collected on medical marijuana to study the benefits. she wants some of that money to set up her own research lab. shawn is here as well. >> i'm a survivor of a lot of the issues you dpiguys are deal with. >> he wants to convince the board that the ptsd and marijuana study should win. >> i think it's going to hopefully show what many of us vets are experiencing, which is a simple plant is helping. >> >> just an hour and a half later, a vote. >> all those in favor? the motion passes you unanimously. >> there are signs everywhere of a revolution gaining momentum. main extreme medicine, serious scientists previously so unwilling to dip a toe into the world of medical marijuana are now diving in head first.

>> all sorts of people came out of the woodwork to try to help us, including the researchers who are experts with marijuana use by vets with ptsd and also researchers funded by nida who are located at john's hopkins. >> and now one year after the study was approved by the federal governments the plants are grown brimming with the chemicals that could hold so much promise, but one question still nags at rick. did it have to take so long? for decades researchers have wanted to speed things by getting a variety of strains from places other than the university, even taking the government to court, but every time they lost. now, in the midst of this revolution, even that may be changing. director of nida. >> we started that dialogue with dea.

in order for us to advance the science, we're going to have to be able to provide very specific product. >> i think that would be a huge deal. >> the doctor knows what a turning point this would be. >> studies that have used marijuana from the government have been very very helpful but perhaps somewhat limited as street product as gone through the roof in terms of pot ensy and strain type and i think the closer we get to studying real world scenarios in the lab the better off we're going to be. >> a real world scenario is what she was able to study. she didn't have to get the cannabis from old miss. patients bought their marijuana from a local dispensary. and now we get to see what the impact has been, her brain on cannabis. remember, she's been using marijuana every day for three months. >> what we see a -- >> the doctor found no evidence of impairment to her brain.

there was a change over here in the cortex. it's a part of the brain responsible for decision making, emotion and empathy, which could play a role in ptsd. >> very very compelling and certainly leads me to want to look more closely at this type of process. >> most importantly she felt better, reporting a 60% decrease in anxiety, something none of her previous medications had ever done. these are exciting results for a research revolution, a revolution that these three senators now want to take to the next level. >> this bill that we are introducing seeks to right decades of wrong. >> march, 2015, democrats along with republican rand paul have just proposed the most outrageous marijuana legislation in our lifetime.

if it passes it would create a change in the way the united states views and treats marijuana. >> our drug laws in this country as a whole need a revolution of common sense and compassion. >> for starters it would do something scientists have been begging for, reschedule cannabis from schedule one to a much less restricti restre restrektive schedule two. >> when does it make sense to use it. that's what is necessary here. it's so simple. >> the bill would man date more farms to grow research marijuana and allow access to those in need, including veterans, would would be able to get a prescription for marijuana from the va hospitals. >> we've now had three presidents that have admitted to smoking marijuana. people in office have said i've

smoked marijuana recreation nally. how much of a hip krit do you have to be to say i'm not going to support this idea that as a medicine for severely sick people that they shouldn't be able to access this drug? >> it's an important question, a question that i took to the president of the united states. >> there's a bill on the floor of the senate now proposing that marijuana get rescheduled from schedule one to schedule two saying it may have a possible medial benefit. >> i'd have to take a look, but i'm on record say that marijuana may in fact be appropriate and we should follow the science as opposed to ideology on this issue. >> it has been that message all along throughout our history. ideology has trumped science often, too often, but every now

and then a revolution takes hold and is guided by those unwilling to give up. >> we have to keep the pressure on because the only thing that's getting this thing moved forward is the pressure. >> a revolution that has moved so far in nearly three years when we first met young charlotte and saw her life transformed by medical marijuana, a government who once fought now supports, a farm once barren now abud ant. studies once forbidden now under way trying to provide scientific proof that could change and save lives like it did for shawn and his family. >> you think it helped save him? >> i do. >> we've walked down those roads together and it's been a process that has been by no means fun or painless, but we're here today and that's kind of how we look at it and we look it from the perspective of helping others.

>> helping others and changing the world, the marijuana revolution has only just begun. >> snow blanketed roads, buried cars and plenty of stranded drivers. a record-setting winter storm brings travel to a frozen halt across the eastern u.s. >> plus, relief for some refugees in norway after the government suspends deportations to russia. >> and later, two u.s. presidential candidates are all smiles on the campaign trail after picking up an influential endorsement in iowa. it's all ahead here this hour. welcome to viewers in the u.s. and around the world. i'm natalie allen. >> i'm george howell. "newsroom" starts right now.

. a very good day to you. we start this hour with that massive snowstorm that hit the u.s. east coast, the first big storm of the year for the region. >> it was a whopper from georgia up to new york. 85 million people feeling the effects of this one. 11 governors declared states of emergency. >> roadways across the region are clogged with snow, ice and stranded drivers. and at airports not much relief there either. almost 7,000 flights have been canceled for saturday and sunday. baltimore airport in maryland had record snowfall there. more than two feet. >> and there's been tragedy on top of frustration with at least 14 storm-related deaths. let's get an update on what's left of the storm because there's a little bit left. >> the bulk of the heavy snowfall now moving away from the new england coast. there's still the threat of blowing and drifting snow. that's going to create very

hazardous conditions. still the majority of the blizzard warnings have been lifted with the exception of long island and along the coast of connecticut. lease still the threat of minor to moderate coastal flooding because we still have the on shore push of atlantic moisture that will potentially bring some minor flooding. that is particularly in middlesex and monmouth counties in new jersey. this is the wider perspective of the storm system. this is the radar you're looking at. this is realtime precipitation. you can see it is pulling away from the new england coast quickly. in fact, all the major metropolitans now out of the heaviest snow bands, washington, philly, into new york and even boston. that's just into nantucket and the long island area as well as the extreme southern sections of connecticut that has measurable snowfall taking place at this time. you can see maybe a passing

flurry or light snow shower but that's about it. we start to focus on the winds that will wrap around the storm or that are that have been wrapping around the storm as it exits the east coast of the united states. here it goes. new englanders are probably saying good-bye and good rid dance. the good news, we're finally going to see some sunshine after the system passes through. that's got a flip side. it's going to warm the temperatures up and allow melting to take place. remember, once we lose the daytime heating from the sun, the temperature drops below freezing and we refreeze all the melted snow back and the potential for black ice. here's the look at additional snowfall models from the latest computer model run. 1 to 3 inches. i would say we're pretty much done with any measurable amount of snowfall with the exception of the coastal areas of long island and connecticut. it is still very blustery along the east coast. ocean city, more folk into new

york, gusts between 30 to 40 even higher localized gusts possible for the next three to six hours. blowing and drifting snow certainly a potential into your sunday. do take care. but the good news is, the bulk of the heavy precipitation is moving away. here goes the temperatures. we are still below freezing and will remain so at least for the next few hours. daytime highs for the big apple into the nation's capital rising above that freezing mark, being 3g 2 degrees fahrenheit height, 0 celsius. the minimum temperatures overnight tonight abdrop below freezing. a cooldown into tuesday. single digit overnight lows tonight for washington, d.c. again, refreezing will take place and that will create black ice on the roadways. you can see the system pulling away and we finally see the sunshine after this. but again, the threats now, natalie, george, the potential for that minor coastal flooding is specifically along the new jersey shoreline and the blowing

and drifting of snow as the storm exits the new england coast. >> then will come the melting. we'll talk about that later. >> thank you. derek talked about the sunrise in new york is about four hours away and people will wake up to a city still frozen. >> cnn's brian stelter hit the roads to look at conditions there tonight. >> reporter: we all know new york is a city that never sleeps. it came can close to snoozing these past few hours. we're heading toward lower manhattan. we are the only ones out here. the sanitation vehicles have been able to get ahead of the storm thanks to the travel ban put into effect saturday afternoon. we're seeing blacktop out here. already being able to see that the roads are clearing up as the snowfall starts to calm down. this storm was much bigger than anticipated from new york city. a couple days ago, the forecast was for four or eight inches.

maybe a foot. but we ended up with more than two feet of snow here which is interesting. normally people complain when the weatherman overestimates, or exaggerates it's going to be. in this case, the storm models suggested that washington would bear the brunt of the storm, that new york would be let off easy. it turns out in the great d.c., new york rivalry, new york was death the tougher blow from the storm. ended up with more storm up here than in many areas around washington. how widespread it is, we're talking about hundreds of miles that is going to be digging out on sunday as the people start to recover from the storm and start to head out and maybe enjoy the fresh snow going sledding, of course, taking their pets out and things like that. as we drive around here, we see almost no one out here. only a few pedestrians and emergency vehicles. this travel ban is maybe

surprisingly eb, surprisingly well accepted by new yorkers and has had the benefit of being able to clear the roads as a result. back to you. >> so the story is snow and ice in new york and d.c. certainly causing problems. but in new jersey, a different story. it's also strong winds pushing water from the atlantic ocean right into some coastal communities. >> it's causing floods across several seaside towns. cnn's ryan young has more on the rising waters of new jersey. >> reporter: the snow copies to fall and the wind is getting stronger by the hour. you look behind me. the real story is the flooding and what this town will have to deal with all the water invading the area. we're five blocks away from the water source. every half hour we see more water coming into this area. just around this corner, police officers had done a good job blocking off this road to stop people from traveling through this area. but you can see the amount of water that's rising here. this is about knee deep at this level.

we're standing on an area keeping our feet dry. if you look back, you can see a trash can and every ten minutes, we can see it's almost getting to the top of that trash can. water has entered some of these businesses here. we knew this was a potential threat because of the high tide, the full moon and the pushing of the storm water coming in this direction. there's something that everyone was worried about. what they're hoping is in the next few hours, maybe the water will stop. but we know high tide could still continue during the felt hour or so. during superstorm sandy, it was waist deep in this area. now they're getting to face it once again. >> ryan younging there reporting from mar gate, new jersey for us. poppy harlow spoke with new jersey governor chris christie about the flooding awhile back, a few hours ago and the emergency response. >> the national guard has been called in to our state. we sent a number of high water vehicles there to be able to

move people if we need to. the state police has moved their urban search and rescue and swiftwater teams there. if there are people who need moved from their homes and local law enforcement can't handle it. we know we've got the resources there we need and know our national guard men and women are ready at a moment's notice. they're some of the true heroes from hurricane sandy three years ago and will do it now. the great thing abouting thissing is this. if you think about the fact that right now we only have about 63,000 people in new jersey without power at the moment. that's down from over 100,000 earlier today. so the utilities are working hard to get these, are the power restored quickly. we've lowered it by about a third so far. by tomorrow, when the weather is better, i think we're going to make real headway on that. >> chris christie earlier on cnn. for more on the coastal flooding, we're joined on the

line by vincent jones, the director of the atlantic county office of emergency preparedness. thank you for joining us. we're sure you're quite busy. we just heard the governor talking about whether people might need rescue or help. what has been the situation since the flooding occurred? >> well, that's one of the problems we he had this morning with the flooding. we did have, because of the wind keeping water in and the back bay areas we did have some substantial flooding and we did have people that were displaced not only from their homes but individuals that were out in their vehicles trying to traverse and drive through it. they became stranded and needed rescue. we were able to do that successfully. and right now, we're getting through tonight's high tide and, of course, looking at tomorrow to see what it will bring. we still have flooding in our back bay area. snow has started to taper off and the winds we're hoping are going to turn around and come

out of the northwest and help push some of that water out of the back bays. >> you talk about the tide tomorrow. so there could be more flooding tomorrow? >> yeah, there is a good chance we're going to see some moderate flooding tomorrow. and mewater that does not train off the streets or drains in the back baes, any tide that comes in and any water we do get is just going to add to that. we don't believe it's going to be as bad as it was today but nevertheless we're still not out of the woods with that. >> yeah. this is a region that saul that got hit by hurricane sandy three years ago. this is a different situation. i know that one area there along the shore built up a wall, a sand do you know wall. did that help keep the water out? >> the sand dunes absolutely help. they are basically the first line you have defense. they take the brunt or the initial punch, if you will, from the waves. we had some anywhere from 12 to 14 up as much as 20 foot waves

