By AccuWeather staff writer
Published Mar. 12, 2022 8:45 PM EDT | Updated Mar. 14, 2022 8:28 AM EDT
The last full weekend of winter was a snowy one across the Northeast as a major storm blasted the region with heavy snow, strong winds and a record-challenging chill. This was the latest bump along the weather rollercoaster in the Northeast with the region experiencing springlike warmth on Monday, March 7, followed by a midweek snowstorm, and then the return to mild air on Thursday and Friday.
Heavy snowfall and high winds caused near-blizzard conditions across a swath of the Northeast on Saturday, with blizzard warnings active for Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains for the first time since the Blizzard of 2016. At the same time the blizzard warnings were active, parts of the state's southeast, including Virginia Beach, were under a tornado watch.
In Washington, D.C., a light snowfall dusted the city's famous cherry blossoms, which are forecast to reach their peak bloom between March 23-25, according to the National Park Service. The Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport measured 0.9 of an inch of snow, while suburbs northwest of the nation's capital measured between 2 and 6 inches of fresh snow.
Snow and ice accumulate on a blooming cherry tree in Washington, Saturday, March 12, 2022, as temperatures dip into the 20s. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
Washington, D.C., was the snowiest of all the major cities along the Interstate 95 corridor in the Northeast with 0.4 of an inch falling in Baltimore and Philadelphia, 0.2 of an inch falling in Boston and New York City's Central Park reporting just a trace of snow.
Snowfall totals were much higher across the interior Northeast where plows, shovels and snow blowers were needed to clear roads, sidewalks and driveways.
Morgan, Vermont, located near the Canada-U.S. border, was the snowiest spot across the region with 20 inches falling from Friday through Saturday. A few other spots across the region measured over a foot of snow, including Eden, Vermont, located northeast of Burlington, Rockwood, Maine, located near the center of the state, and Pittsburg, New Hampshire, located in the northeast corner of the state.
A gas station canopy is blown over in Wilkesboro, North Carolina after high winds early Saturday March 12, 2022. (Facebook/Eric Duncan)
A significant pileup occurred during the height of the snowstorm on Saturday afternoon southwest of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. A massive 73-car pileup was reported on eastbound 581 amid heavy snow and gusty winds. The crash occurred around 2 p.m. EST, injuring 10 people though none of the injuries were life-threatening, according to the Pennsylvania State Police. Buses were directed to pick up people who had been involved in the crash and take them to the New Cumberland Borough Fire Department as a reunification location as well as to warm up. The road was closed for around four hours while crews cleared the wreckage.
There had been whiteout conditions prior to the crash, drivers and witnesses told ABC27.
A gas station canopy is blown over in Wilkesboro, North Carolina after high winds early Saturday March 12, 2022. (Facebook/Eric Duncan)
In Scranton, Pennsylvania, officials canceled the city's St. Patrick's Day parade, which is one of the nation's largest, and rescheduled it for next Saturday. Snow totals of 4 to 8 inches have been reported in and around the city with 11 inches falling in the nearby town of Moscow, Pennsylvania.
To the north, organizers of the St. Patrick's Day parade in Syracuse, New York, were determined to hold the annual event snow or shine, the first time the event has been held since before the COVID-19 pandemic.
"A little snow is not going to stop us," Donna Hamilton told AccuWeather's Kim Leoffler on Saturday. "We're over here every year. In 2017 when it was 20 degrees below zero we were out here. Everything froze, but we were here."
A gas station canopy is blown over in Wilkesboro, North Carolina after high winds early Saturday March 12, 2022. (Facebook/Eric Duncan)
The strong winds that accompanied the snowstorm led to snowdrifts and power outages, the latter of the two being one of the biggest impacts of the storm.
At one point, more than 17,500 electric customers in Pennsylvania were out of power, as well as more than 15,000 people in Maryland and 10,000 in Virginia, according to PowerOutage.us. However, most of the outages related to the storm came not from heavy snowfall, but from high winds and severe thunderstorms in the Southeast.
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As snow buried the Northeast, severe thunderstorms on the southern side of the system wreaked havoc.
A weak EF0 tornado hit near Jensen Beach, Florida, located about 100 miles north of Miami. Wind gusts of up to 73 miles per hour were clocked in Ocala, Florida, a town about 90 minutes northwest of Orlando. The gusty winds knocked out power to more than 43,000 in the state, while more than 67,500 people lost power in Georgia.
A gas station canopy is blown over in Wilkesboro, North Carolina after high winds early Saturday March 12, 2022. (Facebook/Eric Duncan)
At Fort Myers Beach in Florida, a day at the beach turned dangerous after a waterspout moved ashore. Reporting from Fort Myers, WINK News Meteorologist Dylan Federico stated that two beachgoers were swept up in the waterspout, but they are “fine” with no injuries.
In North Carolina, the wind gusts were extreme with a 97-mph gust reported at Frying Pan Tower, an offshore platform south of Wilmington, North Carolina, according to National Weather Service reports. Onshore in the state, a gust of 77 mph was measured at Carolina Beach.
The gusts knocked down numerous trees in North Carolina, also toppling a gas station canopy in the town of Wilkesboro. In the state's mountains, more than 9 inches of snowfall was recorded in Faust.
Areas even farther south and west also managed to see a fairly rare March snowfall. Images captured from NOAA’s GOES-16 satellite showed snow on the ground in parts of northern Louisiana and northern Mississippi, but it quickly melted in the strong March sun.
The winter storm is moving fast enough for NOAA's GOES-16 satellite to reveal snow on the ground under clear skies in Arkansas, northern Louisiana, northern Mississippi, Tennessee and Kentucky this morning.
As the storm departed late on Saturday, it left behind record-challenging low temperatures, potentially making Saturday night the coldest night until next winter for some areas of the Southeast. Low temperatures across the region's interior bottomed out in the 20s, which approached record territory.
Temperatures fell to within a few degrees of the daily record low in Charlotte and Asheville, North Carolina; Macon and Savannah, Georgia; and Jacksonville, Florida.
Columbus, Mississippi, was one of the few spots that set a new daily record with the mercury dipping down to 24 degrees Fahrenheit. A low temperature of 45 is more common in Columbus in mid-March.
Even though the storm has ended, wintry hazards lingered farther north into Sunday evening.
"The same wave of cold that helped to bring snow across the Northeast Saturday lingered in the region, allowing for below-normal temperatures from Buffalo to Boston and Philadelphia on Sunday," AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Courtney Travis.
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