United States
Winter Storm Jacob, as the system was unofficially known in North America, made landfall over the Pacific Northwest on 15 January. In the community of Joyce, on Washington state's Olympic Peninsula, 22 inches (56 cm) of snow was recorded.[3] In eastern Oregon, high winds and blowing snow resulted in the closure of Interstate 84.[7] Jacob brought heavy snowfall from Montana to Idaho and Utah and down into the Sierra Nevada of California on 16 January,[3] including up to 26 inches (66 cm) of snow at Tahoe Donner, California.[8] On 17 January, an avalanche at the Squaw Valley Ski Resort in northern California, site of the 1960 Winter Olympics, killed one person and seriously injured another.[5]
Rare snowfall and freezing rain led to difficult commuting conditions on the morning of 17 January in Reno, Nevada; Omaha, Nebraska; and parts of the Texas Panhandle, including the Amarillo area.[3] Freezing rainfall across Kansas, Missouri and Arkansas led to ice accretions of up to 0.5 inches (1.3 cm) widely by nightfall;[3] icy conditions at Kansas City International Airport resulted in a Delta Air Lines Airbus A319 sliding off of a taxiway onto grass while attempting to take off, although there were no injuries.[9]
As Jacob moved off into the Atlantic, winds gusting up to 60 miles per hour (97 km/h) were recorded across the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic states on 18 January, leading to difficult conditions with existing blowing snow, with 500 miles (800 km) of Interstate highways closing as a result.[3] Up to 5 inches (13 cm) of snow was recorded in Chicago, Illinois; 7 inches (18 cm) in Detroit, Michigan; and 5 inches (13 cm) in Cleveland, Ohio.[3] Further east, 3 inches (7.6 cm) of snow fell in Boston,[10] and 2.1 inches (5.3 cm) fell in New York City.[11] The snow in New York City resulted in a crash on the Bronx River Parkway with eight injuries occurring, one of which was life threatening.[12]
Canada
As Winter Storm Jacob emerged into the Atlantic on 18 January, it passed offshore close to Atlantic Canada, bringing high winds and heavy snowfall widely. Worst affected was Newfoundland, where St. John's recorded over 30 inches (76 cm) of snow, breaking the city's all-time single-day snowfall record.[1] Mount Pearl had 93 centimetres (37 in) of snow.[2] As a result of the severe blizzard, 21,000 homes were left without power and a state of emergency was declared across Newfoundland, banning all road travel except for emergencies.[1] A 26-year-old man was reported missing after failing to return home from a walk in the blizzard in Conception Bay.[1]
High winds, gusting up to 156 kilometres per hour (97 mph) in the Avalon Peninsula, 164 kilometres per hour (102 mph) in Bonavista, Newfoundland[13] and 171 kilometres per hour (106 mph) in Green Island (Fortune), Newfoundland and Labrador[2] damaged the roofs of houses and created snowdrifts as high as 15 feet (4.6 m) against buildings and vehicles, trapping people indoors for several days and hindering emergency vehicle access; fire engines required snowplough escorts, and snowmobiles were used to transport patients to local hospitals in the days following the blizzard.[1] The storm created an avalanche in The Battery, St. John's.[14] Many meteorologists in the area described this storm as the worst winter storm they had ever seen.[1]