from the storm pushing in. those dunes take that initial brunt of the waves. they knock the waves down enough that you know, any water that does make its way up over on from the beach onto the street is not as bad as it would without the dunes where the water would just have a clean shot making its way toward the street. they absolutely work. unfortunately, we've had some substantial beach erosion and damage to those do you knows. and that's one of the things that's going into the winter, we are prone to get these nor'easters. we're going to have to build that structure back up. >> how many towns got flooded and did the water get inside people's homes? >> almost all of our barrier islands had flooding. and they experienced flooding at different levels, different heights depending where they were and the direction of the winds. but we did have water that did get into a lot of residences especially some of the low-lying

areas. unfortunately they saw flooding during sandy. they experienced flooding again in this storm. so they had to relive all that. we did have some commercial buildings too, some businesses that also were flooded. so this event -- three years later and that having to rebuild and clean out again from the flooding. > that's such a shame. how in the world will business owners and residents try and clean up in these frigid icy conditions? there were ice chunks going down their street. >> yeah, that's going to be one of the problems. and as you heard, the temperatures tomorrow is supposed to be a nice day. so you know, we have to get out there and start assessing some of the daniel. people are try to start cleaning up. there's not much they can do until some of the snow does melt away. there's still -- we still could

be faced with another storm at any time going into what we refer to as our nor'easter season. people, it's going to be a slow process. they will bounce back. they're pretty resilient. we have the support of the governor and others in the state and we'll get through had just like we did sandy. >> we'll end on that note. thanks for taking the time with us, vincent jones with the atlantic county emergency office in new jersey. >> there were pictures of people walking through that because they he had to. can you imagine how freezing cold? >> you see the ice floating right down the street. >> not a good sign. washington had more than its share of rough weather taking a toll on the capital city. chris welch was out on the streets for more of the storm and sent this report to us just a short time ago. >> reporter: here in d.c., this is the first time we haven't receive snow falling since about 1:00 friday afternoon. and you can finally see the u.s.

capitol glowing behind us. there's the dome. we haven't been able to see that for most of today. this is what has been falling from the sky for last 36 hours or so. this is about 22 inches here in the d.c. metro area. wet, heavy snow. that's what we got here. dulles international airport got about 28 inches of snow. they were thinking for a while d.c. might break a record here. it doesn't look liking that happened. that record was set back in 1922. that was 28 inches forever here in the d.c. metro area. that record has not been broken, but what's next? well, tomorrow temperatures will pick up a little bit. it will be above freezing which will give some of the snow a chance to melt just a little bit. it might help the crews as they get out and try to clear some of these roads and dig out. but the other thing they're going to be competing with is a lot of people out on the roads

tomorrow. a lot of people who have been cooped up in their homes, hotel rooms, who want to get out and enjoy some of this. that's the big question, will the city be clean enough, will the roads be cleaned up enough by tomorrow night to get things back to normal by monday? that's the big question. for now, the highlight here, the snow appears to have stopped. there might be an inch tops that comes overnight. by and large, this storms appears to have moved past d.c. natalie, george? >> that's one of our hardy reporters we've had out there for 24 hours. >> chris, we appreciate it. thank you. we're going to turn to other news in a moment. we're getting reports that norway has temporarily suspended the deportation of refugees to russia following a standoff at a church. we'll have that story for you. and inference jews are migrating to israel in record numbers. we will take you to a town where you're likely to hear french as well as hebrew.

>> welcome back to chn newsroom. following pro refugee protests in norway, the government there has temporarily suspended the deportation of asylum seekers back to russia. >> russia's state news agency reports the decision followed a request from russian officials. thousands of migrants arrived in norway over the last year by

taking the so-called arctic route you see on this map. norway is part of the european free movement agreement. the u.n. high commissioner for refugees says russia is simply not a safe country for migrants. as atika schubert reports, some norwegians took it on them elves to help refugees who feared deportation. >> refugees in norway as a arctic town are fighting against deportation to russia and they're getting some help from a volunteer with the group refugees welcome to the arctic she says i did not think to myself at the time that what you're doing now is criminal. my only thought she says was to get this poor family to safety. on thursday, she helped a syrian family seek asylum in a church. the family was due to be deported to russia imminently. but when she returned to the deportation center to get another family, police stopped

the car. she took these photos of the encounter. she was briefly arrested on alleged immigration violations and released with a fine. the refugee family was returned to the center. the mother was crying, no russia, no russia she said. they cried, i cried, the family cried. it was heartbreaking she says. hundreds of refugees have taken the so-called arctic route through russia into norway but this week, norway's government began to deport any refugee with a valid russian visa. local residents came to support refugees demanding to stay in norway. aid groups warned refugees could be left stranded with temperatures reaching minus 34 degrees. prompting locals like this to take action and she isn't deterred by the police stop. one local reporter asks was it worth it, she answers yes, absolutely. even the arctic circle it seems is feeling the effects of the

refugee crisis. atika schubert, cnn. and as the migrant crisis goes on and on and on, 30,000 have crossed so far this year. this week, cnn's bringing europe's crisis into sharp focus. for months we've been following the path of thousands upon thousands of people, families fleeing the war in syria many of them. >> at first countries like austria extended a warm welcome but harsh winter finds attitudes cooling now. we are seeing a backlash. arwa damon will report on a controversial vote in denmark that the measure could rumt in officials seizing some refugees possessions to offset the cost of caring for them. >> an tick cag schubert will look at efforts to assimilate newcomers to germany following wide reports of widespread sexual assaults by migrants in colon and elsewhere. norway, the deportations are a

con tensious issue. >> you will hear from refugees in jordan, people languishing in limbo. that's all a focus on europe's migrant crisis all this week only on cnn. cell phone video from the french port of calais shows hundreds of people breaking into the gates of the port on friday. about 50 managed to get on to a ship disrupting ferry traffic temporarily. >> 35 people were arrested. earlier, a dem moonstration denounced living conditions in the nearby refugee camp dubbed as jungle. after the deadly terror attacks in paris and a rise in anti-semitic violence some jews in france say they don't feel safe there anymore. >> french jews leading the largest migration of western jews to israel in more than half a century. a town in israel many french jews now call home. >> the ages are as varied as the backgrounds in this class.

students in their 20s or 40s from france or russia all learning the same language hebrew. they are new immigrants to israel, part of the largest wave of jewish immigration from western europe to israel since 1948. french jews are leading that wave. after the attack on the kosher supermarket in paris a year ago where four jews were killed just days after the "charlie hebdo" attack, many french immigrants report they felt increasingly unsafe. his friend was killed in that attack. >> it was not good. really not good. and talked to my mom. i said, we must go to israel. >> and this is where you will continue your life? >> yeah, of course. >> this is home for you? >> yeah. >> many like him have made their home in a city in southern israel. here, you are as likely to hear french on the streets as hebrew. the cultural center here in the

heart right near city hall looks a lot like the louvre and across the street is cafe leon, a popular meeting spot for the trench community here in the city. sitting here at this french cafe, it's quite stunning. all the conversations i hear around me are in french. the entire menu is in french. on the window outside it says in french, the eb joimt of life. and that's what french jews like charlie say they're looking for, a place to combine their owed home with their new one. we've tried to preserve our culture here he says. it's important to hold on to that when you've lived in a different country for 30 or 40 years. we bring our old culture with us and try to combine it with a new one. a jewish teacher was attacked last week in more say in an isis inspired attack and the city's chief rabbi told jews not to wear religious skull caps on the french streets. according to it the eu, the vast majority of french jews avoid openly identifying as jewish at

least some of the time. dove cohen left marseille in july. there's a feeling of security here that no longer exists in france, he says. 20 years ago maybe there was. since the year 2000, it's gone. the idea of israel has always been that jews anywhere have a home here but what of the place these new come kers have left behind? one french leader expressed the fear that france would no longer be france without a group of its native sons. of this week could be crucial for finding a solution to the year's old war in syria. peace talks are set to start on monday after u.s. secretary of state john kerry met with leaders from the six of countries of the gulf cooperation krl this weekend. >> he an said he is confident the syrian peace talks would proceed. >> one of the main disagreements

ahead of the peace talks is the question of who will be at the negotiating table. our becky anderson has this look. >> reporter: it's a war everyone agrees must be stopped. but nobody agrees on how. twice international peace talks have failed and already, it's not looking like third time lucky. >> there are a lot of work still to be done. what we want to ensure is that this time it will not be like geneva 2, a serious talk about peace and not talk about -- >> with days to go, united nations still hasn't issued invitations saying it's up to major powers like russia and the u.s. to agree on who is attending. but despite a last-minute meeting, there's still no clarity. in particular, a new saudi backed opposition council says it won't accept any other opposition groups attending. >> translator: there will be no negotiation in any way whatsoever if there is any

addition. we will not go to negotiate. this thing is settled and we would not succumb to pressure. >> who might be at the table in the negotiations are u.n. mediated bringing together the syrian government and the deeply divided opposition that includes political and fighting groups backed by saudi arabia, turkey and france. and veteran secular dissidents who oppose islamist rebels. major world powers like russia, the u.s., saudi arabia, turkey and iran will also attend. everyone agrees that terror groups like suess and al nusra have no part to play despite their huge influence on the battlefield. to illustrate how delicate this all is, for some, even the presence of one of the strongest rebel militia is problematic. having shopped the world by parading prisoners as human shields last year, the army of islam is among those saudi arabia wants to send to the

talks. in a war where human rights groups say all sides are committing atrocities and war crimes, if a guest list is finally agreed on, there are stur sure to be some difficult compromises involved. becky anderson, cnn. >> you're watching "cnn newsroom." still ahead, the epic winter storm that turned new york city into a winter wonderland. the question, did it bring record snowfall. find out next. >> we'll size up the damage of one of the states hit hardest by the storm.

a very warm welcome back to our

viewers here in the united states and around the world. you're watching "cnn newsroom." i'm george howell. >> i'm natalie allen. we're live in atlanta for you. here's an update on our top stories. a strong winter storm has parts of the eastern u.s. in a deep freeze. i think that explains it right there. air, road and rail traffic still at a standstill. 11 governors from georgia to new york have declared states of emergency. so far, the weather has caused at least 14 deaths. >> that blowing snow that hurts your face when it hits your face. norway has temporarily suspended the deportation of asylum seekers back to rush. that decision followed a request from russian officials. norwegian activists russia is not a safe country for migrants. >> iran and china pledging close economic and diplomatic ties now that economic sanctions have been lifted against tehran. the chinese president and iranian president signed

agreements on peaceful uses of nuclear energy, trade and military communication. >> rescue workers in eastern china are preparing a special capsule to save four miners trapped underground for almost a month. one by one.will lift the miners- one miner died and 11 rescued since the mine collapsed back in december december 25th. in just about four hours time, new yorkers will find out if a travel ban has been lifted for the snow covered city. >> roads, bridges and tunnels into manhattan were closed after near record snowfall there. even the so-called great white way shuttered all broadway performances saturday were cancelled. >> chad meyers has been covering this all from times square. where there were a few people who ventured out earlier. take a look. >> reporter: well, we are officially going to break a record here in central park or times square all across the city. manhattan officially going to go

above the highest snowfall record on record for as long as they've been keeping records here in new york. and i guess that's kind of a milestone. but the wind here in central park and in times square wasn't as bad as we saw down in baltimore and philadelphia and d.c. so we don't have the drifting like they have down there. it's a little bit better. talia joins meese from florida. you live over hell's kitchen. you said the cars over there are snowed in. >> everything's snowed in and it's freezing but we're having fun. >> this is the most snow you've seen? >> yes, i've lived here 10 1/2 years and this is the most i've seen in my life. >> are there stores open? >> we found one restaurant that's open. we figured it would be packed but it's not. we're having fun with it. >> at this point in time, we've gone by the oh, my gosh, i'm not going to get to work on monday and mou we're just going to have fun with it. if you don't want to go out, please don't.

