they canceled the flight. then ty rebooked me on a fght for this morning which also got canceled. >> repoer: and atlanta's hartsfid. >> i'm rolledack to the 3:40 flights. > reporter: it kocked out electricity t tens of thousands up and do the east cot where crewsre working to store powe >> i used to like snow. i'not sure i like it anymore. >> reporter: it wasn't l misery. fo children seeking shelter from the srm, the smiles tell their stor >> reporter: just a fe residual snow flake he in the boston suburbs as the snow go down, you nice theoadways are clear of snow and ice. a complete turn-around for this orning. after lunch time, just about everybdy came out of their shell. at logan airport which was next ficially closed, flhts are taking off and landing. they re expected torun as much a fu schedule as ssible. and our team coverage in thought continues. the problem is not so much snow but someeally fierce nds. they were tosng around trees and pulling down power lines. derrick ward is in 97 washington with more on this. >> reporter: as you said, trees, power lines, even fires we all fected by this high wind. couple that with the low temperatres and make it ver ncomfortable and sometimes downright dangerous. what did it make for firefighters a utility workers was a very busy day. it was high winds that kept firefighters busy day. ocking down utility fires and fanning ame across the city. among most serious, a fire on holbrooke street. it started in first floor apartment and ultimately dispced four families in a four-unit building. >> of course the win conditions fueled the fire. there was aot of personal possesons in the apartment, clutter, i you will that contribute to the fuel load in this particular uni >> reporter: not far away, e wind took the of off the building ithe 1200 bck of h street. in northwest, dowd power lines caused problems. >> the wire came down on a chain link fence, energized the fence, caught some wood stkade. the homeowner started experiencing power problem inse his home. by the time i got out, it aught fire. it started at the post coming toward the postal there wa a brush fire there and there. >> reporter:he said he call pepco whenthe fire started and th fire department waited until they came. >> i wt in the house. smoke every where >> reporter: that home oer did the rht thing. when por lines are down, your caution leve should go up. >> you have to sume the line is energized. what we call a live wire. itan be very dangerous. treat all t wires that you see wn as live a dangerous. d call 911 and either we'll comeut or pep cloe respond. bu it is an emergency sittion that's dangerous. stay away. >> reporter: again, that's part othe problem fire companies experienced. onef the things a fire needs to go is oxygen. we're live in northwest. back to you. >> derrick ward, thank you. pepco sa almost 800 people ar without powe the southern maryland electric company repor a handful of people without power. domion says oh 200 people are without power in northern virginia. whilehe immediate mro area was mosy spared from this snow, some areas are digng out this morning. in maryland, workers are treating those streets. one driver told us underneath a couple inches of snow, they are removing ice. since the forecast h call for more snow, road crews d pretread most of the major roads beforetoday's rush. still some side streets always as usual a tricky. doug kammerer joins us now tell us when is this wind going to subside? >> probably by tomoow ening. we'll see the winds 30 to 40 miles an hour. today we've seen wind of 40 to 50 miles an hour. that's why we have that wind advisory that haseen in effect all day and will continue until 9:00tonight. did hit a wind gust of 52 miles an hour. winchester, 48 mles an hour. ully martinsburg, west virginia. fwhin baltimore an la plata with a wind gust o 35 miles an hour. that sure does maket appeal the cold out the. as far as t snow, we definitely missed this one. i-95 corridor to the west. le than an inch of snow. half an inch tward reagan national airport. one to three into portns of southern maryland, three to six nk tort toward saint mary's county. s you move toward the east, over a foot. ocean city with 13 inches. over 13 inches of snow. around our immediaterea, it w saint mary's county that got the bulk ofhe snow. any time you have the wind, look at is. leonardtown seeg the 30 t 40-mile-an-hour winds picking up that snow. that's wh snow like that isso hard to keep off the roads. the kids, they're enjoying it. doing a little sledding across the area. that's a pretty nice hi. not bad a all. as far as the weather is concern, what wil we be seeing the goodews is that storm system is way out hre and it will continue to move out. thing will start to getack to normal for s. we'll stayith the cold and the wind for one mo day. then i have some very good news coming up in my full forecast. i'll have that comingup a little later. trying catch a plane tond fr almost any airport along he east coast was miserable toay. those stos caud thousands of ancellations and delays. the airports binning to open their runways. those include of course, had laguaia, jfk and newark. teterboro, new