Early Snow Hits East Coast

AP

An unusually early and powerful nor’easter dumped several inches of wet, heavy snow Saturday on parts of the mid-Atlantic region, and it weighed down or toppled leafy trees and power lines to knock out power to 1.7 million as the storm headed toward New England.

Communities inland were getting hit hardest, with eastern Pennsylvania serving as the bull’s-eye for the storm, said National Weather Service spokesman Chris Vaccaro. Some places got more than half a foot of snow, and towns near the Maryland-Pennsylvania border saw 10 inches fall.

More than 1.7 million customers lost power from Maryland north through Massachusetts, and utilities were bringing in crews from other states to help restore it. Half a million were without power in New Jersey, including Gov. Chris Christie, who declared a state of emergency. Throughout the region, officials had warned that the early storm would bring sticky snow on the heels of the week’s warmer weather and could create dangerous conditions.

The storm disrupted travel along the Eastern Seaboard. Several airports had hours-long delays Saturday, including Philadelphia’s and two that serve New York City, Newark Liberty and Kennedy. The smaller airport in Teterboro, N.J., was briefly closed. Amtrak suspended service between Philadelphia and Harrisburg, Pa., and commuter trains in Connecticut and New York were delayed or suspended because of downed trees and signal problems.

Residents were urged to avoid travel altogether. Speed limits were reduced on bridges between New Jersey and Pennsylvania. A few roads closed because of accidents and downed trees and power lines, and more were expected, said Sean Brown, a spokesman for the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation.

Some said that even though they knew a storm was coming, the severity caught them by surprise.

“This is absolutely a lot more snow than I expected to see today. I can’t believe it’s not even Halloween and it’s snowing already,” Carole Shepherd of Washington Township, N.J. said after shoveling her driveway.

Southern New Jersey was soaked with heavy rains and winds that ranged from 20 to 35 mph, while northern communities awaited the arrival of 5 to 10 inches of snow. Jersey Central Power & Light, which was heavily criticized for being too slow to restore power following Hurricane Irene, had hundreds of workers set to be deployed.

Parts of New York saw a mix of snow, rain and slush that made for sheer misery at the Occupy Wall Street encampment in New York City, where drenched protesters hunkered down in tents and under tarps as the plaza filled with rainwater and melted snow.

October snowfall is rare in New York, there had been just three October days with measurable snowfall in Central Park since record-keeping began 135 years ago, according to the National Weather Service. The fourth came Saturday, when about 1.3 inches had fallen by mid-afternoon, a record snowfall total for the month of October and the date itself.