At least 4 dead in U.S. East Coast blizzard

WASHINGTON, Jan 31 (NNN-Xinhua) — At least four people reportedly died over the weekend, as a blizzard swept through parts of the U.S. East Coast.

Three of the dead were found in the snow next to their shovels on Long Island, New York, on Saturday, while a snow plow driver found an elderly woman dead inside her vehicle overnight in Uniondale, also on Long Island, according to local media.

At least a foot of snow fell in nine states from Maryland to Maine on Saturday, with the heaviest amounts near coastal areas.

Boston, capital of Massachusetts, was in the crosshairs, seeing record-tying single-day snowfall from the winter storm, with 23.6 inches falling on Saturday.

Mayor Michelle Wu said on Sunday that cleanup efforts are well underway in Boston and that schools will be open on Monday.

There are still more than 11,000 households in Massachusetts left without power as of Sunday evening, according to power outage tracking site poweroutage.us.

The total number of flight cancellations within, into, or out of the United States reached nearly 1,500 of Sunday evening, data from flight-tracking website FlightAware.com showed. More than 2,600 U.S.-related flights were delayed.

The blizzard was produced by a bomb cyclone that formed on Saturday. The large, intense midlatitude storm has low pressure at its center and an array of associated weather, from blizzards to severe thunderstorms to heavy precipitation, according to the country’s national weather authority. — NNN-XINHUA