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What's A Blizzard?

A blizzard is a severe winter storm where both wind and snow combine to create low visibility. There are some specifics according the National Weather Service:

A blizzard has sustained winds or frequent gusts at 35 MPH or greater which combined with falling or blowing snow will cause reduced visibility to 1/4 miles or less. Typically to be considered a blizzard these conditions must last for 3 hours or more. It's interesting to note that snow doesn't have to be falling in order to create a blizzard. If a freshly fallen snow is loose enough on the ground, strong winds will pick the snow up to create blowing snow and thus reduced visibility.

As you can see from the above definition, these are rather specific conditions a storm must meet in order to be a blizzard. However, most people in the United States use the term blizzard to mean any heavy snow storm. Meteorologists on the other hand, are careful to only use the term when the snow storm combined with wind will cause blinding visibility.

$700 million in damages

During the Blizzard of 1996 which hit a large portion of the eastern US 187 people lost their lives The flood aftermath of the snow storm cost Pennsylvania over $700 million in damages and losses. Over 300,000 claims were made to insurance companies from all the eastern US ^(1).

⁽¹⁾The Handy Weather Answer Book. Lyons, A. Walter. Visible Ink, Detroit; 1997