Boston ? The Northeast struggled to dig out Tuesday from a paralyzing storm that unloaded up to 4 feet of snow, busted city snow-removal budgets and stranded thousands of people at airports up and down the East Coast.

The storm, blamed for 44 deaths, finally headed out to sea after taking a parting shot at Boston, which got a record of 27.5 inches by the time the snow stopped falling Tuesday morning.

Homeowners and motorists dug out their cars and doorways and toiled to reopen driveways that had been sealed shut by passing snowplows.

“What can you do?” said 38-year-old Brian Shipley of Rockville, Md., standing waist-deep in the mini-canyon he had shoveled in the path to his door. “You dig out and you get ready for tomorrow.”

A few blocks away, acupuncturist Cindy Clark foresaw a lot of sore backs. “There’s going to be more work than I can handle for a long time,” she said, leaning against a shovel in her almost cleared driveway.

Major airports labored to resume service after the biggest snowstorm to hit the Northeast in seven years.

Boston’s Logan International had only about 25 takeoffs and landings an hour, compared with 80 to 90 during a typical weekday. Baltimore-Washington International opened one runway for takeoffs Tuesday morning and the first arriving flight in 2 1/2 days landed during the afternoon.

A woman crosses the street between mounds of snow in New York's financial district. Snow continued to fall on the city Tuesday morning, leaving nearly 20 inches in the city.

Thousands of people expecting to fly home from vacations were stranded at airports in Florida. With Northern airports still catching up Tuesday, airlines could not meet the demand.

“As US Airways explained to us, everyone’s going nowhere fast,” David Kiley said at Baltimore-Washington, keeping watch over a half-dozen 9- and 10-year-olds in wheelchairs who had flown from Charlotte, N.C., to Washington for a basketball tournament. They had spent two nights in a motel.

The storm spread snow from the Plains to New England, caused floods and power outages, and closed schools from West Virginia to Massachusetts. Federal offices remained closed Tuesday in Washington; they were closed Monday for Presidents Day.