On this day in 1950, the Great Appalachian Storm of 1950 slammed into the eastern part of the U.S., causing a staggering level of damage to a large swath of the country.
On Thanksgiving weekend that year, the winter storm covered the Appalachian mountain range and surrounding areas in snow and buffeted much of the Northeastern part of the country with strong winds. It formed in North Carolina and drifted north, crossing over Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio and West Virginia. Snow reached up to 62 inches across the central Appalachians by the storm’s end. Travel was impossible for several days in some areas, and some communities saw temperatures in the tens of negative degrees Fahrenheit.
Winds swept across the East Coast, all the way up to New England where tides ran high. Buffalo, N.Y., had no snow but did experience 50-mile-an-hour winds. Property damage was widespread, and 160 deaths were attributed to the storm overall.
You can read more about the storm on the websites of the National Weather Service and Weather Underground.