maybe monday, tuesday is the day to get there. right now it's stay in and watch tv or enjoy it briefly and get back inside. >> oh, get out there and have some fun because even in near record snowfall in new york can't keep some inside. plenty of people ventured outside including aerosmith's lead singer steven tyler and his daughter mia. they came across our colleague poppy harlow. >> not playing out anytime soon. i'm from new york city and down here to see my daughters and my grandson milo. how you doing, milo? decided to go downtown but then decided not to. weather's terrible. >> already with you going next? you were here promoting your latest single on colbert last night. you're going to obviously hunker down for this thing? >> i'm going to hunker down. i've got a funny feeling the storm will keep us here a couple

extra days. stay home. two words, hot chocolate. >> and family hugs. >> family hugs. >> only poppy harlow could bump into him. you know, all covered up. good for her. officials are trying to get things back to normal in philadelphia as the winter storm weakens there now. >> but there are still stranded drivers to rescue. there are still lights to get back on. cnn's sarah gangnam has this report. >> reporter: the snow has finally let up in philadelphia but officials working into the night in pennsylvania to try and rescue more than 500 drivers and attentions of vehicles that were stranded on a five-mile stretch of the pennsylvania turnpike near breezewood which is an interchange in between washington, d.c. and pittsburgh, pennsylvania, cars stuck on the roadway when tractor trailers could no longer navigate the roads because of the snow, stuck more than 24 hours in some

cases. the national guard being brought in to try and help rescue them. a couple of bus loads of parishioners from a catholic church from omaha, nebraska, tried to make light of this by holding mass out in the snow. working to pass the time. we're told that many of the stranded passengers participated in that mass while they waited for shelter, waited to be rescued. in the meantime, here in philadelphia, this was a record breaking 24 hours. the office of emergency management recording nearly 30 inches of snow far beyond the previous record for that" an of time. only good news here, no major incidents, no major power out e outages. i do want to show you what this snow looked like that fell here. this is so telling to us because this is such wet heavy snow, the kind of snow that really takes a lot of effort to shovel. quite the workout here. and the blizzard effect will remain in philadelphia until

7:00 a.m. this morning. as officials are asking people please to stay inside, not to hit the roads as you do see some people doing here because they're really working overnight to try and clean up and get everything back 0 normal and asking people to stay inside and stay safe while they do that. back to you. >> sara ganim, thank you. after those stuck in the pennsylvania turnpike, the storm caused a traffic backup nearly 37 miles or 60 kilometers long in central kentucky. hundreds of motorists were stranded some for as long as 19 hours till traffic finally started moving again on saturday. >> me and my dad keep getting out and kind of walking back and forth. he's talking to other people in vehicles. but very frustrating because you're in a car and not comfortable. you're cramped. we've made multiple phone calls to the kentucky state police and ekeep getting the same story.

like ten hours ago they told us we'll have you out in no time. we've not heard anything else you know, my dad's a diabetic and i have two kids that are hungry. we ran out of stuff a long time ago. >> we have people who abandoned vehicles in the middle of the roadways. those vehicles, national guard is attempting to take those vehicles and move them out of the way so we can get traffic moving. it's just a really treacherous stretch of road. it's the vehicles are sitting on a solid sheet of ice. >> the traffic accidents were a big deal in the u.s. state of virginia which was one of those places particularly hit hard by the snow. this was the scene in oakton not far from dulles airport. >> more than 70 centimeters or over two feet of snow piled up, the second largest snowfall on record. nick valencia spoke with us from

fairfax, virginia, a short time ago. >> reporter: the commonwealth of virginia continues to be pounded by this fatal storm. you can see just how treacherous this is. let me just give you an example here. walking through there, falling nearly knee deep. further i go, just about up to my waist here. this storm has lived up to all of the expectations. the biggest issues on the roadways have been disabled vehicles just a little while ago, we saw one of those emergency vehicles stuck in the middle of this thoroughfare, this route 50 that connects to interstate 66. the virginia state police saying that is their main concern. those disabled vehicles including those emergency vehicles trying to help residents. the positive news is people are listening to government officials and staying inside. there's of course, some unfortunate news to report. at least two people died of hypothermia, the cold weather just really brutal and bonecallying here. another person individual lost control of his car and ran into

a tree causing him to die at the scene. this winter weather expected to last well through the weekend. more than 85 million americans up and down the east coast impacted by this with more sticky wet weathe and this snow continuing to fall and expected to falwell through sunday. back to you. >> already. our meteorologist derek van dam is with us now. you want to be out there, derek? >> you sure do. you know it. i've got new records for you. >> what? >> getting excited. >> a lot of people are talking about, well, was new york city record breaking snowfall or wasn't it? i'll break the silence in a second. let's get to where it was record breaking. >> you need a drum roll? >> exactly. baltimore, you did it. cheers to you. 29.2 inches. that comes in first. dulles airport was at 28.3 inches. that is the second largest snowfall ever behind your february, 2010 snowfall event of

32 inches. drum roll. new york city, did you do it? you fell short by .1 inch. >> so close. >> i'm sorry. probably a lot of upset new yorkers. you've come this far. why can't we just go .1 more and break that record? unfortunately, we didn't set the all-time snow event record. but we did break one record in new york city. that was a single day snow record set back in 2010. congratulations to you if you're in new york city. let's talk about the nation's capital where we focus so much attention on. that is where we put the bull's eye. this is the top three snowstorms ever recorded. it's reagan international airport that is the location where we determine washington, d.c.'s official snow totals. so did we break it? unfortunately, no. 17.8 inches puts you at number

five. but there were some other impressive totals to talk about. over 40 inches of snow in parts of west virginia. maryland and west virginia, what's where we saw the heaviest of snowfall in the higher elevations. this is what it looks like when you get 30, 40 inches of snowfall. where's my car car? can you imagine sifting through that amount of snowfall just to find your vehicle? unbelievable. i do have good and bad news. the storm is pulling away. the heaviest bands of snow exiting no longer present across the major metropolitan areas. new york you're dry. we doe have blizzard conditions can along long island and the coastal areas of connecticut. still very strong winds out there, that means blowing and drifting a concern. one last thing i want to bring up. that shading of green along the coast of new jersey into the nantucket area, that is coastal flood warnings. that's in effect through noon today. we still have the strong storm just off the coast. there's a lot of waves going to

coincide with high tide. there is the potential for moderate coastal erosion in that area. something we're going to keep on monitoring have he very closely. i'm sure we'll have reporters out there, as well. >> thank you. we've got some sports news to report. this is just in. the world's top tennis player novak djokovic has survived a major scare against french man giles simone to reach the quarterfinals of this year's tournament. simone is the 14th seeded player at the aussie open but djokovic was expected to cruise into the finals after winning the tournament for the last four years. a challenging day at the office with simone. fans hope he will run back into roger federer in the semifinals, a rivalry that produced plenty of classic matches over the years. so high drama on the australia open a short time ago just ended. >> you're watching "cnn newsroom." an american student remains in

north kraechb custody. more on his alleged hostile acts coming up. >> plus, a boy abandoned as a baby in china is finally adopted. getting to know his new life and new family in the u.s.

more than 20 days after he was taken, an american college student from cincinnati, ohio is still being held in north korea.

>> he went there despite strong warnings from the u.s. government that americans stay out of that country. cnn's paula hancocks reports from south korea on how he got into the country. >> reporter: another u.s. citizen detained in north korea. this time a student on a tourist visa who pyongyang claims was carrying out a hostile act against the country. state run media says otto frederick warmbier was acting to bring down the regime at the con knife advance of the u.s. government. the utah embassy says it is aware of the of report. young pie year tours says he traveled with them and was detained january 2nd. tour group says his family has been informed and they're working with the state department and north korea's foreign ministry to try and secure his release. this is not the first incident of this type. earlier this month, cnn was

allowed to visit a korean american man who the north says it being held for espionage and a canadian pastor sentenced to life hard labor bore. the north koreans say he was trying to overthrow the government through religious means. half a dozen u.s. citizens have been detained and then released by north korea over the past five years. the u.s. state department strongly recommends against all travel by u.s. citizens to north korea. paula hancocks, cnn, seoul. >> now this story about a chinese boy who thought he would never be adopted. he's now settling into his new life in the united states. ja ja arrived in kansas city, missouri, on friday with his new parents. his new american name is jason wilson. >> before that, ja ja spent most of his nine years at an orphanage in beijing. will ripley has more on what it was like covering his story, his

adoption in this special report. >> we have been working on this story for five months. and it was really hard for you to find a place an orphanage that would allow to us film. >> most of them were saying sorry, sensitive topic in china. finally i reach out to selena's house. >> i was expecting this drab dismal place and then it was lovely in there. hardwood floors. it was bright and kids were playing. but it didn't make up for the fact that all of these kids didn't have parents. there were a lot of kids when we were filming but jiajia stuck out to me. he was the oldest one at the orphanage. he was acting as a big brother for everybody. >> he's smart. he's brave. he helpsaking care of little sisters and brothers. when his parents come to get him, he was telling me i don't want my best buddy to be here. i don't want him to go through what i've been through before. >> i got to know the wilson

family a lot through facebook. and i admire them so much that they as really working class people who don't have a lot of money would be willing t be wil this. >> that's why i wish our piece could get more people like touched and get involved. >> when we did the story and they raised almost $50,000 in about a day, i didn't expect that kind of a reaction. >> i know. i was shocked, as well. >> it was great. i just think about the life that jiajia is going to have now. >> yeah. we're looking at your shirt. >> and also with all his three big sisters in kansas city, i'm sure they're going to have fun while he's there. >> i think he's going to be embraces and loved by everybody in his town. >> exactly. >> i'm so happy that jiajia pound a family but haunted by the fact there are so many other

kids like him out there. there are hundreds of thousands of orphans here in china. these kids need homes. >> cnn's will ripley and serena. jiajia was spina bifida. he was abandoned as a baby. to find out more about his story and the other children abandoned in china read more about it@cnn.com. >> you're watching "cnn newsroom." still ahead, bernie sanders sets his sights on a crucial win in iowa. >> and he has folk music legendses lending their voice to the cause.

it's almost time for some vote taking in the presidential election in the united states. >> it's coming up. >> an influential iowa newspaper gave its endorsements for democratic and republican presidential candidates. hillary clinton and marco rubio got the nod respectively. the des moines register interviewed every major candidate on both sides with the notable exception of both donald trump and ted cruz. >> meanwhile, hillary clinton's main competitor bernie sanders has turned to folk music icons. simon and garfunkel lent their music to the new sanders ad. ♪ they've all come to look for

america ♪ >> yeah, this ad has gotten a lot of attention. art garfunkel spoke with our michael smerconish why he decided to let sanders use the classic song. >> i like that bernie is very upset by the gap between the rich and the poor. i think that's central. the power of money to -- when bernie says hillary gave a speech and got $275,000 for that speech, you got to give a very good speech to earn that money. he's winking as we know the power of whoever backed her. and she's beholden to them. that's how america, would till somebody says not with me. >> does the purpose of the song if you read the liner notes and i remember what liner notes are, does it match the message of that commercial or is it that we just love seeing the faces and love hearing america? >> i think we love hearing america. so much of news is looking at

what happened after the fact. and then making a story. but i think i just acquiesced and let bernie use my song that i'm so proud of. and i don't know if there's a specific thing except we've come to look for the country and we don't really know who we are. we never knew who we were. we'rtill working out what alexander hamilton was working out. how do we fuse and become a united states of america and not southern planters who want state's rights in the very constitution, we're working out the fusion of the nation. we're still doing it. >> well, a win in iowa would be a huge break through for bernie sanders as he looks to beat hillary clinton for the democratic nomination. on the other side, donald trump is the exhibiting even more confidence that he will earn his party's nomination. he told a crowd in iowa about how loyal his supporters are. >> the people, my people are so

