New York, Feb 10 (PTI): A "record-breaking" winter-storm battered northeast US and Canada, killing at least 10 people, burying some areas in nearly three feet of snow and leaving upto 7 lakh homes without heat and electricity.
The gigantic midwinter storm buried the Northeast in snow, leaving behind a debilitated and disoriented region digging through plump white drifts and reeling from gale-force winds, the New York Times reported.
The blizzard set record snowfall in Portland, Maine, with nearly 32 inches, while parts of Connecticut got more than three feet of snow, bringing everything to a standstill.
The mammoth storm left roads clogged, airports shut, snapping of power lines and forcing more than half-a-million customers without power, including 400,000 in Massachusetts, 186,000 in Rhode Island, and about 39,000 in Connecticut.
"This has been a record-breaking storm," Connecticut Governor Dannel P Malloy was quoted as saying by local media.
The cleanup "will go on for a number of days; this will not all be done today," Malloy said, adding that heating centers were being set up in areas without power.
Yesterday, as many as 2,200 flights were cancelled, taking the number of such cancellation to about 5,800 for over past two days, according to FlightAware. More cancellations are expected for today.
Boston's Logan International Airport and Bradley International Airport in Connecticut, remained shut down.
The snow-storm contributed in Seven deaths in US alone. One of the victims was an 11-year-old Boston boy who died from carbon monoxide poisoning, as he was helping his father shovel snow and took a break to warm up in a car.
Authorities warned residents to make sure home-heating vents were cleared of snow, saying a number of people had been taken to the hospital for carbon-monoxide inhalation.
Several rescued motorists in Connecticut were treated for hypothermia, state officials said.