Snow fell at a rate of 2 to 3 inches an hour early Monday from New York through Massachusetts. Some areas have gotten well over a foot of snow since Sunday, along with wind gusts of over 30 mph and low visibility.
Long Island MacArthur Airport reported 20 inches of snow as of Monday morning. Freehold, New Jersey, had 19 inches.
The National Weather Service called travel conditions “nearly impossible.”
Blizzard warnings stretched from Maryland to Maine. Cellphones across New York City received wailing push alerts Sunday night announcing a ban on non-emergency travel on all streets through noon Monday because of “dangerous blizzard conditions.” Rhode Island and New Jersey implemented similar restrictions.
More than 5,000 flights in and out of the United States were canceled for Monday, according to the flight tracking website FlightAware. Most were canceled in New York, New Jersey and Boston.
Public transit was suspended in some areas. Even DoorDash announced it was suspending deliveries in New York City overnight.
The storm caused power outages that left more than 300,000 customers in the dark along the East Coast early Monday, including about 115,000 customers without power in New Jersey, according to PowerOutage.us which tracks outages nationwide.
Emergencies were declared in New York, Philadelphia and other cities, as well as several states stretching from Delaware to Massachusetts as officials mobilized readiness efforts.
“The combination of heavy snowfall and strong winds will continue to produce blizzard conditions along the Northeastern Seaboard,” the weather service said Monday. “Sharply reduced visibility will make travel extremely treacherous across these areas.”
Weather service meteorologist Frank Pereira said the storm could possibly become a bomb cyclone, which is when a storm drops at least 24 millibars in pressure in 24 hours.
Heaviest snow is falling and wind picking up
The weather service said the snow was expected to taper off by Monday afternoon.
New York City and Boston canceled public school classes for Monday, while Philadelphia will switch to online learning. New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani called it the “first old-school snow day since 2019.”
“And to kids across New York City, you have a very serious mission if you choose to accept it: Stay cozy,” he said.
Meanwhile, outreach workers worked to coax homeless New Yorkers off the street and into shelters and warming centers.
Various landmarks and cultural institutions announced closures Monday, from New York's Museum of Modern Art to Arlington National Cemetery in Washington, D.C. Broadway shows were canceled Sunday evening.
The weather service said the storm’s strong wind gusts could cause whiteout conditions and warned of a “Potentially Historic/Destructive Storm” southeast of the Boston-Providence corridor.
Shovelers recruited for major snow clearing
In addition to their robust plow operations, New York City officials recruited people to shovel snow, with some beginning work Sunday night to get an early start on the first wave of snowfall, Mamdani said.
That move created some controversey for Mayor Mamdani who said the city required people who wanted a snow shoveling job to provide legal identification documents.
Mamdani and many Democrats have condemned Republicans for demanding that people show ID before they are allowed to vote.
