The Worst Nor’easters in US History, Ranked
The single costliest nor’easter in American history dropped zero inches of snow on New York City. That is the whole trick of ranking these storms: the “worst” one is a completely different storm depending on whether you measure snow, storm surge, deaths or dollars. We ranked the biggest nor’easters using our own NOAA station snowfall, then laid the surge, deaths and damage beside it.
The reason this is worth reading in late October: nor’easter season has opened. As this published, Subtropical Storm Josephine — a coastal storm that spun up off the Mid-Atlantic on October 21, 2026 — was churning about 265 miles south of Nantucket with roughly 65 mph winds, driving coastal-flood alerts and 50 mph gusts from the North Carolina coast to Cape Cod (CNN, The Weather Channel). It is forecast to stay offshore and never make a mainland landfall, but it is a textbook season opener: nor’easters run October through April, and the ones below are what the peak of that window can do.
A quick definition, because the ranking turns on it. A nor’easter is a large, cold-core winter storm that strengthens along the East Coast, named for the northeast winds that scream off the ocean into the coast. Unlike a hurricane, it does its damage several ways at once — heavy snow inland, a battering storm surge at the shore, hurricane-force gusts, and days of it. Rank them by one of those and you get one list; rank by another and the order scrambles. Here is the master table, sorted by death toll, with every other yardstick alongside.
The Master Ranking
Sorted by death toll. “Peak snow” is the highest storm-total we measured at a primary airport station in our NOAA archive (1970–present); the three pre-1970 storms carry cited peak totals, marked with an asterisk. Deaths, damage, surge and pressure are cited to NWS, NOAA and event records.
| Storm | Peak snow | Deaths | Damage | Signature extreme |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Great Blizzard of 1888March 11–14, 1888 | ~50 in (New York / New England)* | ~400 | $25M (1888) | 80 mph gusts, 50-ft drifts |
| Great Appalachian StormNovember 24–25, 1950 | 62 in (Coburn Creek, WV)* | 383 | $66.7M (1950) | 160 mph highland gust; record-low pressures |
| Storm of the CenturyMarch 12–14, 1993 | 26.8 in (Albany, NY) | 270+ | $5.5B | ~960 mb; hit 26 states at once |
| Superstorm SandyOctober 28–30, 2012 | 0.0 in (NYC / Boston) | 233 (147+ US) | $68.7B | 14-ft surge at the Battery; 940 mb |
| Blizzard of 1978February 5–7, 1978 | 28.6 in (Providence, RI) | ~100 | $520M (1978) | Hurricane-force gusts; Boston buried 27.1 in |
| Jonas (“Snowzilla”)January 22–24, 2016 | 29.3 in (Washington Dulles) | ~55 | ~$1B | Mid-Atlantic bullseye; Baltimore 29.2 in |
| Ash Wednesday StormMarch 5–9, 1962 | Mostly coastal flooding* | 40 | $200M (1962) | 5 tide cycles of flooding; 30-ft waves |
| Grayson (bomb cyclone)January 3–4, 2018 | 16.8 in (Worcester, MA) | ~22 | — | Explosive bombogenesis; Boston Harbor flooding |
| NemoFebruary 8–9, 2013 | 31.9 in (Portland, ME) | 19 | ~$100M | Worcester 28.7 in; 700k lost power |
| JunoJanuary 26–28, 2015 | 34.5 in (Worcester, MA) | 3 | ~$500M | Worcester’s biggest storm ever; missed NYC |
| SnowtoberOctober 29–30, 2011 | 12.3 in (Hartford, CT) | — | — | Freak October snow on leafed trees; days-long outages |
*Pre-1970 snowfall is cited (NWS/NCEI/Wikipedia), not from our archive, which begins in 1970. 1970-and-later snow totals are summed over each storm's window from NOAA GHCN-Daily station records in our database, queried October 22, 2026, quality-flagged observations excluded. Sandy's 0.0 in is the coastal reading at New York and Boston; its snow fell in the Appalachians.
