Snowstorms forced hundreds of flight cancellations at US airports on Sunday, creating travel misery for thousands of Christmas travellers just as conditions in Europe began to ease.
As hundreds of passengers trapped by freezing weather in Paris and Brussels returned home after European flights resumed normal service on Christmas Day, it was the turn of those in the United States to shiver and face disruptions.
At the other end of the spectrum, Moscow's main airport was also closed to international traffic as unseasonably warm weather produced hailstorms that wreaked havoc on the roads, downed transmission lines and terrified shoppers.
Across the Atlantic, the northeastern part of the United States was expected to bear the brunt of "dangerous" blizzard conditions and dumps that could approaching 0.75m in the Boston area.
Crews pre-treated roads with salt and prepared emergency vehicles in Washington, which was paralysed for days by record snowfalls last year.
The capital looked set to escape the worst of the conditions this time around but blizzard warnings were issued for coastal New England, parts of New Jersey and New York city.
The storm was expected to dump a total of between 23 to 38 centimetres on the Big Apple as powerful wind gusts blow through the city.
Boston was forecast to receive up to 56 centimetres of the white stuff by Monday, with wind gusts as high as 72 km/h by that evening.
Maryland, Massachusetts, Virginia and North Carolina had all declared states of emergency to provide extra funding and resources to respond to the storm.
Heavy snow forced the NFL to postpone an American football game for the second time in three weeks - this time for the Vikings-Eagles face-off in Philadelphia.
The inflatable roof of the Minnesota Vikings's Metrodome collapsed during the last major storm earlier this month.
The storm was already bringing misery to travellers hoping to return home from their Christmas vacations. Many airlines waived fees for changing flights.
Delta Air Lines said one sixth of its flights around the country, some 850, had been cancelled.
Americans in the deep south were treated to a very rare white Christmas on Saturday.
Light to moderate snow blanketed communities in the southern Gulf states of Alabama and Mississippi, meteorologists said, while Atlanta, Georgia enjoyed its first white Christmas in 128 years.
Snowfalls were expected to break records in the normally mild south, where at least the children were pleasantly surprised by the winter weather.
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