Winter storm paralyzes Washington

WASHINGTON, Dec. 19 (UPI) -- A storm moving up the East Coast brought Washington to its knees Saturday with a record-breaking snowfall in the nation's capital.

Snow was falling from Virginia to New York through the afternoon. Around the time the first flakes fell in New York City, the snow was ending in Richmond, Va.

By early afternoon, all bus service and most trains had stopped running and no flights were arriving or departing at Ronald Reagan National Airport and Thurgood Marshall Baltimore-Washington International, The Washington Post reported. Officials in the region asked residents to stay off the roads and a section of Interstate 95, the major north-south corridor, was closed in Virginia.

The storm brought heavy rain Friday to South Florida and dumped snow in the mountains of North Carolina before moving into Virginia. At least three deaths in the state were blamed on the weather, CNN said.

Thousands of people spent Friday night in their cars on Interstate 81, which runs up the Shenandoah Valley to Pennsylvania, Jeff Caldwell, a spokesman for the Virginia Department of Transportation, told the Post. A tractor-trailer crash Friday blocked the highway.

But some government business continued in the capital. President Obama apologized to reporters for holding a news conference, telling reporters that after his years in Chicago, the snow was finally making Washington "feel like home."

Some coastal areas were hit hard. Ocean City, Md., got snow, which turned to rain and was expected to return to snow, The Baltimore Sun reported. The beach resort was under advisories for high surf and winter weather, as well as a coastal flood warning.

In New York and New England, the National Weather Service predicts the heaviest snowfall for Long Island and Cape Cod. The storm was expected to hit Massachusetts late Saturday.