Heavy Snow Batters Northeast Feb 9, 2013

A gigantic midwinter storm buried the Northeast in snow on Saturday, leaving behind a debilitated and disoriented region digging through plump white drifts and reeling from gale-force winds.

New York City eluded its worst bite, and muffled-up pedestrians trooped along slushy sidewalks as insouciantly as after any matter-of-fact winter snowfall.

Marcy Reed, president of National Grid, which also supplies power to the Long Island Power Authority, said failures there could last several days because repairs would require unearthing power lines buried under mounds of snow.

Long lines materialized at gas stations.

The accumulation in Central Park was measured at 11.4 inches by the time the snow relented at daybreak Saturday.

Waters breached a sea wall in the Humarock section of Scituate, while roads in Gloucester, Marblehead and Revere were reported flooded or impassable.

Wind gusts of 80 miles per hour cut power lines and toppled trees.

In Massachusetts, National Guard soldiers were deployed, mainly in the southeastern part of the state, to retrieve residents and take them to warming centers and shelters.

Scores of cars including tow trucks, semis and even county snowplows were strewn about and stuck in the snow along North Ocean Avenue in Brookhaven, which had received 30.3 inches by 6 a.m.

New York City fared far better: 478 customers were out of power in Brooklyn, according to Consolidated Edison, for by far the most of any borough.

The storm, spawned by the collision of two weather systems, touched more than 40 million people, though early reports suggested it accounted for only a handful of deaths.

“The way this evolved was a very classic winter nor’easter,” Mr. Stark said.

Dannel P. Malloyof Connecticut reported cars stranded across his state despite orders to stay off the roads, and said several people needed to be treated for hypothermia after spending hours trapped in their cars.

New York City eluded its worst bite, and muffled-up pedestrians trooped along slushy sidewalks as insouciantly as after any matter-of-fact winter snowfall.

The three men extricated Mr. Berry’s car and he handed them $20.

More than three feet of snow fell on parts of Connecticut, and more than two feet accumulated on Long Island and in Massachusetts, causing coastal flooding that forced evacuations of some Massachusetts communities.

Wind gusts of 80 miles per hour cut power lines and toppled trees.

Barbara Bariciano, 43, a housecleaner, tried to shadow the plows, but the snow snapped both windshield wipers on her Honda Civic hybrid.

Deval Patrickof Massachusetts banned travel on all roads as night fell on Friday, an order that remained in effect until 4 p.m.

With snow still falling, the Weather Service said it had reports out of New Haven County of 36.2 inches in Oxford and 38 inches in Milford.