jersey, also delaye chris gordon now at national airport with more on the stry there. >> reporter: we have wnd but thas not the problem. it is cold but that's not t problem either. delays and cancellatio. these the problem >> check in only if yore canceled. >> reporter: all of the people in this long line at reagan national airport had flights canceled because of the snowstorm th crippled the northeast. >> we ha to get to boston for afuneral. and we started in tampa. tama, florida. we're on our way to boston. we went to dulles, taking a cab from dulles to reagan. taking a flight hopefully from trying providence and then a car from providence toboston. >> i'm trying to go to atlanta >> air transhasn' answered the phone in two days. >> porter: some passenger slept to pass thetime. others rushed aroun this groupegan the day in trinida hopscotching through the sky, lanng in dulles on the way toew york. >> weended up going to jamaica first. then we were ready to end. about 15, 20 minutes from land. they said we to go with philadelphia. then they said, no, we won't to go philadelphia. we'll too dulles. >> reporter: this the fight song of james madison university. 375 members of the band, the marching royal dukes, are trying to get to london for theew yers parade. it a good thing they'reull have fight because it will be tough going. >> it looks like we'll be here at least until torrow and hopefully we'll be o of her by wednesday. >> repter: where will you stay? >> i don't know yet >> we have a bunch of fights at jfk and bwind everyone is stuck right now. ♪ >> reporter: okay. here's the update here at reagan national. i just looked at the board. there e no departures to w york stifl ho the first arrival om laguardia is expected to arrive here at 6:3 some people nted to avoid those days at the airports but they found the buss and amtrak weren't much better. mega bus canceled all service and there was day on amtrak. train service started back up. all sense btween penn staying and new jersey has been suspended due to signal problems. st with news4 for continuing coveragef the mess. in the next half-hour, we'll have full rert. tlk about some football now. after the win last naight. one of the skinplayers got in trouble with the law. lindsay, who and at? >> reporter: threeays after being promoted from the practice squad, joe joseph found himself in police custody. around 3:00 this morning, he was arrested for dui after officers resnded to a report of a sine car accident. oseph made his nfl debut yesterday against the jaguars. the redskins signim to the practice squadon december 15th. theyromoted him to their activeroster over the weekend. the head coh mike shanan is reserng comment. >> theirst thing i do, i'll have a chance to ta to joe. i don't know his circumstances, exactly what happened. i'll make a statement afr i talk with him. reporter: we'll have more on the redskins' win cing up in sports. coming up, investitors have figured out what sparked million-dollar storage fire in irfax. >> is she breatng? >> we don'tknow. reporter: a young mother, aspiring del, found dead. we'll take a look back at police have reased part of the 911 call whe a woman was ound dead. they had been dating forbout a year. the woman was 27 years old. a mother, an aspiring actress. she was found dead in sch's house in missouri on sunday police say a member of the hse staff, his nam is michael young, called 91 when he found martin a couldn't wake her up. >> this girl is not wake up. >> is she breathing? >> i'm gong to get a light and try to see. >> the medicalxaminer said there were no obvus signs of eier trauma or disease. they say it will ta up to six weeks for the relts of the toxicology report. eight americans on a tour of ancient yptian temples were kill over the week when their tour bus crashed into a parked uck. this happed just before dawn sunday. as the bus drove to an historic site. as martin fletcher reports, the roads in that area are known for being dangerous. >> reporter: those roads tough the desert can be deadly. they're long, narrow, poorly mainined, people drive w to fast and truck often park with one set of wheel on the tarmac so theywon't getstuck on the sand. it was dark, about 5:15 in the morning. the bus drivewith the american tourist must have seen the parked truck way too latest sideswiped and it tore off the entire right side of the bus. almost all the passengersn the right side of the bus were killed or injured. >> i can remember hearing it and the big blank and gettng showered with glas and then the bus spinning around and so i took my eye shades off and i could see the side of the b was gone. >> reporter: there were two other buses of american tourists following. 