NASA

NASA's Terra satellite snapped this image of snow blanketing the Northeast on Sunday.

By Becky Oskin
LiveScience

The aftermath of Saturday's massive snowstorm was spotted from space by NASA's Terra satellite on Sunday.

The snow started falling Friday when a frigid Arctic air mass from Canada collided over the Northeast with warm, moist air sweeping up from the South. Heavy snow combined with strong winds to create blizzard conditions, with more than 2 feet (0.6 meters) of snow dropped in New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Maine.

At its peak, the storm dumped 10 inches (25 centimeters) of snow in an hour on Allentown, Pa.

The clouds had mostly cleared when the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the Terra satellite snapped the winter wonderland stretching from Pennsylvania to Maine.

As of Sunday, Hamden, Conn., won the prize for the weekend's highest snowfall, with 40 inches (101 cm), Accuweather.comreported. While the total wasn't a record for Hamden, Portland, Maine, was buried in 31.9 inches (81 cm) of flakes, the greatest snowfall ever for the city.

Wind-driven snowdrifts blocked doors and built up sedimentarylike layers on windowsills, according to pictures and video posted online. Gusts over 60 mph (96 km/h) chilled residents from Maine to New York, according to Accuweather.com. In Portland and Westport, Conn., the winds topped more than 80 mph (128 km/h).

Commuters battling the snow won't get much respite, according to the National Weather Service (NWS). The NWS forecasts a much warmer storm system moving through the region Monday, with freezing rain.

Reach Becky Oskin at boskin@techmedianetwork.com. Follow her on Twitter @beckyoskin. Follow OurAmazingPlanet on Twitter @OAPlanet. We're also on Facebook and Google+.

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NASA

The GOES-13 satellite snapped imagery of the two low pressure systems joining forces to slam the Northeast United States with heavy winds and snow. Observations were made between Feb. 7th and Feb. 9th, 2013.

By SPACE.com

A satellite in orbit captured the birth of the mega-snowstorm Saturday as the blizzard dumped feet of snow on New England and other parts of the Northeast.

The video of the snowstorm from space was recorded by the GOES-13 weather satellite from Thursday through early Saturday, as two low-pressure weather systems collided to form a single, giant nor'easter. According to NASA's GOES Project officials, "the two systems came together and created a blizzard of historic proportions in New England."

"On Feb. 9 at 4 a.m., hundreds of thousands of people were without power in Massachusetts alone," GOES Project officials wrote in a video description.

The snowstorm buried much of the Northeast in more than 2 feet of snow.

The GOES-13 satellite video shows the storm form over two days as a powerful Alberta Clipper system carrying cold Arctic air from Western Canada slammed into a low-pressure system that moved northward from the Gulf Coast in the south.  

GOES-13 is operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which oversees a fleet of Earth-watching satellites with NASA to monitor the planet's weather systems.

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