NEW YORK/LONDON: A major snowstorm producing blizzard-like conditions hammered the northeastern United States on Friday, causing flight delays and cancellations, paralyzing road travel, and closing schools and government offices. Britain's western coast, Northern Ireland and parts of northwestern France were also hit by high winds, waves and tides on Friday.

The winter storm across the eastern half of the US led to at least nine deaths.

Slick roads caused traffic deaths in Michigan, Kentucky, Indiana and Illinois.

The first major winter storm of 2014 brought bone-chilling temperatures and high winds from the lower Mississippi Valley to the Atlantic coast, with nearly 2 feet of snow falling in some areas of Massachusetts.

Much of the US northeast saw heavy snowfall and plummeting temperatures late on Thursday and early on Friday morning, said Jared Guyer, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.

The weather service said the mass of Arctic air would drop temperatures to levels 20 to 30 degrees below normal.

Residents grappled on Friday with road and school closures throughout the region.

“Severe weather conditions” led officials to close New York City public schools on Friday morning. Schools were also closed in Hoboken and Jersey City, in New Jersey, and in Boston and Providence Massachusetts.

The storm also posed the first major challenge to Bill de Blasio, the newly elected Mayor of New York, which expected to see up to 8 inches (20 cm) of snow.

More than 1,400 US flights were canceled and more than 340 were delayed early on Friday, according to flightaware.com.

New York’s three major airports prepared hundreds of cots to accommodate stranded travelers and Logan International Airport said that up to a quarter of its scheduled flights had been canceled on Thursday.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Thursday warned people to stay in their homes and Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick told non-essential state workers to head home on Thursday, as did his officials in neighboring Connecticut.

A city worker in Philadelphia was killed after a machine he was using was crushed by a mound of de-icing rock salt, NBC News reported. In Chicago, a man was in critical condition after being pulled out of an icy Lake Michigan by fire fighters.

In Britain, high winds, waves and tides lashed the western coast Friday in a winter storm that flooded seaside towns and low-lying areas.

Wales, southwest England and Northern Ireland were the worst-hit regions by the storm, the latest in a series of extreme winter conditions. Parts of northwestern France also suffered flooding.

A combination of heavy rain, winds gusting up to 70 mph (113 kph) and exceptionally high tides sent water flooding into several British seaside towns Friday, and some western rivers burst their banks.

Floods also washed over parts of northwestern France, as heavy rains coupled with unusually high tides left the streets of some coastal towns underwater.