By the CNN Wire Staff

(CNN) -- A freak snow storm that pounded Mid-Atlantic and Northeast states is expected to move out of the United States by Sunday afternoon, leaving residents to grapple with its aftermath.

More than 2 million customers were without power early Sunday morning as throngs of air travelers remain stranded.

"It's like a blizzard -- you can't see far at all," Alban Ajro of Watertown, Connecticut, said Saturday night. "This is the first time that I can ever recall this kind of storm happening before Halloween."

The early onslaught meant heaps of wet snow fell on trees still heavy with leaves -- adding to the risk of falling branches and downed power lines.

At least three deaths are linked to the unusual October snowstorm.

An 84-year-old man was napping on his recliner in Temple, Pennsylvania, on Saturday when a part of a large, snow-filled tree fell into his house and killed him, according to a state police report. With numerous downed trees in the area, rescue crews took two hours to safely remove the victim, police said.

A motorist died in Hebron, Connecticut, state emergency spokesman Scott Devico said.

A third person was killed in Springfield, Massachusetts, when a man in his 20s ignored police barricades surrounding downed power lines and touched a metal guard rail, which was charged, said city fire department spokesman Dennis Legere.

Snow buried parts of New Jersey and New York on Saturday, including 15.5 inches in West Milford, New Jersey, and 12 inches in Harriman, New York. Cities in West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Maryland saw more than 9 inches of snow in less than one day.

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Lauren Tracy of Brooklyn, New York, described the scene around her as "blinding white."

"Snow was coating everything. However, it was a very wet snow -- puddles of slush were everywhere," she said.

But the storm did little to deter Occupy Wall Street protesters, who camped out in tents coated with a layer of snow in New York's Zuccotti Park.

A day earlier, dozens of firefighters removed the group's propane tanks and six generators, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said, citing fire hazards. That left the demonstrators to battle the cold weather seeping through their tents, blankets and sleeping bags.

"Occupy" demonstrators face bite of wintry storm

The governors of New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts issued emergency declarations for their states.

Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy said Saturday evening that 50,000 to 70,000 customers were losing power every hour. Malloy said power crews were not yet on the roads and wouldn't return until road conditions improve markedly.

"If you are without power, you should expect to be without power for a prolonged period of time," he said.

On Sunday morning, the state's largest utility -- Connecticut Light and Power -- reported more than 710,000 customers without electricity.

Elsewhere, about 715,000 customers were without power late Saturday in New Jersey, along with 333,000 in New York, according to figures reported Saturday evening by power companies in those states. An additional 360,000 were in the dark in Pennsylvania, as well as 1,400 in West Virginia.

The number of households without power also included at least 7,000 in Maryland and 6,300 in Virginia.

Meanwhile, frustrated air travelers who endured delays and cancellations will try to get back on course Sunday.

At Bradley International Airport near Hartford, Connecticut, weary passengers helped set up cots distributed to the hundreds stuck there early Sunday.

The stranded included passengers from a New York-bound plane that was diverted to Bradley on Saturday. Passengers from the plane sat on a runway for more than four hours.

On Saturday, all domestic flights out of New Jersey's Newark International Airport were canceled in the late afternoon.

Teterboro Airport in New Jersey closed around 2 p.m. before reopening hours later, the Federal Aviation Administration said. The FAA also reported major delays of up to 5 hours or more at New York's John F. Kennedy and LaGuardia airports.

But the worst should be over for residents across the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast states, as forecasters predict the precipitation will end by late Sunday.

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CNN's Greg Morrison, Sara Weisfeldt, Richard Roth, Elizabeth Cherneff, Susan Candiotti and Ivan Cabrera contributed to this report.