Historic Blizzard Hernando Paralyzes US East Coast
The storm triggered an aviation meltdown, with over 5,000 flights canceled on Monday alone and a total of more than 10,000 cancellations recorded between Sunday and Tuesday. Major transportation hubs, including New York’s JFK and LaGuardia, Newark Liberty, and Boston’s Logan International Airport, reported that over 90% of their scheduled flights were grounded during the peak of the storm.
Snowfall totals have shattered long-standing records across multiple states, particularly in New England. Warwick, Rhode Island, recorded a staggering 37.9 inches of snow at T.F. Green International Airport, making it the greatest single snowstorm in the state's history and surpassing the legendary Blizzard of 1978. In Providence, 33.5 inches fell, while areas in Massachusetts, such as Somerset and Berkeley, recorded up to 31 inches. New York City’s Central Park saw 19.7 inches, marking its ninth-snowiest day in recorded history and prompting Mayor Zohran Mamdani to issue a temporary ban on all non-emergency vehicle travel.
The storm’s intensity was classified by meteorologists as a "bomb cyclone" or "superbomb," with atmospheric pressure dropping 39 millibars in just 24 hours. This rapid intensification brought hurricane-force wind gusts, peaking at 98 mph in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, and causing widespread structural damage. Over 600,000 homes and businesses across the East Coast lost power, with Massachusetts and New Jersey bearing the brunt of the outages. Although travel bans in New York were lifted by midday Monday, emergency declarations and hazardous travel advisories remain in place across seven states as crews struggle to clear massive snowdrifts and restore essential services.