smart and you know what else they say about my people? the polls say i have the most loyal people. did you ever see that? where i could stand in the middle of fifth avenue and shoot somebody and i want lose any voters. it's like incredible. no, they say trump, we love you too, man. >> well, there you hear it there. one week before the state of iowa casts ballots in the nation's first caucus, the democratic candidates will go face to face for voters there. chris cuomo moderates the democratic presidential town hall with martin o'malley, hillary clinton, and bernie sanders tuesday at 2:00 a.m. in london, 3:00 a.m. central time, 9:00 p.m. eastern only on cnn. when a familiar face took the stage to endorse donald trump, it was hard not to notice what she was wearing. > it may have been mocked by some but sarah palin's nearly $700 sweater has sold out. here's jeanne moos. >> sarah palin didn't just

appear. she razzle-dazzled. >> no more putty footing around. >> there's definitely no puss footing around that sweater by millie. >> it looked like she kill aid disco porcupine. >> go ahead and laugh but that else is for 695 bucks and sold out everywhere we looked. we call it the endorsement sweater but it hasn't exactly been endorsed. >> what was she thinking. >> by the fashion police. >> there was a little tassels. i could have seen ginger wearing that on gilligan's island before i would see sarah palin wearing it at a campaign rally. >> well, how do i look? >> the "washington post" suggested it was intentionally inappropriate for a political event. did you notice sarah palin's sweater? good. you were supposed to. >> i am here to sparkle and shine. >> but what do you call those shimmery shiny things? descriptions ranged from a spangle laden shrug to listening

stalactites. is that chain maile on sarah palin but a defender wrote it's delightful. she wore the same woven silk sweater a couple of months ago for a network tv interview. >> absolutely. >> palin started shimmering long ago. check out her gown the time she came in third for miss acwhen she was 20. some may say seems sexist to me. we never discuss men's suits but we did pick on marco rubio's high heeled booties. last year sarah wore what seemed to be her daughter bristol's dress to snl he's anniversary joking. > what if i were to run for president. >> i can see the snl folks desperately trying to track down one of these sold out sweaters fortin na fay. >> you betcha. >> jeanne moos, cnn, new york. >> i have a feeling we might see

tina fey in that sweater in a future skit. >> we just might very soon. >> thanks for watching this hour. i'm natalie allen. >> i'm george howell. we will have more news right after the break right here on cnn.

welcome back to our viewers here in the united states and around the world. you are watching cnn's continuing coverage of the winter storm that's affected many, many people. 85 million in the eastern part of the u.s. many cities, washington, d.c., new york and several others and towns along the new jersey coast are getting swamped with a tidal

surge. i'm george howell. >> i'm natalie allen. welcome to our viewers in the u.s. and around the world. here are the latest developments. heavy winds and high snow brought road and air traffic to a stop across a broad swath of the eastern u.s. look at that. >> 11 governors from georgia to new york declared states of emergency and authorities throughout the region urged people to stay inside. thoufs drivers were stranded on roads. in the mid-atlantic airports, they are virtually shut down. >> not just snow and ice. along the jersey shore, high winds forced waves deep inland flooding several towns. >> the u.s. national weather service has issued a warning for the new jersey coast until noon local time, some eight hours from now. meanwhile, residents along the new jersey shore are dealing with high water. cnn's ryan young has more. >> the snow continues to fall

and the gusts of winter getting stronger by the hour. the real story is the flooding. what this town will have to deal with all the water invading the area. we're five blocks away from the water stores. we keep seeing more water coming into this the area. police officers have done a good job blocking off the road to keep people from traveling through the area. the water is rising. this is about knee-deep. if you look back this direction, you can see a trash can and every ten minutes, it's almost getting to the top of that trash can. water entered some of these businesses here. we knew this was a potential threat because of the high tide, the full moon and the pushing of the storm water coming in this direction. it's something that everyone was worried about. what they're hoping in the next few hours, maybe the water will stop. but we know high tide and the

water coming from that area could continue for the next hour or so. we were told during superstorm sandy it was waist deep here. now they're facing it once again. >> ryan young was reporting on the jersey shore. gosh, you see all that water. >> 24 hours ago he was standing in snow that was blowing sideways, now he's in floodwaters. he's earned his keep. so has derek van dam. he would love to be out there. >> it would be. that's where you get excited as meteorologis meteorologists, out in the elements. i do want to touch on this situation on the new jersey coastline. we pulled up a map. everywhere you see that shading of green, that's where there's coastal flood advisories or warnings. that includes nantucket. keep this in mind. coastal flood warning remains in effect through noon today. i just identified a few locations along the new jersey coast. ocean, southeastern burlington

and atlantic. what's happening is the tides and the wave action from the departing storm are going to result in the potential of more beach erosion today. the impact to the numerous roadways being flooded and additional minor to moderate property damage possible across that area. high tide along the new jersey oceanfront occurs between 7:00 and 8:00. again, we still have our departing storm system that really has churned up larger waves. we have a lot of coastal action taking place across this part of the eastern u.s. so we've high lietd these regions. that's the latest weather alerts from the national weather service here in the u.s. by the way, many of the blizzard warnings or the majority, i should say, of the major metropolitans across the u.s. have been lifted. the only exception is along the southern coastline and into long island new york, baltimore, philadelphia. you're in the clear.

this storm system is exiting and quickly. that doesn't mean the threat is over. we'll touch on that in a moment. look at how expansive the storm is. it swiped a good majority of the eastern seaboard. here's the real time radar. the major snow bands exited the region as i have said. only a few flurries or snow showers exist along the i-95 corridor. perhaps a few heftier snow showers along the long island area. we talked about the potential of coastal erosion thanks to the departing storm. but we have very strong winds associated with the backside of this intense low pressure. wind gusts today, this morning specifically, could gust between 40 to 50 miles per hour. ocean city, atlantic city, new york, a little bit less in terms of -- then we start to see improvement later today and especially into the day on

monday. nonetheless, the roadways will be impacted by this. what's significant going forward is the potential of black ice because we've got this freeze/thaw temperature swing that will happen over the next several days. over night lows tonight in washington, d.c., single digits. then we warm up above freezing throughout the day and then freeze overnight. it's more of the same in new york and philadelphia. so the potential for black ice existing with this. people often forget about that particular scenario, natalie and george. they think the storm is over, the threat is done. it's not. black ice is a real concern. it can take you by surprise. it's called black ice because it's invisible to see on the pavement. >> i've hit black ice. it's scary. >> extremely dangerous. >> i do warn our domestic viewers watching and on the east coast who are going to venture on the roadways, please be aware of that going forward. >> thank you, derek.

the sun is set to rise in new york in three hours' time. that's when new yorkers will soon find out if a travel ban will be lifted there. that ban was imposed on saturday and has kept all nonemergency vehicles off the roads, off the bridges and tunnels into manhattan. our jean casarez is there. >> reporter: just what you were saying, i have to reiterate, it is rough to walk around here. we're in times square, but there's so much snow and it's packed up. it's more difficult today to walk around than yesterday. as you're saying that, travel ban, they're looking at lifting it at 7:00 this morning. they're going to reassess but 7:00 a.m. is the target time. right now, there are only emergency vehicles on the road. no one can get in their car and drive anyway. the underground subway system is working at this hour. but the aboveground subway system is set to take place and begin again at 6:00 a.m. this

morning. now, 7:00 a.m., along with lifting the travel ban, they'll be assessing the bridges and tunnels coming into and going out of new york city because they have been shut down. they're also going to assess the metro bus service for that to begin running at 7:00 a.m. 7:00 a.m. is an important time right here. but along with all of that, it looks like new york city has set a record. because the national weather service is saying unofficially that the amount of snow at central park was registered last night a little after midnight at 28.6 inches. that would be the second largest snowfall on record since they've been counting. number one is 2006. now it looks like yesterday was number two, breaking a record from 1869. on a very sad note, at least three people have died in the new york city area from shoveling snow yesterday. back to you.

>> well, you know, just talking about the situation there, new york, it's not really a city that you think of as coming to a point of a standstill. but that is the case. you've got the travel ban and record snowfall on the ground. how are new yorkers feeling about the situation? things just so slow right now. >> reporter: they do. in new york, people just keep going. let me tell you what i've seen this morning. people really can't walk on the sidewalks at some point. i see them, of course, usually virtually nobody here in times square. it's desolate. people are walking in the streets because that is an easier way to walk than on the sidewalk that either hasn't been plowed or they can't get from the sidewalk to cross the street. so they just walk in the street on the side, of course, to be safe. even though there aren't any vehicles around. that's what we're seeing this morning. people doing what they have to do if they have to walk somewhere. >> jean casarez, thanks for

being with us live in new york with a lot of snow behind you. thanks for your time. if you were out driving in the snow and suddenly were stuck in the snow, who would you want to come by and save you? anybody really. check this out. new york's governor got a firsthand look at the trouble with the roads because he happened to help a driver who was stranded. he told cnn it was mayhem out there. >> new yorkers really demand to get their money's worth from almost any service and also from elected officials. so i'm a full service governor. i tow karks i push cars, i shovel snow up to not the recommended limit. there were cars all over the roads which is one. reasons we imposed the travel ban. there was one car we came across that was in a dangerous position. it was on an exit ramp where many cars were trying to get off and it was blocking the exit

ramp and there was just mayhem. it's amazing what can happen so quickly. so we actually got out to help that person move the car and get out of the snowbank. we were successful because it was just a matter of time before that cascaded into a number of accidents. >> full service governor there as he describes it. governor andrew cuomo speaking with cnn earlier. he said he expected 30 inches in new york, that's about 3/4 of a meter by the time the storm is entirely done. >> again, 11 governors declared states of emergency. that's how widespread the storm was. another state that got hit hard was virginia. look at all of that snow. this isn't far from dulles airport. this is oakton, virginia.

more than 70 centimeters of snow piled up. the second largest snowfall on record. nick valencia has been out in the snow off and on for 24 hours. he spoke with us a short time ago from fairfax, virginia. >> reporter: the commonwealth of virginia continues to be pounded by this fatal storm. of course, you can see how treacherous this is. let me give you an example here. walking through this, following nearly ankle deep, knee-deep. the further i go, just about up to my waist here. the storm has lived up to the expectations. the biggest issues on the roads have been disabled vehicles. a little while ago we saw one of those emergency vehicles stuck in the middle of this thoroughfare. this route 50 this connects to interstate 66. the virginia state police saying that really is their main concern, those disabled vehicles, including the emergency vehicles out trying to help residents. the positive news in all of this, people are really listening to government officials and staying inside.

there's, of course, some unfortunate news to report. at least two people died of hypothermia. the cold weather just really brutal and bone-chilling here. another person, individual lost control of his car and ran into a tree causing him to die at the scene. this winter weather set to last well through the weekend. more than 85 million americans up and down the east coast impacted by this with more sticky wet weather and this snow continuing to fall and expected to fall well through sunday. back to you. >> nick valencia, thank you. you are watching "cnn newsroom." still ahead, we continue to follow this deadly winter storm in the united states. at least one state has flooding to deal with. we'll take a look next. also ahead, we turn to the u.s. presidential race. presidential hopefuls duking it out in iowa. two got good news from the state's most powerful newspaper. we're getting reports that norway temporarily suspended the

deportation of refugees to russia. we'll show you how some norwegian as have taken it upon themselves to help migrants. you're watching "cnn newsroom."