So Which One Was Actually the Worst?
Pick your metric and the answer changes. Here are the four honest ones.
Snowfall: the Blizzard of ’78, Nemo and Juno
Our station data crowns the snow kings. 2015's Juno dumped a measured 34.5 inches on Worcester, Massachusetts — the city's single biggest storm on record. February 2013's Nemo put 31.9 inches on Portland, Maine and 28.7 on Worcester. And the legendary Blizzard of 1978 buried Providence under 28.6 inches and Boston under 27.1, a figure still etched into New England memory. Notice what's missing from this list: Sandy, the costliest of them all.
Surge and cost: Sandy, then Ash Wednesday 1962
Water, not snow, writes the biggest damage checks. Superstorm Sandy drove a 14-foot surge into New York Harbor and ran up about $68.7 billion in damage. Half a century earlier, the Ash Wednesday Storm of 1962 flooded the Mid-Atlantic coast through five straight high tides over three days with 30-foot waves — still the benchmark coastal-flood nor’easter before Sandy, and a reminder that the deadliest thing a nor’easter does is often at the waterline, not in the snow totals.
Death toll: the pre-forecast giants of 1888 and 1950
The deadliest nor’easters came before modern forecasting could warn anyone. The Great Blizzard of 1888 killed roughly 400 people from the Chesapeake to Maine; the Great Appalachian Storm of November 1950 killed 383 across 22 states with 160 mph gusts in the New England highlands. The 1993 Storm of the Century (270+ dead) is the deadliest of the satellite era — proof that even a well-forecast superstorm can still be lethal at that scale.
Raw intensity: Sandy and the Storm of the Century
By central pressure — the cleanest measure of a storm's power — Sandy (940 mb) and the 1993 Storm of the Century (~960 mb) stand alone, both in the range of a Category 2 or 3 hurricane. The 1993 storm is the rare nor’easter that tops almost every list at once: near the top on snow, on deaths and on intensity, and the only one to shut down airports from Atlanta to Boston in the same hour.
Five Storms Worth Knowing
Superstorm Sandy (October 2012)
Sandy began as a hurricane and merged with a winter system into a 940-mb hybrid that came ashore near Atlantic City and behaved like a continent-sized nor’easter. The surge, not the wind, did the killing: nearly 14 feet of water at the Battery, flooding the New York subway and killing more than 140 people in the US. Our stations logged 0.0 inches of snow at New York and Boston — all that destruction, and not a flake on the coast. Full event page: Hurricane Sandy, 2012.
The Blizzard of 1978 (February)
The storm that stopped New England. It parked over southern New England for 36 hours, burying Boston in 27.1 inches and Providence in 28.6, with hurricane-force gusts and a coastal surge that destroyed oceanfront homes. About 100 people died and thousands were stranded on highways. Our deeper dive, with the January “other” 1978 blizzard untangled from it: the Blizzard of 1978, explained.
The Storm of the Century (March 1993)
Not a pure nor’easter — it was a superstorm that spanned 26 states — but on its Northeast flank it was the nor’easter all others are measured against: our archive caught 26.8 inches at Albany, with 42 at Syracuse, a ~960-mb center and 270+ dead. Read the full south-to-north sweep in the 1993 Storm of the Century.
“Snowtober” (October 29, 2011)
The freak one. A nor’easter dumped 12.3 inches of wet snow on Hartford and 11.4 on Worcester before Halloween — onto trees that still had their leaves. The extra weight snapped limbs and power lines across the interior Northeast, leaving some towns dark for a week. It is the clearest proof that nor’easter season really does start in October.
Juno (January 2015) — and the forecast that busted
Juno was a tale of 50 miles. It gave Worcester its biggest storm on record (34.5 inches) and buried Boston and Long Island under two feet — but the heavily hyped New York City total came in under 10 inches as the heaviest band set up just east of the city, one of the more famous forecast busts of the decade. Intensity without a bullseye on the biggest market.
