Temperatures across the Atlantic dipped so low during the ‘bomb cyclone’ that the ocean froze over in Massachusetts and one man captured footage of the astonishing scenes.
Ryan Canty posted a video to his YouTube channel showing his family joking around on top of frozen waves at Old Silver Beach in Falmouth.
At one point Mr Canty says: ‘Who wants to go swimming?’
Ocean waves are frozen over in the clip of the Old Silver Beach in Falmouth, Massachusetts
Ryan Canty, who filmed the video, said that his grandma who lives in the area has only seen this happen three times in past 80 years
The ocean waves are frozen solid to the point where people can easily walk across them without worrying about plunging into the icy depths.
Ocean water freezes at a lower temperature than plain water due to the salt content, freezing at around -2C (28.4F).
Posting the video to Reddit, Mr Canty said that his grandmother, who lives in the area, has only seen the ocean freeze over like this three times in the past 80 years.
In the video, Mr Canty is heard saying that ‘it looks like Antarctica right now’.
The incredible clip has been viewed nearly 700,000 times since being posted yesterday.
One commenter said: ‘That’s in Massachusetts?! That looks like that would be in GREENLAND! HOLY MACARONI.’
Another said: ‘The real question is how deep is the water frozen?
”Cause that s*** was giving me anxiety just watching them walking over it’
Ocean water freezes at a lower temperature than plain water due to the salt content, freezing at around -2C (28.4F)
The incredible clip has been viewed nearly 700,000 times since being posted yesterday
A big freeze has gripped the Northeast over the past week but is set to be leaving.
Burlington, Vermont, and Portland, Maine set records, with Burlington falling to minus 20, beating a 1923 record by a degree, and Portland recording minus 11, also a degree below a 1941 record.
The National Weather Service said Worcester, Massachusetts, which fell to minus 9, and Providence, Rhode Island, which dropped to minus 3, also set record lows, as did Hartford, Connecticut, where the temperature dropped to minus 9, smashing a 1912 record.
Boston tied a low-temperature record set more than a century ago in 1896 of minus 2.
The temperature registered minus 37 on Saturday at the Mount Washington Observatory in New Hampshire, one of the coldest places on the planet. The wind chill was minus 93. It tied with Armstrong, Ontario, as the second coldest spot in the world.
Evan Premo, of Marshfield, Vermont, stopped into a Capitol Grounds coffee shop in Montpelier for lunch Sunday with his two young sons, aged 5 and 3.
‘We’ve been stir crazy because we spend so much time outside always so yeah, it’s a challenge,’ said Premo.
By Monday, Boston temperatures should return to a more seasonable low 30s. The mercury will continue to rise and Boston could see temperatures in the mid-40s by Thursday and as high as the low-50s on Friday.
Many Northeast residents endured jaw-clenching temperatures and brutal wind chills over the weekend as cleanup continued from the storm that dropped as much as 18 inches (46 centimeters) of snow in some places on Thursday.
A deep freeze has hit the Northeast over the past week. One commenter said: ‘That’s in Massachusetts?! That looks like that would be in GREENLAND! HOLY MACARONI’
The National Weather Service said the deep freeze is expected to end on Sunday
Illinois is forecasted to reach 29 degrees on Sunday. Pictured is a view of the frozen Chicago river on January 6, 2018
But while the freezing over of the ocean bay brought amazement and delight to the people of Massachusetts, it is not the first time that the striking phenomenon has taken place.
Last January, freezing temperatures across Europe saw a layer of ice covering the continent’s second-longest river.
The freezing of the river Danube is usually a once in a life-time event and it was only the second time it had frozen over in the past thirty years.
The freeze pleased locals in Vienna who spent the weekend skating across the river’s huge sheet of ice.
But it also caused problems for the locals, blocking all river traffic and endangering rafts and boats parked on the banks of the river.
Authorities in Vienna warned residents that the icy sheet could be dangerous and the thickness of the ice has not been tested.
The 2,872km long Danube River runs from Germany through eight countries to the Black Sea and is the second longest-river in Europe, after the Volga River.
In January 2012 the river froze for the first time in 25 years causing European shipping companies to lose millions of pounds and halting ferry routes.
At the time Europe was gripped by extremely cold weather with several people dying as a result of the freezing temperatures.
In southeast Serbia a 58-year-old man was found dead in the snow as the cold spell continued.
The body of the man, from the remote village of Strbovac which was cut off by the snow, was discovered when neighbours notified authorities after noticing he had been missing for two days.
Four people died while skiing, snow-shoeing or sledding in Austria over the weekend which is an unusually high number of fatalities for snow sports in the country.
Two Czech nationals who were snow-shoeing, a form of hiking using special shoes for gripping the snow, in Salzburg’s alpine region were also killed after being buried in an avalanche.
Back in 2009, a half-mile stretch along the shoreline in Poole, Dorset, reaching about 20 yards out to sea was covered in ice.
In southern England, normally immune to the worst of the cold weather in winter, temperatures fell to as low as -12C.
A half-mile stretch along the shoreline in Poole, Dorset, reaching about 20 yards out to sea was covered in ice in 2009