116 arican tourists in all. everybody in those buses were okay. this is a very bu tourist road, too. the road lick twos great sites. they have beautiful very important ancient temples. as a mter of fact, this is the third such crash in three months. a total of 22ourists killed since october the director of tourism said she didn't think it woulhave any effect on tourism. >> officia have not released the name of those killed. the east coastblizzard could affect post holiday sales. and doug come back with a look at the forecast. >> reporter: good evening. volume has been lit around the rion but we had an know. it is still ongoing just after route 7. single file to get by at this point and here there delays them begin out maryland as you leave 270, towardhe accint. and agen and as you can see, it is jammed up. in india, some villagers went to well to get som water. they look down and that' what they saw. a opard trapped in there. they called the forestry official. the came and tied a rope around the leper to help pull him out of there. is was not aneasy thing to do. in fact, it tookhemtwo hours to get it out. theyinally did. >> that leopard didn't realize ho lucky it was to be rescued. hard to explain that to a cat. when are we getti some help fr all this wind? it just about knk you off your feet. >> it really es. you say when will it change? not until next year. fortunately that' only five days awa how about that? >> you've bewaiting all day. >> since8:30 this morning. it will get a lot better tard the endf this yar and the begiing of next year. we have to get through rather cold period. nothi like what theyaw there toward nw york. how, look at this in times square. this is just amazing. a shot right now atimes square, bustling cy. this is probably one of the busiest interceptions in th coury. and they are dealing with plenty of snow. reported 20 inches ofsnow. the fifth biggest snowfall total ever in theity ofew york. how about that? 50-mile-an-hour winds to go ong with that snow. and how about down to the south? we saw it fromll sides. to the sou, the east, out to e north. this was down to the south sterday around norfolk. some areas there received six to 12 inches of snow as wel they don't see a lot of snow in this region of theory and this region of the state. and they definitely got it from this storm. the good news for them, it will warm up dratically over the next couple days the. live radar around our reon, nothing worry abt. no ra, no snow across our region. the big thg to deal with will be the wind. those winds have been howling during the day. our cameras have en sheikh all day long. atreagan national airport, things starting to get a little better under control. high temperature, 37 degrees. a low of 27. the average high this time of year, and for the whole month of december, isn the mid to upper 40s. 15 of 27 days so far have been the 30s or below. we had two days with temperatures in the 20s. right now, this is the coldest december we'veeen in about ten years. andt is going to continue to be col for just the next o or two days. 34 degrees, the current temperature. dupe, 11. thatakes humidity at 38%. very, very dryatmosphere. the windchill at 24 grees. it is not just th wind. it is the wind gusts. 30 degrees, the current tempature. 28 in hagerstown. 31 in sterling. out toward quantico. we're looking at a temperatu of 33 degrees. the wind advisory does continue until 9:00 tonight. we're still seeing those winds gusting upwards of 40 miles an hour. here's the latt wind, guing to 40. 24 fred rifg 43n sterling. reston as well. 25 toward quantico and 35-mile-an-hour wind gusts around la plata. the winds gusting to 30, 40 miles an hour will continue through the portion of the night and then i think we'll slow down to 20 to 30miles an hour by the time we make our way into tomorrow morning. we'll dealing with windchills. 16 in sterling. 21 in manassas. in the distri. i expect winhills about ten degrs as you wake up. ere goes the storm syem. it is outf here. and look how strong this stm is. a classicor'easter that made its way up the coast. fortately for us, it moved to the south, out tosea and then ma a bee ne toward new york city before fially making its way toward te eat. what is everody dealing with? everybody across the eastern half of the natiocontinues to deal with what we've been dealingwith. 15 in chicago, 27 in cincinatti, 23 in detroit. the air right now flowing out of the northwest. we'll see a pattern change. it won't be tonight, it won't be tomorrow. windy and very cold conditions contie. it will be this area of high pressure that will settle in during the day. our winds will subside. it will be cold but without the wind, itill feel better. as the high moves closer to the area, look at this. some mild airaking its way in. we have not see 50 degrees since the first of themonth. deember 1. we saw 65. and after hat, the temperature fl throughout the day on that december 1 day. we have not seen 50 once again this month. we will see it once again on friday. clear skies, very windy and very cold. way to 32 degrees tonight and through the evening hours. tomorrow morning, mostly clear skies, breezy and cold. a windchill near 10 as you step ut the door. as y make your way through the day tomorrow, mostly sunny, windchills in the 20s. 35 to8 degrees with those winds guing to 30. maybe 35 miles an hour but t quite the 40, 50 miles an hour we saw during the day today. here's the warm-up. 41 on wednesday. 