The Premier was last night stranded in the US after freezing conditions caused the cancellation of his flight home.

Dr. Ewart Brown was due to fly from New York's JFK Airport at 7.30 p.m., but his American Airlines flight was cancelled after crews made unsuccessful attempts to de-ice the aeroplane.

It is expected Dr. Brown — who was making his way back from a meeting of Caribbean leaders in St. Vincent and the Grenadines (see story below) — will return early today, when it is hoped conditions will have eased.

His flight was one of a host of cancellations or delays as a result of the snowstorm affecting airports in the US Northeast yesterday. Strong winds in Bermuda added to the chaos.

Cancellations included American Airline and JetBlue flights from New York, US Airway flights from Washington, DC, and Philadelphia, and Delta flights from Boston. An Air Canada flight from Toronto arrived in the Island at 6 p.m., more than five hours late, partly due to winds in Bermuda, while a Continental flight from Newark arrived 45 minutes late during the afternoon.

Airport Operations manager James Howes said last night: "Dr. Brown's flight was cancelled for the night. They were trying to keep the plane de-iced but they didn't succeed. There were a lot of cancellations throughout the day. It was about what we anticipated because of the snow hitting the north east of America.

"We also had bad weather here. That was part of the reason for the delay in the Air Canada flight."

The winter storm, which roared into the mid-western and northeastern US yesterday, dumped a mixture of snow, ice, sleet and rain that caused transportation havoc and forced many schools to close. During the day, blizzard warnings were up for parts of Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine and New York.

Declan O'Connell, of the Bermuda Weather Service, said conditions in the north east of US should improve today as the bad weather moves north.

"Places like New York and Boston should be OK," he said. "It will still be cold but shouldn't be as bad."

Mr. O'Connell said gusts on the Island reached the low 50s yesterday, while about half an inch of rainfall was recorded at the airport between 8 a.m. and 2 p.m. He said the weather was not as severe as late last month, when hurricane force gusts led to the closure of the Causeway. The weatherman predicted the worst of the weather would have blown away by this morning. Passengers are advised to check with their airline for the status of their flights today.