Why the Northeast Coast Breeds These
Nor’easters are engines run on contrast. In winter, frigid air pouring off the North American continent meets the warm water of the Gulf Stream just offshore, and that sharp temperature difference is the fuel a coastal low feeds on. A storm riding north along the boundary between the two can deepen explosively — a 24-millibar pressure drop in 24 hours earns the name “bomb cyclone,” which is exactly what Grayson did off New England in January 2018. The counterclockwise circulation then drives moist ocean air back into the cold continent as northeast wind, wringing it out as snow inland and shoving the sea onto the shore as surge. It is the same coastline, the same Gulf Stream and the same January cold that make the region a nor’easter factory year after year.
What This Season Could Bring
Josephine is an opening act, not a headliner — a coastal storm staying offshore. But the calendar is now in nor’easter range, and a strong El Niño is set for winter 2026–27, a pattern that historically tilts the storm track toward an active southern and Mid-Atlantic route — the Jonas lane. If you want to see how these storms fit the bigger picture, our ranking of the worst blizzards in US history widens the lens to the Plains and Midwest (blizzards are defined by wind and visibility, not just coastal track), while the worst winters America has lived through and the worst ice storms cover the cold season's other faces. And if a nor’easter hits your town this winter, you can check exactly how much it dropped against the records on the snowiest cities in America — or look up the weather on any past date in your own city.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the worst nor’easter in US history?
It depends on the yardstick. By cost and storm surge, Superstorm Sandy (October 2012) is the worst — about $68.7 billion in damage and a 14-foot surge at the Battery — yet it dropped essentially no snow on New York City. By death toll, the Great Blizzard of 1888 (~400 dead) and the Great Appalachian Storm of 1950 (383 dead) are the deadliest. By snowfall, the Blizzard of 1978, 2013’s Nemo and 2015’s Juno top the list. The only nor’easter near the top on both snowfall and raw intensity is the March 1993 Storm of the Century.
Is a nor’easter worse than a hurricane?
They are different beasts. Hurricanes are smaller, warm-core and summer-to-fall; nor’easters are large, cold-core winter storms that can last days and pound hundreds of miles of coast with surge, wind and snow at once. A strong nor’easter can rival a hurricane in central pressure — the 1993 Storm of the Century bottomed out near 960 mb, Category-2 territory. Superstorm Sandy blurred the line entirely: it began as a hurricane and merged with a winter system into a hybrid that behaved like a giant nor’easter at landfall.
When is nor’easter season?
Nor’easters are most frequent and strongest from October through April, peaking in the dead of winter (December–February) when the temperature contrast between the cold continent and the relatively warm Gulf Stream is sharpest. They can strike at the margins, too — 2011’s “Snowtober” hit on October 29 and Superstorm Sandy came ashore October 29 — which is why an active late-October coastal storm is a normal season opener, not an anomaly.
Why did Superstorm Sandy cause so much damage with so little snow?
Sandy’s destruction came from water, not snow. Its warm, tropical air meant rain rather than snow along the coast — our NOAA stations recorded 0.0 inches at New York and Boston — while its enormous size and a 940-mb central pressure drove a record 14-foot surge into New York Harbor at high tide during a full moon. The snow that did fall from Sandy landed in the colder Appalachians, where parts of West Virginia got up to three feet.
Sources & Method
Peak snowfall for 1970-and-later storms is an original query of our copy of NOAA’s Global Historical Climatology Network-Daily archive, summed over each storm's window at the listed airport station (quality-flagged observations excluded), queried October 22, 2026. Death tolls, damage, surge, wind and pressure are cited: Superstorm Sandy figures from the event record and the NHC report; the Great Blizzard of 1888, the Great Appalachian Storm of 1950, the Ash Wednesday Storm of 1962 and the modern storms (Juno, Jonas, Nemo, Grayson, the Blizzard of 1978) from NWS and NOAA NCEI event summaries and The Weather Channel storm reports. The live Subtropical Storm Josephine details are from CNN and The Weather Channel, October 21–22, 2026. Figures from our stations are labeled as such; everything at storm scale is cited.