking. She cried as the family walked through the shelter’s doors. “It’s something I will never forget in my life.”

At home nearby, Shahida Muhammad told WKBW, a local TV station, that she had a desperate weekend after an outage knocked out power to her year-old son’s ventilator. He and the boy’s father manually gave him breathing from Friday to Sunday when rescuers saw desperate social media posts and called for help.

Erie County officials said they went to the family’s home there, but no one came to the door. Muhammad said he was there, but thankful that his son was healthy despite the ordeal. She described him as a “fighter.”

The storm knocked out power in communities from Maine to Seattle. The mid-Atlantic grid operator has asked 65 million consumers to conserve energy amid Saturday’s freeze.

Deaths related to the storm were reported across the country, from six motorcyclists who died in crashes in Missouri, Kansas and Kentucky, and a woman who fell through ice on a Wisconsin river.

In Jackson, Miss., city officials on Christmas Day announced that residents should now boil their drinking water because of a water line that burst in the freezing temperatures.