welcome back to our continuing breaking news coverage in the united states. more than 74,000 people are without power right now after this deadly winter storm that hit the u.s. east coast. parts of the country are still getting snow, but the bulk of the storm is now headed out to the atlantic ocean. >> in just about three hours, new york will lift its imposed travel ban. but 11 states are still under states of emergency. as for who got hit the hardest, 40 inches or a little over a miter of snow was reported in west virginia. right now, rising waters are a huge concern for people living in coastal new jersey. there were high tides right when the strongest part of the snowstorm hit saturday. that triggered this. flooding in a number of towns along the jersey shore. i spoke a short time ago by phone with vyncent jones, the director of the atlantic county

office of emergency preparedness about this. >> we did have people that were displaced, not only from their homes but individual that is were out in their vehicles trying to traverse and drive through it. they became stranded, they needed rescue. and we were able to do that successfully. right now, we're getting through tonight's high tides and, of course, looking at tomorrow to see what tomorrow is going to bring. we still have flooding in the back bay area. the snow is tapering off, which is a good thing. the winds, we're hoping are going to turn around and come out of the northwest and help to push some of that water out. >> you talk about the tide tomorrow. there could be more flooding tomorrow? >> yes. there's a good chance that we'll see moderate flooding tomorrow. any water that does not drain off the streets or drain from the areas, any tide that comes in or any water that we do get

will add to that. it's not going to be as bad as it was today but we're still not out of the woods with that. >> this is a region that got hit by hurricane sandy three years ago. this is a different situation. but i know that one area there along the shore built up a wall, a standing wall, did that help keep the water out. >> the sand dunes absolutely helped. they are basically the first line of defense. they take the brunt ort initial punch, if you will, from the wave. we had some, anywhere from st. to 14, as much as 20-foot waves from the storm pushing in. those dunes take that initial brunt of waves, they knock the waves down enough that any water that does make its way up over on from the beach on to the street is not as bad as it would without the dunes where the water would just have a clean shot making its way toward the street. they absolutely work. unfortunately, we had some

substantial beach erosion and damage to those dunes and that's one of the things that's going into the winter, we are prone up here to get these nor'easters, so we'll have to build that dune back up. >> talking with me earlier from the emergency management services. the 2016 race for the white house could be getting a major shakeup. the former mayor of new york city may have his eye on the oval office. new york times says that michael bloomberg wobbling to spend $1 billion, that is billion with a b of his money on an independent campaign. >> a source close to the media mogul has previously told cnn bloomberg would consider entering the race if it appeared donald trump or ted cruz, frontrunners right now, would face bernie sanders in the general election. so interesting development

there. a major iowa newspaper gave endorsement for democratic and republican presidential candidates. hillary clinton and marco rubio got the nod roo respectively. we explain the impact of the des moines register's pick. >> hillary clinton and marco rubio are the choice of the establishment. but this is a nonestablishment election cycle. that's why these endorsements have to be viewed in that lens. if you look at both of the endorsements, hillary clinton is exactly the argument she's making. she's the establishment candidate, she's the experienced candidate. she knows exactly how to do the job. marco rubio is the future face of this republican party. he sort of represents a different brand of republican. the question is, are voters going to be in the mood for these type of establishment picks on both sides? without question, everyone usually wants an endorsement, but they have limited value. in this cycle, i think they have

less value than in previous cycles. >> the des moines register interviewed every major candidate on both sides with the notable exception of both the frontrunners for the republicans, donald trump and ted cruz. the state of iowa places -- the democratic candidates go face to face with voters there. chris cuomo moderates the democratic presidential town hall with martin o'malley, hillary clinton and bernie sanders. you can find it tuesday at 2:00 a.m. london. 9:00 p.m. eastern only on cnn. donald trump is more confident, if that's possible, more confidence in his chances of earning his party's nomination. he told a crowd in iowa about his loyal supporters. >> the people, my people are so smart and you know what else they say about my people. the polls. they say i have the most loyal people. did you ever see that?

i could stand in the middle of fifth avenue and shoot somebody and i wouldn't lose any voters. it's incredible. they say trump, we love you too, man. >> "saturday night live" has had no shortage of material throughout the presidential race and they did their own take on sarah palin's now infamous donald trump endorsement. >> of course, tina fey got the call to reprise her role as the former alaskan governor. take a look. >> i'm here because we americans are struggling. so many of us have lost our jobs at the factory or reality shows about alaska and we've seen our own children targeted by the police for no reason other than they committed some crime. we turn on the news every morning and are shocked to see we're not even on it because we've been replaced by immigrants like geraldo rivera. >> she's fun.

she just says whatever she wants. it's like her mouth starts driving before her brain gets in the car. >> all right. well, she did already have the sweater on. we can't wait for the next parody of donald trump and his shoot somebody popularity he talked about. >> i'm sure that will be coming. >> take that one on. >> you're watching "cnn newsroom." we'll have much more on the winter storm that slammed the eastern u.s. from washington to philadelphia and the streets of new york. we have reports from across the region. and french jews are leading the largest jewish migration from western europe to israel in over half a century. you'll hear from a french jew who migrated after he lost his friend in the paris terror attack.

welcome back to our viewers here in the u.s. and around the world. you're watching cnn's continuing coverage of the winter storm impacting tens of millions in the eastern u.s. i'm natalie allen. >> i'm george howell. here's an update on the developments we're following as the storm makes its way out to the atlantic. it has claimed the lives of at least 14 people on the east coast. most of those were in traffic accidents. but some people were out who suffered heart attacks while shoveling the snow on the ground there. three of the deaths happened in new york city. 26 -- look at that video there. so pretty. 26.6 inches of snow fell in 24 hours in manhattan's famed central park. that's 66 centimeters. it is a record for a single day

of snowfall in new york city. >> it's not just the snow and ice causing problems. strong winds, they are pushing water from the atlantic ocean into the coastal parts of new jersey causing heavy flooding. the u.s. national weather service has issued a flood warning for new jersey for the coast there until noon local time. that's another 7.5 hours from now. officials in new jersey say the level of the floodwaters caught them by surprise, but they've been working hard to evacuate people and to protect people's homes. earlier, the mayor of one of the flooded towns spoke to cnn by phone. take a listen. >> this morning's high tide was really bad. it came in much higher than we had anticipated or had been forecast. actually to levels that exceeded what we saw during hurricane sandy. we have a lot of evacuations, a lot of people who stayed in their homes not anticipating this needed to be rescued. we've rescued well over 100

people from flooded homes throughout the day. we've also been without electricity in most of the city since 6:00 a.m. this morning. with the cold temperatures and the flooding, that is also leading to more evacuations. >> that was patrick rose nell owe, the mayor of north wildwood, new jersey. let's get an update on the status of the storm. it's moved off into the atlantic. again, still snowing in some places. >> still snowing in some places, but the majority of the heavy snow bands are moving on. we continue to focus on the strong gusty winds that will bring blowing and drifting of that snow. but also the potential for coastal flooding, as you heard a moment ago. there are still coastal flooding along the new jersey coast and nantucket, parts of delaware. be aware of that. moderate property damage possible today. we've got a combination of the tides and the wave action from the departing low pressure system that's going to potentially result in minor to

moderate beach erosion across those areas. we're going to monitor that closely keep in mind. in new jersey, the counties of ocean, southeastern burlington and atlantic counties, that's the areas that we've highlighted here. if you're located within those regions, take care. there is the potential for obviously the coastal erosion and certainly do not pass any of those flooded roadways. let's talk records now, right? that really exciting stuff, at least for me. take a look at this. we have a couple of impressive snowfall totals behind me. i think the numbers speak for themselves. jfk airport, over 30 inches of snow. new york central park, 26.8 inches. remember, that is storm total. now, this is a 48-hour event at least. it was not the number one storm total that new york city has ever experienced. that actually happened a few years back when they set a record of 26.9 inches.

so we are .1 of an inch from setting an all-time snow record for a snow event. we did break the 24-hour event in central park. congratulations to you there. in washington, d.c., that was our bull's-eye. this is the top three snowfall event in the nation's capitol. did we break it? reagan national airport is our official locator for snowfall totals for d.c. 17.8 inches. that puts it at number 5. still impressive. some areas in west virginia reported over 40 inches of snow. what does that look like? that's a pretty good indication of what 40 inches-plus looks like. dude, where's my car? can you imagine having to search for your vehicle in that amount of snow? impressive stuff. never seen it. would love to see it. that's the latest radar. you can see that the snow bands are moving away from the major metropolitan areas. you're in the clear, washington.

philadelphia, baltimore, most of new york city except for the extreme northeastern sections of long island and into nantucket. that's where the snow remains. now it's the blowing and drifting of that snow that is the next concern. still wind gusts this morning through the rest of your sunday. anywhere between 30 to locally 50 miles per hour. that will create drifting on the roadways. still, obviously, dangerous road conditions out there. the other concern to consider is that we have this melting of the snow pack. we've got a die earn al temperature variation. take washington, for example, 31 degrees. just about freezing. we'll drop into the single digits overnight. then we warm up above freezing. so things melt and we drop below freezing once again. it will freeze quickly on the roadways, we'll get a thin layer of icing on the roads and a lot of times people can't see that as they travel and that's where the accidents occur.

>> that is incredibly dangerous. >> it is. >> the black ice. >> thanks. cnn has had reporters in many states covering this storm along the eastern seaboard. chris welch is near where the center of the storm hit, washington, d.c. sara ganim in philadelphia. >> first let's start with brian who traveled to new york. >> new york, the city that never sleeps. but it came close to snoozing these past few hours. we're heading toward lower manhattan. you can see we're the only ones out here. the sanitation vehicles have been able to get ahead of the storm thanks to the travel ban put into effect on saturday afternoon. that's why we're seeing blacktop out here, already able to see that the roads are clearing up as the snowfall starts to calm down. this storm was much, much bigger than anticipated for new york city. a couple days ago, the forecast was for 4 or 8 inches, maybe a foot.

we ended up with more than 2 feet of snow here. it's interesting because normally people complain when the weatherman overestimates, overstates, exaggerates how bad it's going to be. in this case, the storm in washington would bear the brunt and new york let off comparatively easily. it turns out in that d.c./new york rivalry, new york was dealt the tougher blow and ended up with more snow up here than in many areas around washington. one of the notable parts about the storm is how widespread it is. we're talking about hundreds of miles digging out as this day gets started here on sunday as people recover from the storm and head out and maybe enjoy the fresh snow. going sledding, of course, taking their pets out and things like that. as we drive around here, we can tell you we see almost no one out here. only a few pedestrians and a few emergency vehicles. this travel ban may be surprisingly effective, surprisingly well-accepted by

new yorkers and it's had the benefit of being able to clear these roads as a result. back to you. >> brian stelter for us in new york telling us that new york really got most of the snow in that rivalry. but washington, d.c. had plenty of snow as well, more than its share. our chris welch was out on the streets for most of the storm and sent us this report a short time ago. >> reporter: here in d.c., this is the first time we haven't seen snow falling since 1:00 friday afternoon. you can finally see the u.s. capitol glowing behind us. there's that dome. we haven't been able to see that for most of today. take a look at my feet. this is what has been falling from the sky for the last 36 hours or so. this is about 22 inches here in the d.c. metro area. wet, heavy snow. that's what we got here. dulles international airport got about 28 inches of snow. they were thinking for a while that d.c. might break a record

here. it doesn't look like that happened. that record was set back in 1922. that was 28 inches for here in the d.c. metro area. that record has not been broken. but what's next? well, tomorrow temperatures will pick up a little bit. it will be above freezing, which will give some of the snow a chance to melt just a little bit. it might help the crews as they get out to try and clear the roads and dig out. but the other thing they'll be competing with is a lot of people who will be out on the roads tomorrow. a lot of people who have been cooped up in their homes, their hotel rooms who want to get out and enjoy some of this. that's the big question. will the city be clean enough? will the roads be cleaned up enough by tomorrow night to get things fully back to normal by monday? that's going to be the big question. for now, the highlight here, the snow appears to have stopped. there might be an inch, tops, that comes overnight. but by and large, this storm appears to have move past d.c. natalie, george?

