The first day of spring skipped the sunshine and brought snow to parts of the East Coast Friday, dusting a region from Washington, D.C. to New England as the latest storm in a winter that seemed to have no end swept through.
Two people died in a car crash as snow fell in New Jersey Friday afternoon, NBC Philadelphia reported. Nearly 600 flights were cancelled at airports from Newark to Maryland.
Three inches fell in parts of New York City, with 1.5 inches was covering parts of Central Park by 7 p.m., the National Weather Service said. More than 5 inches fell in parts of southwestern Connecticut, more than 3 inches fell in Union City, New Jersey, and 4 inches fell in Stony Brook, on the north coast of Long Island in New York.
Snow in western Maryland contributed to car crashes that sent several people to the hospital and shut down part of Interstate 68, NBC Washington reported.
Boston could see less than an inch of snow on Friday and Saturday, Jon Rowe, senior meteorologist at The Weather Channel, said. Snow is not unheard of on the first day of Spring, but "it's pretty tough to get a really big, cold snowfall at this time of year," he said.
Weather advisories were posted across eight states ahead of the official start of spring at 6:45 p.m. ET. New York City and Philadelphia last saw measurable snowfall totals on the first day of spring in 1965, according to The Weather Channel.
Chilly temperatures between 5 and 15 degrees below average are expected to accompany the snow, according The Weather Channel.
Residents of Massachusetts, which has been battered by record-setting snowfall this winter, were keeping their chins up. "I'm sick of it," Donna Bohan, 52, a lifelong South Boston resident, told The Associated Press. "I want to not have to wear my boots, and I want to be able to take a nice walk. But we can handle a bit more. We're New Englanders. We're tough."
The wintry weather was expected to move north to the Canadian Maritimes by the early hours of Saturday where it could intensify and cause potential blizzards, forecasters at The Weather Channel said.
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