Twenty-six people have already been killed in the snowstorm that hit the United States, according to reports from Reuters and CNN.
The deadly storm hit the city of Buffalo and surrounding Erie County in upstate New York particularly hard, with people stranded in their cars and power outages in many places, Reuters noted.
Erie County Governor Mark Poloncarz said the cold snap killed seven people there alone. The snow continues to fall and in some places the snow cover is 1.2 meters. Four of the victims were found in a snowbound car.
The other victims were found buried in the street. The local authorities representative does not rule out an increase in the number of victims in Buffalo and throughout Erie County. “This is not the kind of Christmas we imagined,” he said.
Up to 60 centimeters of snow is expected to fall in the area overnight, France Press adds.
Although the authorities had warned people of the imminent element and banned them from moving between settlements, many people did not obey the ban, the BTA reported.
New York state officials have dispatched the National Guard to help those stranded in their cars in the snow.
Many places in Buffalo won’t have power restored until tomorrow. Today more than 200,000 households in the area are without electricity.
The roads are impassable. The winds are very strong and create real snow dunes, said Ali Lawson, 34, who has lived in Buffalo for eight years and says he has never seen anything like it. She adds that the snowplows can’t even go out to clear the snow.
The situation in the rest of the country is also dire. In South Dakota, the outside temperature due to the wind was minus 46 degrees Celsius in some places.
Air traffic is instead improving steadily, with only 1,500 flights canceled today compared to 3,400 yesterday.
Homeless shelters are also open in several cities affected by the storm, including Chicago and Denver.
In El Paso, Texas, Mexican migrants sought refuge from the winter weather in churches, schools and other community centers.
The storm also affected neighboring Canada, where more than 200,000 people were without electricity in Ontario and Quebec. Trains from Toronto to Ottawa and Montreal are suspended due to a train derailment.