“Historic” bad weather across the US claimed eight lives in the state of New York and buried it under metres of snow.

Another wave of stormy weather is forecast to sweep across the city of Buffalo on Thursday, bringing the total snowfall this week up to levels normally expected over an entire year.

The new fall will undermine the efforts of many who started digging out of their homes on Wednesday, and another 1 metre of snow is forecast.

On top of the 1.68 metres already there in some places, it could become the heaviest 24-hour snowfall on record in the mainland, beating the 192 centimeters, which fell at Silver Lake, Colorado, in 1921.