A barricade of cold air across New England met several wet fronts coming in from the west to produce a major blizzard that blanketed much of the eastern half of the US with massive amounts of snow just before Valentine's Day, 2007. Stowe, Vermont, saw four feet of snow fall. The storm even spawned a New Orleans tornado.
Chicago's O'Hare airport saw over 900 flights canceled, and at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, several empty planes froze to the tarmac, snaring gate traffic. The Toyota Pavilion at Montage Mountain in Scranton, Pa., collapsed due to the weight of the snow on Feb. 15. The National Guard had to be called in to rescue motorists stuck on a 50-mile iced-over section of Interstate 78 in Pennsylvania. A total of 300,000 homes lost power across the affected region in a storm that the National Weather Service classified as among the top three blizzards to hit the interior section of the Northeast since 1940.
The storm severely affected postal deliveries, too, meaning many Americans didn't receive Valentine's Day cards in time.
