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New York City, Blizzard of 1888:
Those who tried to reach home regretted it. The ever-increasing gale swept and hurled the snow everywhere.  As wires whistled and telephone and telegraph poles swayed ever more precariously, the wind whipped the crystals into a pedestrian's eyes where the snow would melt and then freeze so fast that the victim had to constantly struggle to protect his sight. Deflected from buildings and other objects, the wind seemed to blast from every point on the compass and spin and twirl and whirl in "snow devils" or "white tornadoes." If one turned his face, a gust from the opposite direction would catch and spin him around like a puppet. The wind would snatch the breath away as the snow clogged the nostrils and throat. Next, the snow would follow his breath into his lungs, nearly choking and suffocating him.
People appeared on streets wearing homemade devices resembling gas masks.
Some, caught out in what a New Haven newspaper described as "the bewildering, belligerent, blinding blitz," became hysterical, shouting, cursing the wind and pounding the snow tearfully. Others wandered, disoriented, into drifts and died quietly.

Storm surge, New England, '38 Hurricane:
The storm surge rolled on; at high tide it overwhelmed the shorelines of Rhode Island and Massachusetts as far east as the southwestern tip of Cape Cod.
At Block Island, although the waves spared most of the houses, which were built on much higher ground than on Long Island's south shore, they smashed to smithereens all the lobster pots and the entire fishing fleet.
Between Point Judith, on the east - where, at the entrance of Narragansett Bay, the tide rose over 17 feet above mean low tide - to Watch Hill on the Connecticut border, a great, green wave estimated by onlookers to be 60 to 70 feet high came rolling in from the ocean. It washed away miles of beaches and dunes; it scooped out new inlets and filled others, permanently transforming the coastline. The surge smashed hundreds of homes and other structures into driftwood - and then its backlash sucked entire settlements into the sea.
At Whale Rock, just off the shore of Watch Hill, it toppled the sturdy lighthouse, carrying the assistant keeper to his death in the depths. Reaching the mainland at Watch Hill, it split the yacht club in two, and  a piano came flying twenty feet into the air.

Storm surge, New Jersey coast, '44 Hurricane:
The blackness of the wild night was broken by the snow-white surf that swept in to explode in clouds of spray over the boardwalk as it scoured out gaping holes in Ocean Avenue. The distance between the troughs and crests of the larger waves was unreal. Imagine wading in normal surf, then shrinking to one-quarter your stature. Far, far out, the high-rolling combers would rise to foam-capped peaks of 30 to 40 feet, then break into proud smiles as they came roaring in toward you, swallowing up the smaller waves in immense fields of seething, smoking foam that would then merge with the rain flooded streets, turning them into torrents.
One of these waves uprooted a section of the boardwalk, lamppost and all, where the Coast Guardsman stood, and swept him two and a half blocks down Beacon Boulevard. Deciding to call it a day, he jumped off and sloshed another few blocks to his home.
Others were not so fortunate. Mrs. Marques, an elderly woman who lived in a house nestled between big sand dunes on Long Beach Island, refused to leave with the Coast Guardsmen who offered her shelter at their station in Holgate. ("I've been through many storms before, and I'm not worried about this one.") The next morning, where her home had been was nothing but a stretch of sand. The dunes, the house, and the woman had been swept from the face of the Earth.

Great Appalachian Storm of 1950:
... the storm was to many an exciting dream as they watched from the safety of windows and front porches. The few lingering red and yellow autumn leaves flew against the darkening wisps of the wind-ripped clouds, while the rain, "like sheets of glass," winged down the streets.
Some ventured out, joining neighbors and total strangers at street corners to watch and hear the wind blow in from the ocean in its mysterious way, first with great force down one street, and then as the mortals ducked for cover behind thick holly trees, down their street, each time bending the trees ever lower. Then trees a block or so away reared their darkly twisting forms to face the next, even higher gust.
Troubled souls were briefly released from their problems, their longings, their grief and their heartaches and, losing their inhibitions, talked, laughed, and swapped yarns with friends they had just met, or strangers they had seen, but never spoken to. Some people are rescued in a storm - others are rescued by one.