At least 26 people have died in the United States as a fearsome winter storm continues to pummel parts of the US and Canada with blizzard conditions.
This morning, over 200,000 people woke up without power as a result of the powerful Arctic winds, which also caused Christmas travel chaos.
The extreme weather, a mix of prolonged blizzards and historic cold, plunged wind chill temperatures in all 48 contiguous US states below freezing this weekend, stranded holiday travellers and trapped residents in ice- and snow-encrusted homes.
Twenty-two weather-related deaths have been confirmed across eight states, including at least seven fatalities in western New York, where ferocious snows, relentless winds and deep freezes have plunged Buffalo and surrounding towns into crisis.
While large swathes of the country have begun shovelling out from the massive storm and temperatures in some locations were returning to seasonal normality, Buffalo remained in the grips of "a major disaster," with emergency responders unable to reach several high-impact areas, according to a senior official.
"We do have seven confirmed deaths at this point as a result of the storm in Erie County. There may be more," county executive Mark Poloncarz told reporters.
He described ferocious conditions, with hours-long whiteouts and bodies discovered in cars and under snow banks in a region where Governor Kathy Hochul deployed the National Guard to help with rescues.
"It was as bad as anyone has ever seen it," Mr Poloncarz said.
The National Weather Service warned that blizzard conditions in the Great Lakes region caused by lake-effect snow would continue today, with "additional snow accumulations of 2 to 3 feet (0.6 to 0.9 meters) through tonight."
More than 1,700 flights in the United States were canceled as of midday today, according to flight tracker Flight Aware, as weather further disrupted holiday travel. This is in addition to some 3,500 scrapped yesterday and nearly 6,000 on Friday.
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg tweeted yesterday that "the most extreme disruptions are behind us as airline and airport operations gradually recover."
But travellers remained stranded or delayed at airports including in Atlanta, Chicago, Denver, Detroit, Minneapolis and New York.
Road ice and white-out conditions also led to the temporary closure of some of the nation's busiest transport routes, including the cross-country Interstate 70.
Drivers were being warned not to take to the roads - even as the nation reached what is usually its busiest time of year for travel.
The extreme weather has severely taxed the country's electricity grids, with multiple power providers urging customers to reduce usage to minimise rolling blackouts in places like North Carolina and Tennessee.
At one point yesterday, nearly 1.7 million customers across the country were without electricity in the biting cold, according to tracker poweroutage.us.
But the figure dropped substantially by today, although more than 200,000 customers in eastern states still lacked power.
Canadian authorities have also issued severe weather warnings. Hundreds of thousands were left without power in Ontario and Quebec provinces, many flights were cancelled in major cities and train passenger service between Toronto and Ottawa was suspended.
