© Scott Eisen/Getty ImagesA stop sign sits on a flooded-out road in Scituate, Mass. as a large coastal storm bears down on the region Friday.
Residents along the East Coast on Friday battened down as heavy rain and gusting winds pummeled states from Maine to North Carolina.
The Nor'easter was predicted to bring damaging winds - up to hurricane strength in some areas - along the Atlantic through Friday,
according to the National Weather Service, which issued numerous severe-weather warnings and advisories lasting into Saturday.
At least six people were killed when fierce winds brought trees crashing down on roads, homes and other buildings. In the Putnam Valley area north of New York City, an
11-year-old boy was killed when a tree fell on a home, officials said. In Newport, R.I., a
72-year-old man was killed by a falling tree. In Baltimore County, Maryland, a
77-year-old woman was killed when a branch fell on her outside of her home. A
44-year-old man was killed in James City County, Va., when a tree branch fell on a car he was in. And in Chester, Va., a
six-year-old who was asleep in bed was killed when a tree came crashing down into his family's home. And in Connecticut,
one person was killed in a carnear the Stamford-Greenwich line.
Nearly two million people up and down the Eastern seaboard lost power on Friday:
392,000 in Massachusetts; 332,538
in Virginia and part of North Carolina; 323,000
in New York; 308,164 in
Washington D.C. and Maryland; 224,242
in New Jersey;
143,000 in Rhode Island;
120,000 in Eastern Pennsylvania, and more than 40,000 each
in Connecticut and
Delaware.
Throughout the day Friday, at least
3,200 flights at airports between Washington to Boston had been canceled. At New York's LaGuardia airport, which suspended all flights on Friday afternoon, 729 flights had been grounded by the end of the day.
Comment: On the same day elsewhere in Kenya a woman was killed by lightning as she was digging a trench, while a day prior in South Africa 3 young football players were struck with one currently fighting for his life.