Snowzilla wreaks havoc, kills 18

Millions of people in the eastern United States started digging out on Sunday from a huge blizzard that brought New York and Washin-gton to a standstill, but the travel woes were far from over.

The storm — dubbed “Snowzilla” — killed at least 18 people after it walloped several states over 36 hours on Friday and Saturday, affecting an estimated 85 million residents who were told to stay off the roads and hunker down in doors for their own safety.

Forecasters said the storm dumped more than 56 cm of snow on the paralysed capital Washin-gton and the 26.8 inches that fell in New York’s Central Park was the second-highest accumulation in the city since records began in 1869.

Near-record-breaking snowfall was also reported in other major cities up and down the US East Coast, with Philadelphia and Baltimore also on the receiving end of some of the worst that Mother Nature could fling at them.

With the storm finally tapering off overnight, officials in New York lifted a travel ban at 7:00 am on Sunday (1200 GMT), restoring access to roads throughout the city and in Long Island and New Jersey.

“You never like to disrupt transportation and commerce. However, the storm was fast and furious,” said New York State governor Andrew Cuomo. “So far, so good, but we have more work to do.”

Forecasters were predicting an altogether more forgiving outlook for the remainder of the weekend in New York and Washington — blue skies and sunshine with temperatures hovering at about zero degree celsius.

However, there were concerns about lingering strong winds and melting snow, with streets in some New Jersey coastal towns filled with water and ice, raising the specter of flooding and dangerous black ice.

Meanwhile, a 6.8 magnitude earthquake struck southern Alaska early on Sunday, US seismologists said.

The US Geological Survey, updating its earlier location for the quake, said it struck at 10.30 GMT and was centred about 83 km east of Old Iliamna.

The USGS, which initially had assessed the magnitude of the quake as 7.1, estimated that it had a depth of 127 km. There is only a low likelihood of casualties and damage, the USGS said, adding that “weak” shaking from the quake could be felt in nearby cities.

One of the cities where it could be felt was Anc-horage, the closest large city, some 259 km from the epicenter.

A local power company said “the 7.1m earthquake at 1:30 am caused several outages,” including to two power substations.