Winter storm wallops N.L. after pummelling Maritimes, Ont., Que.

A massive winter storm blew into Newfoundland and Labrador Monday after battering Central Canada and the Maritimes.

High winds, heavy snow and freezing rain moved into Newfoundland and Labrador in the afternoon, where officials had already closed schools and issued transportation alerts.

Most of thewidespread blizzard and winter storm warnings were withdrawn by late afternoon, with warnings remaining in effectin northern Newfoundland and eastern Labrador.

In St. John's, the stormturned to heavy rain, which the CBC's Zach Goudie said could turn to "inconvenient and treacherous ice" in the city.

Goudie said the storm is expected to linger in the province through Wednesday, dumping up to 25 centimetres of snow in some regions and bringing winds gusting up to 120 km/h.

By mid-afternoon, whiteouts were common and driving conditions were frequently described as poor, police said. In Labrador, the blizzard was strong enough to cause Canada Post to shut down its sorting station in Happy Valley-Goose Bay.

Power outages were scattered acrossthe province, but by 2:30 p.m. NT, Newfoundland Power reported that only two areas were left in the dark, in the Codroy Valley on the west coast and on the Avalon Peninsula.

The storm swept into the Maritimes around midday Sunday, bringing high winds and heavy snow that left more than 20,000 customers without electricity on Monday morning.

In Nova Scotia, the storm dumped between 10 and 20 centimetres of snow before turning to rain.

By Monday afternoon, repair crews had reduced the outages in the province from 11,000 customers to about1,700 mostly in Cape Breton's Cheticamp area,Nova Scotia Power said.

Spokeswoman Margaret Murphy said the affected lines were in an isolated area and crews, using snowmobiles in an attempt to reach the lines, are getting stuck in snow drifts almost two metres deep.

Power restoration hampered

In New Brunswick, where snowfall was expected to hit 30 centimetres, a few hundred homes and businesses were still in the dark on Monday, mostly in the Moncton and Shediac areas.

NB Power said lingering strong winds were hampering restoration efforts.

"We restore some customers only to have the wind come along and cause an outage again," utility spokeswoman Heather MacLean said in a statement.

In Prince Edward Island, roughly 200 customers were affected by power outages. Police in the province reported very icy conditions with persistent winds and whiteouts after the temperature dipped well below freezing.

At least one storm-related accident was reported, in Nova Scotia's Kentville area, where RCMP said a 16-year-old boy died Sunday after a car he was travelling in lost control on a slippery Highway 101. The 17-year-old driver was taken to hospital with serious injuries.

Numerous cancellations and delays were reported at the Halifax International Airport and the St. John's International Airport. Travellers are being asked to check with their airlines for updates.

Ontario, Quebec dig out

As the storm walloped the east, residents in Central Canada began digging out Monday.

In the hardest-hit areas of Ontario, the storm dumped between 30 and 60 centimetres of snow, with Ottawa's 37-centimetre snowfall beating the city's previous one-day-snowfall record, set in 1977.

The storm caused the cancellation ofscores of flights at Toronto's Pearson airport on Sunday and there were hundreds of traffic mishaps.

At least one traffic death inOntario was blamed on the storm after a woman was killed Sunday when a snowplow struck her vehicle as she stood outside it on Highway 401 near London.

Montreal got about 40 centimetres of snow, while other parts of southern Quebec got as much as 60 centimetres.