Tornadoes and deaths in its wake, powerful winter storm aims at Northeast

A blog on Cleveland.com reported that heavy snow had already hit the city by 11:15 AM. By 12:19 p.m. John Horton, author of the Plain Dealer’s Road Rant column was reporting that traffic was at a standstill and that every half mile cars were sliding off I-90, a major expressway.

The deteriorating weather in the east was starting to cause significant air traffic delays. According to the Federal Aviation Administration’s web site, flights in and out of Philadelphia were delayed an average of 2 hours and 40 minutes, and one and a half hours at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York.

“The whole North East corridor is going down the tubes as we speak,” says Mr. Ressler during an interview at about noon. “A lot of flights are going to be cancelled.”

Cities on the south side of the storm faced violent weather including tornadoes, which were blamed for three deaths. According to Kines on Tuesday there were 34 tornado reports and 75 reports of damaging winds. Some of that weather shifted over to eastern North Carolina on Wednesday afternoon.

Three more deaths were attributed to accidents on snow-slickened roads.

As the system scoots to the Northeast it will be packing a powerful wind field. Along the coast the winds will be out of the east or northeast. This could result in some coastal flooding.

However, Mr. Kines says residents are not likely to have to evacuate like they did from superstorm Sandy.

“The highest winds are at low tide this evening,” he says. “And, I think if they had a chance to build back the sand dunes they should be able to protect the beach communities.”

“The water won’t pile up like Sandy,” he says since the heavy winds will only last for about six or seven hours compared to several days for Sandy, which took place at the end of October.

The next storm is expected to hit the east late Friday or early Saturday. However, Ressler says it will be moving fast and is not likely to result in a major snowfall.

And looking ahead to New Year’s Eve, the nation could be relatively peaceful – as far as the weather is concerned. There could be some rain in southern California and in parts of Texas. “But, a lot of the country is going to be relatively quiet,” predicts Ressler.

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