>> thank you, chris. monday morning could be interesting in new york, d.c. and philadelphia, where they're trying to get things back to normal. there are still stranded drivers, there have been at least to rescue and lights to get back on there. sara ganim is there for us. >> reporter: the snow has finally let up in philadelphia. crews worked into the night to try to rescue more than 500 drivers and passengers of vehicles that were stranded on a five-mile stretch of the pennsylvania turnpike near breezewood which is an interchange between washington, d.c. and pittsburgh, pennsylvania. cars stuck on the roadway when tractor-trailers could no longer navigate the roads because of the snow. more than 24 hours in some cases. the national guard being brought in to try to help rescue them. a couple of bus loads of parishioners from a catholic church from omaha, nebraska,

tried to make light of this by holding mass out in the snow, working to pass the time. we're told that many of the stranded passengers participated in that mass while they waited for shelter, waited to be rescued. in the meantime here in philadelphia, this was a record-breaking 24 hours. the office of emergency management reporting nearly 30 inches of snow, far beyond the previous record for that amount of time. only good news here, no major incidents, no major power outages. but i do want to show you what this snow looked like that fell here. this is telling to us because this is such wet, heavy snow, the kind of snow that really takes a lot of effort to shovel. quite the workout here. the blizzard effect will remain in philadelphia until 7:00 a.m. this morning as officials are asking people please to stay inside, not to hit the roads as you do see some people doing

here because they're rile working overnight to try and clean up and get everything back to normal and they're asking people to stay inside and stay safe while they do that. back to you. >> sara ganim, thank you so much for that report. you're watching "cnn newsroom." still ahead, french jews are migrating to israel in record numbers. >> we'll tell you why they're going to israel and we'll show you how they're combining their old and new cultures in israel. need to hire fast? go to ziprecruiter.com and post your job

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just continue to bring you along most of the u.s. eastern seaboard, some 85 million people are dealing with the aftermath of what's truly been a historic and dangerous winter storm and has claimed at least 14 lives. most of those deaths in traffic

accidents. and from -- some people having heart attacks while shoveling snow. 11 governors have declared states of emergency. airports throughout the mid-atlantic states are shut down. almost 8,000 flights have been canceled through sunday. >> a big concern in coastal new jersey, high tide combined with the storm surge caused this. flooding several towns. >> of course, we'll continue to follow the big storm that hit the east coast as people start digging out here in the day ahead, in the many days ahead. we go now to norway where the government there has temporarily suspended the deportation of asylum seekers back to russia after protests. russia's state news agency reports the decision followed a request from russian officials. >> thousands of migrants arrived in norway by taking the arctic route that you see here. norway is part of the european free movement agreement. >> the u.n. high commissioner for refugees says russia is not

a safe country for migrants. as our atika shubert reports, some took it upon themselves to help refugees who feared deportation. >> refugees in norway's arctic town here are fighting against deportation to russia. they're getting some help from a local and a volunteer with the group refugees welcome to the arctic. >> translator: i did not think to myself at the time that what you're doing now is criminal. my only thought, she says, was to get this poor family to safety. >> on thursday, she helped a syrian family seek asylum in a church. the family was due to be deported to russia imminently. when she returned to get another family, police stopped the car. she took these photos of the encounter. she was briefly arrested on alleged migration and the family was returned to the center. >> the mother was crying, no

russia, no russia she said. they cried, i cried. the family cried. it was heartbreaking she says. hundreds of refugees have taken the so-called arctic route through russia and into norway. but this week norway's government began to deport any refugee with a valid russian visa. in kerr ken is, local residents came to support them and demanding to stay in norway. eight groups have warned that refugees could be left stranded without shelter in russia. with temperatures reaching minus 34 degrees prompting locals like her to take action. she isn't deterred by the police stop. one local reporter asked, was it worth it? she answers yes, absolutely. even the arctic circle, it seems, is feeling the effects of the refugee crisis. atika shubert, cnn. terror attacks in paris and arrived in anti-semitic violence have led to the largest

migration of jews from europe to israel in more than half a century. our oren liebermann reports from a town that many french jews now call home. >> the ages are as varied as the backgrounds in this class. students in their 20s or 40s from france or russia all learning the same language, hebrew. they are new immigrants to israel, part of the largest wave of jewish immigration from western europe to israel since 1948. french jews are leading that wave. after the attack in paris where four jews were killed days after the "charlie hebdo" attack, many say they felt increasingly unsafe. this man's friend was killed in that attack. >> i was not good. really not good. i talked to my mom. i said i must go to israel. >> this is where you will continue your life?

>> yeah. >> this is home for you? >> yeah. >> many like him have made their home in a city in southern israel. you're as likely to hear french on the streets as hebrew here. this town looks an awful lot across the street is cafe leon. a popular meeting spot for the french community in the city. sitting here at this french cafe, it's stunning. all the conversations around me are in french. the entire menu is in french and on the window outside, it says, in french, "the enjoyment of life." that's what french jews are looking for, a place to combine their old home with their new one. we've tried to reserve our culture here he says. it's important to hold on to them when i've lived in a different country for 30 or 40 years. we bring our old culture and try to combine it with the new one. reminders why they left continue today. a jewish teacher was attacked in

marseilles in an isis inspired attack. a chief rabbi told them not to where religious skull caps on the french streets. according to the e.u., the vast majority of french jews avoid openly identifying as jewish, at least some of am of time. doug cohen left. there's a feeling of security that no longer exists in france he says. 20 years ago maybe there was. since the year 2000, it's gone. the idea of israel has always been that jews anywhere have a home here. what of the place the newcomers left behind? one french leader expressed the fear that france bo no longer be france without a group of its native sons. oren liebermann, cnn. you're watching "cnn newsroom." it's fair to she, we've shown you the good, the bad and the ugly of the storm on the east coast. >> in a moment, we may have another category for you. that would be the most adorable

scene from the big storm. stay with us. "ow..."

"are you okay?" "yeah, i just got charged for my credit monitoring. that's how i know it"s working." "ah. you know you can go on creditkarma.com and check it out there. it's completely free." "really?" "yeah" "oh, that didn't hurt at all." "yeah, completely painless." "credit karma. give yourself some credit." live picture there of the white house on this very snowy

and cold evening. blizzard dumping more than 70 centimeters of snow throughout the u.s. capitol. >> let's take a look at this time lapse of the white house. capitol hill from clear skies and to a sea of white. ♪ ♪

pretty cool. all the snow came down, we can tell you that one resident in washington totally got into it. >> check this out. the giant panda at the smithsonian national zoo. zookeepers reported the panda rolling around having a pretty good time as you can see in the freshly fallen snow. they posted the video online with this tweet. he wakd up with the snow and excited about it. #blizzard 2016. >> thanks for joining us for cnn's continuing coverage of the winter storm impacting more than 85 million people and at least one panda in the u.s. i'm natalie allen.

>> i'm george howell. >> you're watching cnn worldwide.

this is cnn breaking news. well, it is time to dig out. millions of you this morning are looking at the aftermath of this historic blizzard that paralyzed motorists nearly 24 hours in some places and tens of thousands without power. new yorkers ready to ride the city lifting its travel ban just hours from now, we believe, as 2 feet of snow blankets that city. plus a sea of red. thousands of flights across the country, i'm sorry to tell you, still canceled as millions of

travels wonder. you're thinking when am i going to get back in the air and get to my destination? new day starts right now. we're always grateful to start that with you. i'm christi paul. martin savidge in new york city. much better conditions than yesterday. the snow stopped obviously. a lot of questions for all of us this morning about the airports, the power outages, the coastal flooding. we're getting incredible video to share with you. we're looking at all of that this morning. martin, let's get to you and talk to me about what's happening in new york city. i know jean casarez is with you as well. >> reporter: good morning, christi. what a difference a 24-hour period in new york city. the good news, it is long gone from here. there are still concerns about coastal flooding and we will be coming up on another high tide in a few hours from now. you talked about that travel ban. but let's face it, in new york, they are breathing a sigh of relief after a storm that may go

down as just one of the most impactful ever, so close to being the deepest though that the city has ever seen. if yesterday was the big snow, today is the big dig. from above the monster storm looks peaceful, almost serene. on the ground, it caused death, misery and destruction. from fatal accidents, huge snowplows, flooding and the complete shutdown of major cities. the blizzard of 2016 is one for the record books. >> this is a huge challenge for pennsylvania. we're deploying all of our resources to try to make sure that the people of pennsylvania are safe. >> reporter: as the weather begins to subside and people dig out from tons of snow, it could be days before life gets back to normal. >> stay patient and to quote a line from one of my favorite musicals, we're all in this together. so just stay patient.

>> i've never seen anything like that. in minutes a rush of water came into the harbor and essentially flooded our crew. >> reporter: in new jersey, they're assessing damage that sent seawater and ice blocks on to town streets. >> i came home early from work yesterday, cleaned up the bottom half of my house and brought everything up. >> it's hard. >> we learned from sandy. >> reporter: in kentucky and pennsylvania, stories of epic traffic jams, some motorists stranded for almost 24 hours. >> i have never been stuck on a highway this long before. we've been here for about 15 hours. >> stuff like this is going to be hard to get out of here anyway. i feel we're going to be here for a long time. >> reporter: 85 million people impacted by the storm. more than a dozen deaths, hundreds of traffic accidents, thousands of power outages and flight cancellations. it is a storm that won't soon be forgotten. >> wet, sloppy conditions. just trying to make the best of it and clean everything up as

much as we can. >> reporter: even though the snow has stopped, the danger and the disruption has not, there is still a long way to go. transportation is still very much a problem in the big apple. new york and elsewhere and beyond. let's go now to jean casarez in times square. jean, they will eventually be lifting the travel ban, right? >> reporter: good morning. yes, at 7:00 is the target time. they're going to assess it. but they believe 7:00 a.m. is when they'll lift the travel ban because right now you cannot drive on the streets in new york city and the outlying boroughs. as you can see, it's desolate here. we've seen some snowplows go by, police cars and emergency vehicles. but no one else. 7:00 a.m. is what they're looking at. currently, underground subways are running. subways exposed to the elements, 6:00 a.m. is the target time for that. they're going to assess the railroads at 6:00 a.m.

and then 7:00 a.m., limited bus service begins and they'll be assessing other modes of transportation, including bridges, tunnels because you can't get in or out of new york city at this point. that's the target time. but we do want to say that unofficially the national weather service is reported a total of 26.8 inches of snow yesterday recorded, actually at 1:00 a.m. this morning out of central park. that would be a record breaker. that would put new york city at number 2 of yesterday's snowfall in the record books, breaking that record from 1869. national weather service is saying that it's unofficial at this point. but obviously, there's a lot of snow. you know, it's harder to walk around today. it's slicker. it's not as soft as it was yesterday. people really need to be aware and careful when walking around anywhere on the eastern seaboard for that black ice and that snow that has become impacted and

it's really slippery at this point, marty. >> reporter: from that soft and fluffy stuff and it's difficult to move and walk around. as far as operations in the city itself, you mentioned already the travel ban being lifted. stores, are they planning to reopen, people going to work? i can't imagine it's going to be any kind of normal day. >> reporter: that's a great point. we've seen some signs on some stores. so we've looked over to see what the signs actually say. they're saying, closed for the storm. sorry. so i'm sure this happened yesterday because they needed to get employees out to the outlying areas where people live before that travel ban took effect. i'm also noting that people are walking down the street. they're not walking on the sidewalks. here's a snowplow right here. this is what they're continuing to do to get the roadways clear so when that travel ban is lifted, that you can actually have vehicles. but people are walking down the street because there's such high

embankments between the sidewalk and the street, people can't get over it, can't cross the streets. if you walk down the street, you have a better thoroughfare to get around a little bit. here's some people, here's an example. see? they're walking down the street. they're not walking on the sidewalk. maybe that's one safe way to go until that travel ban is lifted and you have vehicles on the roadways, marty. >> reporter: it is bizarre, jean, to be able to walk down any street in new york city and not be afraid of getting hit by a bus or a car. it's just quiet. you don't hear any sirens or horns honking. it's a peculiar thing, very still. thank you very much, jean casarez there in times square. >> reporter: thanks, marty. >> >> reporter: we want to check in with gordon sanchez, he's in new jersey. boris, i understand when it comes to the potential for flooding, there is still that threat this morning. >> reporter: yes, marty.

