A historic extratropical bomb cyclone blizzard that hit the United States and Canada from December 21 to December 26, 2022, brought blizzard conditions and winter storms, killing at least 89 people, causing traffic jams and road closures, and canceling or delaying more than 10,000 flights during the busy Christmas travel season. The Weather Channel gave the storm the fictitious moniker Winter Storm Elliott.
It was a “once-in-a-generation storm,” according to the National Weather Service in Buffalo, New York.
An Extratropical bomb cyclone is a low-pressure area’s quick deepening. Latitude affects the amount of pressure change required to qualify anything as explosive cyclogenesis. For instance, explosive cyclogenesis happens at 60° latitude if the central pressure drops by 24 millibars (0.71 inHg) or greater in a 24-hour period.
Various factors, such as exposure to the cold, vehicle collisions, branches falling on people, electrocutions, and carbon monoxide poisonings, contributed to storm-related deaths.
Emergency Medical Services’ acting chief in Ontario’s severely affected Niagara Region said on December 27 that “at this time EMS is not able to confirm any deaths or injuries directly or solely attributable to the storm” and that “emergency medical responses are complex, with many factors often contributing to a medical event, and it would be impossible to accurately quantify the effect of the storm on patient outcomes.”