Other forms: blizzards
A blizzard is a violent snowstorm you cannot see through. Caught in a blizzard, blizzard conditions, a blizzard closed the roads.
The defining feature is wind rather than snowfall: a blizzard needs strong wind and low visibility, and can happen with no new snow at all if the wind is lifting what is on the ground. Meteorological services have exact thresholds. Figuratively, a blizzard is an overwhelming quantity arriving at once: a blizzard of paperwork, a blizzard of statistics.
1nounblizzardA violent snowstorm you cannot see through.
“The blizzard closed every road out of the valley.”
2nounoverwhelmingAn overwhelming quantity arriving at once.
“The new law produced a blizzard of forms and paperwork for small businesses.”
blizzard is a storm, or an overwhelming quantity.
unknown, with various theories as below. Compare English blizz (“violent rainstorm”), dialectal English bliz (“violent blow”); one etymology, from Midlands English dialect, seems to be ultimately from Old English blysa (“blaze”). 2
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA
Practised in Nature & Weather, Weather & Seasons