America paralyzed by the “blizzard of the century”

At New York

America is slowly emerging, haggard, from the worst blizzard in half a century. Originating on the Pacific Rim in the northwest of the United States, Storm Elliott swept through the Rockies and the Midwest, from Washington State to Ohio, before rolling in, its power increasing tenfold in ” Cyclone Bomb,” over Erie County, New York, encompassing the city of Buffalo and Niagara Falls.

It is in this county adjoining the Canadian border that the human toll is the heaviest: 27 deaths recorded, out of the fifty recorded across the United States. Sudden drops in temperature, capable of instantly transforming boiling water into droplets of ice, combined with winds blowing at more than 100 km/h, with massive snowfalls – up to three meters in height -, have generated a “white hell”, taking thousands of motorists and households by surprise, suddenly deprived of heating and electricity…