Wall of snow slams Buffalo, N.Y., as cold strikes much of U.S.

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Cars are covered in snow in Orchard Park, N.Y. The Buffalo area found itself buried under as much as 5½ feet of snow with another lake-effect storm expected to bring 2 to 3 more feet by late Thursday. (Derek Gee / Associated Press)

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A man digs out his driveway in Depew, N.Y. (Derek Gee / Associated Press)

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A sales manager at Toyota of Batavia clears snow off a buried car on the lot in Batavia, N.Y. (Mark Gutman / Associated Press)

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A woman walks along a snow-covered street in the south Buffalo area. A new blast of lake-effect snow pounded Buffalo for a third day piling more misery on a city already buried by an epic, deadly snowfall that could leave some areas with nearly 8 feet of snow on the ground when it’s all done. (Mike Groll / Associated Press)

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Homes are covered in snow in West Seneca, N.Y. (Derek Gee / Associated Press)

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Greg Mitri shovels his way through nearly 5 feet of snow in the Lakeview neighborhood of Buffalo, N.Y. (John Normile / Getty Images)

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Trucks line Memorial Drive waiting to dump plowed snow on the grounds of the Central Terminal in Buffalo, N.Y. Snow was being trucked out of the hardest hit areas after yesterday’s snowstorm which dropped more than five feet of snow. (Sharon Cantillon / Associated Press)

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Bill Funke clears snow out his driveway at his home along Route 5 in Pembroke, N.Y. (Mark Gutman / Associated Press)

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A youth pushes deep snow from atop a roof in Cheektowaga, N.Y. (Gary Wiepert / Associated Press)

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A woman walks along a snow-covered street in the south Buffalo, N.Y. (Mike Groll / Associated Press)

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A car is stranded on Mile Strip Road at the entrance to Route 219 near Buffalo, N.Y. (Derek Gee / Associated Press)

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Floyd Compeau, 65, removes snow from his 1994 Chevy pickup truck outside in house in Brushton, N.Y. (Jason Hunter / Associated Press)

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Samantha Freeman shovels snow off the sidewalk in Public Square Nov. 19 in Watertown, N.Y. A ferocious lake-effect storm left the Buffalo area buried under 6 feet of snow, trapping people on highways and in homes. (Justin Sorensen / Associated Press)

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A man uses a snow blower to clear snow from his driveway near a completely snow-covered car in a neighborhood just south of Buffalo, N.Y. (Mark Webster / EPA)

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Christine Bloom works to clear snow off her vehicle to try and make it to work in Hamburg, N.Y. A ferocious storm dumped massive piles of snow on parts of upstate New York, trapping residents in their homes and stranding motorists on roadways. (Harry Scull Jr. / Associated Press)

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Snow covers a street at daybreak Wednesday in South Buffalo, N.Y. Buffalo-area officials are getting help from a neighboring county in their efforts to clear roads and provide emergency services during the snowstorm that has buried sections of western New York in more than 5 feet of snow. (Carolyn Thompson / Associated Press)

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Bob Wilcox clears the snow at the end of his driveway in Lancaster, N.Y. (Gary Wiepert / Associated Press)

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Rachel Miller drives her dogs Aja and Ivan on a street in Kalamazoo, Mich. (Mark Bugnaski / Associated Press)

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Sally Hawthorne clears the sidewalk in front of her house in Kalamazoo, Mich. (Mark Bugnaski / Associated Press)

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Students from the Grand Valley State University campus in Michigan built a snowman that looks like the character Olaf from the movie ‘Frozen’ in Allendale, Mich. (Joel Bissell / Associated Press)

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Lauren Hansen shovels snow off her porch as her dog Kapone stands by during a mid-November snowstorm in Grand Rapids, Mich. (Emily Rose Bennett / Associated Press)

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People sled down the hill in Richmond Park in Grand Rapids, Mich. Lake-effect storms in Michigan produced gale-force winds and as much as 18 inches of snow. (Zach Gibson / Associated Press)

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With his arms tucked inside his hooded sweat shirt, Aris Espinosa of Erie, Pa., walks to school. (Christopher Millette / AP)