the threat is still there. it's a moderate threat. i have to tell you there is a stark difference between what we saw when talking to you at this time early yesterday morning and what we're seeing now. i want to show you the bay behind me. yesterday this water was threatening to come over the edge. it was only a few inches away from creeping over. at high tide it peaked and said almost a foot of water, potentially a foot of water creeping into this neighborhood behind us, shooting into the street. when we were live with you, we had to pick up our stuff and start running down the street because the water had simply taken over this entire area. you can see residences and businesses here. we checked inside. the damage doesn't appear to be very extensive. there is a lot of debris in the streets. but as you can tell, it's mostly cleared up. the danger here, though, lurks again at high tide. once we get closer to 8:00 a.m., this water is threatening to come up. what i can tell you is that

today there isn't as much wind and no precipitation here. so the threat is not as severe as it was. it appears that things have mostly calmed down and at noon several flood watches expire. so hopefully the cleanup will be under way, marty. >> reporter: they can't wait for that. i wonder, was there any kind of evacuation. did people leave voluntarily or a mandatory evacuation at any point? >> reporter: there were mandatory evacuations, minor ones north of us in barnegat. there were voluntary evacuations in place here. frankly, there weren't very much many people here because this is a summertime community, beach community. in the winter, there's not as much population here. but several people that i had spoken to tried to stay inside their homes. obviously considering they didn't want to be part of all the debris and all the flooding and the mess that was out here

yesterday morning. >> reporter: i can't blame them on that. boris sanchez, thanks very much. we have a contingent of snowplows that are behind us here at columbus circle. that work continues. they have to make the most they can before the travel ban is lifted. there's a rumor of sunshine. still look forward to that. christi? >> i'm sure that you will. i hope that we see that in a couple of hours. our coverage of the blizzard aftermath is continuing this morning throughout the morning. we have more live reports for you straight ahead from several different cities. also a lot of political news to talk about. including what donald trump said about shooting people that's raising eyebrows. also, speaking of politics guess who was featured again on snl last night. hint for you. tina fey played the part. ♪ but i can't come home right now... ♪

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time i've been outside since friday afternoon that it hasn't been snowing. you get a little better look of what it usually looks like here. you can see the capitol real bright and shiny behind me. that's usually the view we get from here. yesterday the wind and snow was so bad, you could hardly see it. take a look. we've shoveled out our live position here. about a foot and a half of snow if you take a look here. that's about what d.c.s, reagan national airport reported at 7 clyne 5 inches. we're a little below that 24 inches called for. we did see bigger snow totals elsewhere in the city. at the national zoo, they had about 22 inches. i don't know if you saw that cute video of the panda bear y playing in the snow. we did get some areas. baltimore international airport between washington and baltimore, hit a record of about 30 inches. so that was about 18 inches more

than the record when they set it back in 1935. we do have some records much our own here. the streets, however, still pretty dicey. they've been working around the chock to get them cleared out. the emergency routes are still pretty clear. but in places like maryland, i-270, that's a spur off the capitol beltway into northwestern maryland, that's still closed until 7:00 a.m. don't try to get out there. those roads are still closed and today is the day everybody is going to start to dig out. officials warned everybody, hey, please stay inside yesterday. we'll have time for the skiing and sledding today. looks like it will be good weather. it's clear. the snow is still here. we'll get about freezing. that's part of what you have to watch here. as things start to melt and we get a refreeze later tonight, that black ice is going to be very, very dangerous. i can tell you, martin, one of

the things we worried about here was this high wind. 40 mile per hour winds. we didn't see those materialize for sustained periods. we had some gusts. but that largely kept the trees up, kept the power lines up. i can report to you that we only have about 30 people out of power right now in maryland and the district of columbia. in virginia, about 500 people without power. that's up 2.35 million. the lights are on, the heat is on. while we didn't hit the record back here, back in 1922. 28 inches. we didn't hit that. i think people are, as usual, this new york/d.c. rivalry, we're going to stand by our snow here, martin. you guys might have gotten a little bit more up there, but i can tell you, it's still plenty of snow to go around up and down the east coast, martin. >> reporter: without a doubt. plenty of snow for everyone.

no one should be grumbling about how they got shorted in any way. it's wonderful to see the capitol again behind your shoulders. thank you so much, chris frates. we want to check in with allison chin char. so many record books have been shaken. allison? >> that's right. several records have been broken. but even in spots where you came close but didn't break them, the numbers are incredibly impressive. take a look at the numbers. shepherds town, west virginia, over 40 inches of snow. cascade, maryland 37.5. round hill, virginia, around 36. parts of pennsylvania, picking up about 32. the airports, this is a reason why we had so many cancellations and delays for a good reason. jfk reports picking up 30.5 inches. the laguardia not far behind. about 28 inches.

philadelphia picked up around 20 and reagan national picking up around 18 inches. now, in terms of the records, we take a look at new york because here's a look. this top one with february of 2006. when we had 26.9, this storm ranks number 2. but i want to emphasize, we're talking about a bitter fraction of a difference. 26.9 versus 26.8. we're talking .1 of an inch was actual difference between that storm. for all intents and purposes, they were pretty much the same. here's a look at the watches and warnings across much of the country. blowing snow. it's not necessarily new snow coming down but now the threat is the wind and what it's doing with the snow already on the ground. we've got the radar. again, notice for the most part, we've got a couple snow showers left up around the cape, around nantucket. for the most part, everything is finally starting to make its way off. that's good news. we'll start to clear out. as martin said earlier, that

allows the folks to get out and shovel out from their homes later on today. wind are still expected to be relatively high today. 25 to 35 miles per hour in atlantic city. 35 to 40 in ocean city. that may cause more delays for some of the airports, especially if the winds get up. we'll have more details on that in a few minutes. martin? >> allison, thank you very much for that. we want to talk about the national guard. they were called out in a number of states and they continue to play a major role in the recovery effort now. major earl brown is with the national guard and a spokesperson for them. major, are you there? >> good morning, martin, how are you. >> reporter: i'm doing well. thank you very much. how is the guard doing and what are they doing and where? >> i work for the national guard bureau in washington, d.c. we have 12 states that have been working around the clock with over 2400 soldiers and airmen out there on the streets helping first responders, helping

stranded motorists get to the locations they need to. it's something that they look forward to, and they enjoy getting out there and getting after it, helping our local citizens. >> reporter: what is the kind of specialized equipment or training that they bring that supplements local law enforcement and emergency responders? >> well, you know, we have a unique capability of having a dual purpose role, both far our overseas mission but here domestically, we have high clearance vehicles, such as the humvees. they can get to other areas where it's not as easily accessible. you know, just for example, yesterday we had a large wrecker that was able to pull out a fire truck here in the d.c. area. so they're helping stranded motorists along the turnpikes

and getting out there, getting first responders, state troopers to their locations where they need to be so they can provide safety and security for our citizens. >> reporter: how long do you think they'll be on the job? now the snow has stopped. the job isn't over, i presume. >> you know, we transition right now. probably more or less it will be a big transition period from a response mode, helping out stranded motorists and making sure people are taken care of to more of a recovery where we're going to have more engineer assets out there helping out, taking down -- taking care of clearing trees and clearing paths so that responders, first responders and commerce can get up and going. i think most importantly, citizens need to listen to local authorities and give the resources the ability to clear

the streets and get things going again. >> reporter: major earl brown, we appreciate it. we certainly appreciate the national guard. they do so many things for us and often that doesn't necessarily get mentioned. they were truly a great help. >> thank you very much. >> reporter: thank you for joining us. christi, let me send it back to you. >> all righty, as we look at that 26.8 inches of snow, of course, behind you that -- that's what obviously we were talking about in new york. thank you so much, martin. we appreciate it. we'll continue to cover this winter storm. today is the day when we finally get to see the aftermath and what needs to be done from this point on to get you back on your airplanes and back on the road where you need to go. we'll follow that. also, a big morning in politics. former mayor michael bloomberg now considering running for president. was engineered...

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26 minutes past the hour right now. continuing to follow the blizzard on the east coast. there is breaking political news this morning that's really intriguing with just one week until the nation's first caucuses in iowa. the des moines register has given its coveted presidential endorsement to republican senator marco rubio and democrat hillary clinton. notably, the paper interviewed every major candidate for 2016 with the exception of republican frontrunners donald trump and ted cruz. apparently both declined those interviews. the former mayor of new york, michael bloomberg, is seriously considering a possible presidential run. sources tell cnn he would run as an independent candidate. he's looking at making a

decision sometime in march. "the new york times" reports bloomberg would be willing to spend a billion dollars on that bid. republican presidential front-runner donald trump, he said that support for his campaign would stay the same even if he shot somebody in the middle of a crowded street. listen to this. >> my people are so smart. you know what else they say about my people, the polls, they say i have the most loyal people. where i could stand in the middle of 5th avenue and shoot somebody and i wouldn't lose any voters. it's like incredible. >> later we asked trump to clarify his comment. but he declined to do so. i'm here because we americans are struggling. so many of us have lost our jobs at the factory or reality shows about alaska. we've seen our own children

targeted by the police for no reason other than they committed some crime. we turn on the news every morning and are shocked to see we're not even on it because we've been replaced by immigrants like geraldo rivera. >> she's fun. she just says whatever she wants. it's like her mouth starts driving before her brain gets in the car. >> okay. who didn't see it coming, right? yes, she's back. tina fey returning again to "saturday night live" last night as sarah palin poking fun at the former alaska government's endorsement of donald trump last week and decked out in that same sparkling sweater that's been setting social media on fire as well. i want to give you a programming note. in the 7:00 a.m. eastern hour, we'll be joined by republican presidential candidate rand paul. we'll talk to the kentucky senator about that mishap yesterday. the weather, the blizzard and how all those cars could get stuck in a 35-mile stretch of

highway in kentucky. also, talking about the latest polls in new hampshire that have him in an uptick a bit and get his reaction to some of this political news this morning. bernie sanders, hillary clinton and martin o'malley all facing voters in a presidential town hall. chris cuomo is moderating it. it is the final pitch, per se, for all the candidates before the first votes are cast. a unique opportunity really for iowans to ask questions of the three democrats. that's on monday night at 9:00 p.m. eastern live only here on cnn. listen, we are just about an hour away from what should be that travel ban in new york city. disintegrating. hopefully going to lift that thing in about an hour and a half, as i said. but there are some assessments that have to be made before that. we'll take you back to new york live with martin savidge.

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you experience tv. take a look at the highways in tennessee. nashville was hit by 8 inches of powder. enough to snarl traffic to cause people to abandon their cars, as you see there. which a lot of people say please don't do, because that can cause more traffic hazards. they're warning drivers to stay vigilant because the roads may refreeze today as well. you do want to be very careful regarding where you're driving. in washington, too, cars were going anywhere but forward essentially. capitol paralyzed by 2 feet of

snow taking a direct hit by the storm. kids, though, this is when you get your inner kid going again. the white stuff was perfect for snowball fights and playing outside. the heavy jackets. look at the little baby even ventured out. that's one brave mom. let's go back to martin savidge in new york city. we've seen a lot of people out, not yet this morning obviously, but the weather did not keep them home yesterday, martin. >> reporter: in fact, there was a point where the governor were sort of saying, we can't continue having everybody out on the streets. you need to go home because we need to get work done. we can't do it if everybody is in traffic or everybody is on the sidewalk. so they rectified that problem. there is still another problem. that is the storm is a thousand miles off of the east coast. it's long gone. but it's still having potential impact. primarily in the area of the possibility of coastal flooding. as we get closer and closer to around the 7:00, 8:00 hour eastern time, that's when high

tide comes back. there are renewed concerns in those areas. boris sanchez is keeping an eye on things for us. bore iz, a quick update if you would. >> reporter: martin, as you said, we're basically waiting for high tide. in the past 20 minutes, since we last spoke to you, the wind has picked up considerably. i'm going to show you the bay again. the water once again creeping up several inches, getting closer and closer to this barrier. by 8:00, we'll find out if we'll see more flooding today. we're not expecting it to be as bad as it was yesterday when water came rushing over this edge and into this neighborhood. we spoke to a gentleman who works at a bar over here to the right, maynard's. he said he got 3 inches inside of the bar. he was cleaning it out. it appears the damage was not extensive and he'll be able to get back in business pretty soon. the water that rushed through this neighborhood is now gone, ultimately and it's pushed away a lot of the ice and snow. as you can see, this area doesn't have nearly as much snow

as some of the other parts of this neighborhood where the water didn't get to. but, again, as you said, martin, near 8:00 a.m. when high tide hits again, we'll keep a close eye on this bay to see if the water goes up. fortunately, the winds are shifting today. so the national weather service tells us that right around noon we should expect some of these flood watches in these neighborhoods to expire and hopefully we'll get to the end of this mess, martin. >> reporter: hopefully we will. boris, thanks so much. we'll stay in touch. want to talk to jeffrey lee of the march gagate police departm where boris is. sir, how are things looking this morning and what is the potential for any kind of reflooding? >> the streets right now, they're still very icy. the areas that did flood, flooding left large debris and large chunks of ice in the road, and it carried away some trash cans and debris and left it in the roadway.