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A commuter walks along Market Street in freezing temperatures in Philadelphia. (Matt Rourke / AP)

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A man walks down Coit Avenue in the wind and snow in Grand Rapids, Mich. (Emily Rose Bennett / Associated Press)

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Lynette Johnson moves snow in front of her home in Springville, N.Y. (Harry Scull Jr. / Associated Press)

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A 4-foot fence and an SUV are nearly buried in Buffalo, N.Y. (Carolyn Thompson / Associated Press)

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A lake-effect snowstorm with freezing temperatures affected travel, including this plane that negotiated its way through the snow at Buffalo’s international airport. (Gary Wiepert / Associated Press)

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Heavy snow covers a street in Buffalo. (Carolyn Thompson / Associated Press)

By Javier Panzar, Lauren Raab

Nov. 18, 2014 8:32 PM PT

As a brutal cold front moves through most of the United States this week with a rude wallop of snow, frigid temperatures and deep freezes -- most notably in the Buffalo, N.Y., area -- it’s hard to believe that the official start of winter is a month away.

Snow coming off Lake Erie started falling Monday night. Parts of the Buffalo area were socked with 5 feet of snow Tuesday, local officials said, and by Wednesday morning the total was predicted to reach 6 feet, said Steven Welch, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.

“It is one of the worst snow events we’ve ever had in terms of impact” in the area, Welch said.

Numerous motorists were stranded in cars stuck in the snow, and crews are still trying to dig some of them out, Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown said at a news conference Tuesday night. Meanwhile, main streets are being cleared so emergency responders can use them; more than 200 cars have been towed so far, city officials said.

Residents are being told not to drive anywhere unless they have an emergency health situation.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo declared a disaster Tuesday evening and deployed 150 soldiers and airmen from the National Guard to western portion of the state to help with the blizzard-like conditions.

“We are deploying the National Guard to ramp up efforts to keep western New York residents safe and to assist storm recovery efforts in any way possible,” Cuomo said in a statement.

Four people are believed to have died in the storm: One was killed in an auto accident and three had heart attacks, Erie County, N.Y., officials said, according to the Associated Press. Two of the heart attack victims are believed to have been shoveling snow.

Meanwhile, Buffalo officials said, a girl was born in a fire station Tuesday after her mother couldn’t get to the hospital. They said emergency medical technicians and paramedics, as well as a nurse who was stranded at the station, helped deliver the baby.

New York State Police shared stunning photos of the snow-swept streets on social media throughout the day to caution drivers.

Officials are looking forward to a break in the snowfall Tuesday night, but the storm is expected to pick up again afterward. “Some parts of our county are going to receive a year’s worth of snowfall in three days,” Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz said on Twitter.

The nationwide record for snowfall in a 24-hour period belongs to Silver Lake, Colo., which received 76 inches on April 14-15, 1921. Some suburbs of Buffalo approached that amount Tuesday, the National Weather Service said, calling it possibly the highest 24-hour snow in a populated area.

The region’s so-called lake-effect snow occurs when a cold front sweeps over Lake Erie and lifts moisture off the relatively warm waters into the frigid atmosphere, where it turns to snow. The trend is expected to continue through Friday.

The cold snap is hitting most of the nation and reaches into the Deep South, according to the National Weather Service.

Grand Rapids, Mich., was covered with 14 inches of snow and white-out conditions Tuesday as the temperature sank to 19 degrees. That is 25 degrees below normal, National Weather Service meteorologist Nathan Jeruzal said.

“This is more typical of January weather. This is definitely unlike mid-November,” he said. “We are looking at a long winter.”

In Destin, Fla., a popular tourist destination with sandy white beaches, the temperature fell to 33 degrees Tuesday morning, a new record low for the date, said Joe Maniscalco of the National Weather Service.

A hard freeze warning is in place for a stretch of the Gulf Coast from Pensacola, Fla., to Mobile, Ala., where the temperature is expected to dip to 22 degrees Wednesday morning.

“We are going to be breaking a lot of records,” Maniscalco said.

Follow @jpanzar for national news.