areas that did flood are still hazardous to the public. >> reporter: how bad was flooding? you know. you live there. was it really severe or was this typical for this kind of severe weather? >> the flooding was severe in certain areas. the water could be up to your knees or up to your thighs depending on what area of town that you were in. >> reporter: was it businesses that were primarily impacted, homes or both? >> it was both. both residential and businesses. there's lots of homes and businesses that are along the bay area. >> reporter: and were there mandatory evacuations? how did you handle that? >> no. there was no mandatory evacuations. but the residents that do live in town that know the areas of town that flood did stay away from the area. there was a lot of people that had heeded our warnings and they were not out and about during the flood. >> reporter: how about

safetywise, everybody is okay and is the power still on and heat still flowing? >> yes. everybody is safe. the power is still on. we only had one incident during the day shift yesterday that a resident had to be removed from the residence because water was entering her home. >> reporter: what's your outlook, say, for about another hour or two hours from now when we go to high tide? >> we have officers on stand by. we have equipment that is capable of handling the high water and we're ready to respond to anything that comes up. >> reporter: that's the best you could ask for. we hope that it doesn't come up. but we will stay in touch with you as well. jeffrey lee of the margate police department there. we wish you the very best as the hours of high tide approach. in the meantime, let's go back to christi. >> all righty. hey, martin, thank you very much. stay with us. we have more on interesting political news as well as

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think about this. can you imagine being stranded in your car on a freeway just sitting there in snow for anywhere from 13 to 24 hours. that's what happened on the pennsylvania turnpike. melanie gillespie of wpix takes us there. >> reporter: from tractor-trailers to tour buses to cars and suvs, hundreds of drivers were paralyzed on the pennsylvania turnpike for a staggering 33-mile stretch prompting the national guard to call in troops to rescue stranded drivers. >> hopefully it won't take too much longer. >> hundreds spent more than 16 hours living off of what was in their car, staying warm with the turn of their ignition and waiting for any sign of movement. >> thought we'd see vehicles, trucks or whatever along a berm or whatever. just nothing. just sat there all night.

>> we slept some watching tv. trying to keep warm. >> the turnpike authority shuttered traffic from somerset to bedford. most we found were in good spirits with a chilling story to tell. >> i've never been stuck on a highway this long before. we've been here for about 15 hours. >> stuff like this. it's going to be hard to get out of this anyway. so i think we're going to be here for a long time. >> a long time is right. they weren't the only ones. kentucky folks were stranded on i-75 for more than 25 hours, 24 hours, i think it was. meteorologist allison chinchar with us know. we know the roads are reopened. still, sheets of ice underneath the snow everywhere. a lot of people are sitting in airports wondering thinking am i going to get out of here today? what are you hearing, allison? >> if you have a flight

scheduled for later today, you got about a 50/50 chance. if you had a flight yesterday or friday and are hoping the airports open back up and you get it today, the airports, the earliest they're booking is tuesday of this week. for good reason. these are the current flights over the air. you can see some around chicago, some into parts of the southeast. the northeast is pretty much a barren zone. the reason is we have a lot of airports already over 50% of the flights out of laguardia, jfk, reagan, baltimore, even newark, over 50% of the flights today are already canceled. in fact, over 75% out of laguardia are already canceled for today. that's just the cancellations. that doesn't even count any delays that you would have. again, even though the snow is finally starting to push its way back out, it's all of the stuff already on the ground. a lot of what's underneath that snow is a thin layer of ice.

that's going to take a lot of the airport crews even longer to finally clear that off a lot of the runways and the planes and things like that. and the winds, we expect the winds to be not as strong as they were yesterday. but they're still strong. we're talking 35 to 40 miles per hour in atlantic city. 25 to 30 in new york. 30 to 35 in boston and 40 to 45 into ocean city. again, notice the numbers do go down as we make our way into tonight. i think that will help in terms of getting some. but they've got all this snow to remove. look at all these airports with impressive numbers. dulles picking up 28 inches, jfk 30, laguardia almost 28. philadelphia picking up 20 inches of snow as well. christi, it's the combination of the impressive snow totals, the ice underneath them, the backup from the last couple of days and then the weather going forward because, again, tonight we expect that refreeze.

anything that they cannot possibly clear off is going to refreeze tonight and they'll have to treat it all over again tomorrow. >> what a mess. i hate get giving people that information but we've got to be truthful. thank you so much, allison. we appreciate all of that. listen, there were other areas affected by the snow. let's talk about maryland for one. at least one person died in that monster storm that hit them and parts of the state are still shoveling out this morning obviously. they're shoveling out at least 3 feet of snow. take a look at this video from largo, maryland. even fire trucks got stuck in this mess. you know they were on the way to help somebody. let's go to virginia now. they're dealing with more than 3 feet of snow there in parts of the state. governor terry mcauliffe riding with v dot workers as they struggled to clear the roads. he's urging people to again stay home if you can each if the storm moved out from where you are. obviously, an awful lot of work to do. in massachusetts more than a foot of snow hit cape cod.

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take a look at the beautiful picture of new york city. at least from the sky. i'm sure there's it is from the street as well. we're about an hour and ten minutes away from what a lot of people, i'm sure, are

anticipating there. the travel ban is supposed to be lifted. we do know that city officials are meeting this next hour, in the 6:00 hour to assess what's happening there and see if they can, indeed, lift that travel ban. but somebody who is already in the thick of things is jean casarez live in times square. you know what, i don't even think she's been alone already. it's almost ten to 6:00 eight to 6:00 and i see people walking behind you, driving behind you. what's it like so early this morning. >> reporter: we saw a police consider. only one private vehicle. i thought, what are they doing? because the travel ban is still in effect. so these roads are really desolate here. as you said, an hour and ten minutes from now, it's believed they're going to lift that travel ban. i want to show everybody what people are doing. the people that are walking, they're walking along the street, as i am right here because the embankments are

pretty high. so it's very difficult at some points to get across the street, so you deal with that by walking in the street. now, we're not going to recommend that after 7:00 a.m. this morning because you're going to suddenly have cars on the streets, but i think the few people have felt that they could do it morning. of course, underground subway is operational. just at in about ten minutes they'll look at subway that's aboveground. they're also going to assess the railroads at 6:00 a.m. the railroads take so many people in and out of the city every day. then at 7:00, along with that travel ban being lifted, also metro bus service and the bridges and the tunnels will be assessed at 7:00 a.m. you can't get in or out of the city right now. it looks like we have an actual record because the national weather service is reporting this morning unofficially at this point that 26.8 inches of snow fell yesterday, which would make it number 2 in the record

books. number 1 would be 2006. this is since records have been kept in 1869. so huge snowfall yesterday. our own brian stelter last night was in the thick of it as he was driving around new york city. let's watch. >> we all know new york is a city that never sleeps. it came awfully close to snoozing these past few hours. we're on the highway heading towards lower man hants. you can see we're the only ones out here. the sanitation vehicles got ahead of the storm thanks to the travel ban put into effect on saturday afternoon. that's why we're seeing blacktop out here already being able to see that the roads are clearing up as the snowfall starts to calm down. this storm was much, much bigger than anticipated for new york city. a couple days ago, the forecast was for 4 or 8 inches, maybe a foot. but we wendended up with more t2 feet of snow.

many complain when the weatherman exaggerates how bad it will be. in this case, the storm models were suggesting that washington would bear the brunt of the storm and new york left off comparatively easy. it turns outs in that d.c./new york rivalry, new york was dealt the tougher blow from the storm and ended up with more snow around here than in many areas in washington. one of the notable parts of the storm is how widespread it is. we're talking about hundreds of miles that will be digging out as this day gets started now on sunday, as people start to recover from the storm. going to head out and maybe enjoy the fresh snow, going sledding, taking their pets out and things like that. as we drive around here, and tell you we see almost no one out here, ohm a few pedestrians and a few emergency vehicles, the ban may be well-accepted by new yorkers and it's had the benefit of clearing the roads as well. back to you.

>> brian, thanks so much for that. one more thing. this morning, it's a little different than yesterday morning. it's slick. it's slippery. the powdery snow has really packed down and it's icy. so if you're walking anywhere along the eastern seaboard, be very careful. very easy to fall in all of this. christi, back to you. >> not only that, the ice is there. not only there but at the airports. that's part of the problem they're having and the refreeze they're expecting as well. jean, they like to talk about the naked cowboy. we hopefully he's not there in the weather that you're seeing now. >> no. we would have talked about that. right? what we've got are actually some shovellers, people shoveling are coming out finally. i don't think we can see them over the embankment of snow but they were out. yesterday they shoveled and shoveled and shoveled and it kept coming down so quickly.

they never made an impact. today, i think they'll make headway because it's not coming down. >> it's funny, you being in new york, you never know who you're going to run into, each in the middle of a snowstorm. that was so true for poppy harlow. look at this. >> not flying out any time soon. i'm from new york city and i'm down here to see my daughters and my grandson milo. how are you doing, my row? decided to go downtown but decided not to. the weather is terrible. >> you were here promoting your latest single on colbert last night. where are you going next? you're going to hunker down for this thing? >> i'm going to hunker down. i got a funny feeling the storm is going to keep us here a couple extra days. stay home. two words. hot chocolate. >> hot chocolate. >> look at this.

>> can you imagine. i'm standing here doing my live shot. here comes steven tyler. only in new york. it is so much fun despite everything that's happening. you got to find the little nuggets, the little pockets where maybe it's not quite so bad. thank you, obviously to steven tyler who took a minute to talk to us when he was out and about yesterday. i don't know if he'll be out again today. there's so much news to tell you this morning regarding the storm and very interesting political news next hour of your new day starts right now. take a look at some of the pictures we're getting in from the jersey coast. devastating floods as it just gets hammered there. coastal towns and roads swamped by ocean waters yet again. also, new yorkers ready to ride. we're one hour away from the city's travel ban being lifted. after 2 feet of snow, the

question is, how safe is it really if people want to get back out on the roads? still in the dark. thousands of people do not have power this morning. they don't have heat as snow-covered trees are toppling power lines covered in ice in a good chunk of the country. despite all of that, we do want to wish you a very good morning. happy sunday. we're grateful to have your company. i'm christi paul. martin savidge is live in new york city as city crews re clearing the sidewalks and the roads. martin looks very different this morning at columbus circle than he did yesterday. i have to believe, martin, though it's still cold, you're much more comfortable this morning. >> reporter: oh, yeah, yeah. a big difference. in 24 hours, you can see the city skyline again, something that's completely disappeared. grateful for that. sunshine expected later today. there's a lot still going on. some very serious consequences. finally you can hear them. see the snowplows. these guys have about one more more to really do what needs to be done. so you can see these are the

sanitation trucks here. they've been outfitted with sa here and outfitted with plows and going nonstop. about 1,600 of them in the city so they have been using the time, since the travel ban is in effect, to try to clear the main thoroughfares and down here at columbus circle is one of those. the other big concern is high tide and watching that and a report in my judgment. in the meantime, the overview of this storm, you just got to see it to believe it. take a look. from above, the monster storm loose peaceful, almost serene. but on the ground it caused death and misery and destruction from fatal accidents to huge snow piles, flooding, and the complete shutdown of major cities. the blizzard of 2016 is one for the record books. >> this is a historic snowstorm. this is a huge challenge for pennsylvania.