44 on thursday. friday, the last day 2010 will be the nicest day we've seen the entire month of december. how about that? we're spaying at 47 degrees. that does not say a lot about the month. there you go,emperature into the 50s. tha's ahead of another storm system that will bring temperatures ino the 50s on sunday. a good chance of rain la saturday work into sunday and then monday. next week loing coole it does look like the month of january will be a t war. er than the month of december was. that's a very nice forast. >> we'll haveomething celebrate. very much so. the east coast blizzard has rand people other places than the airports. >> and a major snowstorm missed us in d. but travelers around the region are still feeling the efcts. if you're getting t of town b the roads or rails, i've got your travel update comingup. family and friends of student who was murdered want her memory to live on. and a mother is making a plea to a hit-and-rudriver. >> reporter: ming up in sports, me shanahan says i there's a rick, he will take it. and the transformation he lots of people still digging ut after a mor snowstorm. in central park today, 20 ches reported inew york city. the fifth bigges storm the. >> that snow forced all thre of neyork's airports to close down. now laguardia, jfk, newark airports have since reopened. it cou be days before they so everything out. >> in our area, strong winds knock down power lins. firefighters stay winds made it ifficult to fight fires across the city, including th one that happenslong holbrooke street i northeast d. >> the travel delays we not limited to theairports. some decided itould be better to drive or take the train. >> b that did not really help all that much. john schriffen is now -- he will tellus now about h conversion with some very frustrated tralers. >> repter: with luggage in hand, some travelers hed to geout of town by taking the mega bus in downtown d.c. surprised passenger were greed by this handwritten sig saying, all service today iscanceled. >> i have to be home. have to be to wo in the morning. >> reporter: when are you goi to do? >> ion't know. i guess i hav to leave tomorrow or whenever. i don't know. reporter: mega bus said it canceled all the routes a safety precaution e to the poor conditions of the roas. drivers we spoke to coming home on i-95 south undstand why. this family was in he middle of the snstorm last night. >> we were coming from north carolina, trying to go to new york. and we had to turn aroundight before we got to delaware. >> reporte what was it like? >> my goodness. we were all over the roads. >> reporter: many we spo to decided to spend last night ia hotel. an venture out onhe highways this morning. >> they were clearer than what i expected they would be. it is hard toee the on and off ramps. the gps telling to you get off the exit andou don't see the the it. you're on top of it. it is a little scary. >> reporter: and travelers trying to escape the roads didn't have much better luck here at union staon. all morning because of t snow weeceived in boston and knocking, travelers saw trns that were either delayed or anceled altogether. but as of 12:00 this afternoo things in d.c. started clearing up. >> reporter: people can go online and check the statu of the train. but for passenger like doug who had his train canceled this morning, getting back to snork up ithe air. >> then'm on standby and hopefully i will get my train. fingers ossed. >> reporter: many decid to rent a car and drive instead. he id even though it has seen an increase in the nber of one-way rentals, if you do need to rent a car in the washington region, therere plenty still available. johnschriffen, news4. amtrak officials said they have fixed the problems that suspended service earlier this morning. but passengers still should expe about delays before an hour to an hour and a half. halogen lights at a store spark massive fire in herndon. started yesterday in wint of the storage uns on the fist floor. the second floor collapsed just after firefighters escaped. the fire caused more than $1.5 million in damage. and ahoarder died in fire at a nome d.c.'s dupont circ neighborhoo just before 11:00 last night. it started atan apartment on "s" strt. firefighters sa efforts to rescue the woman werelowed because sheoarded and they have had problem getting in the door. the fire was startedby smoking materias. the victim has not been identified. the mther is asking for hel in the effort to find the driver who ran over her dauger and killed him. it happed in the 5200 block of marlboro pe in capitol heights last esday. alexandria was cssing the road to meet her mother at a bus stop when she was hit. jane watrel ha our report. >> reporter: alexandria was a happy teen who loved to dance and listened to r & b singer chris brown. the high school fresh han had two older bthers and a very close relationship with her mom. >> she liked baking cookies, we cook breakfast, yep. >> rorter: after breakst, alexandria would walk with her mother to this bus stop. often meeting her there in the evenings, as well. i see her every day wither mom. >> report: her mom would come up to meet her here? >> eve day. >> reporter: around 6:30 as the 14-year-old wastrying to cross the 500 block of marlboro pike to meet her mom at the bus stop, she was hit by two cars. policesay the dver of the first car stopped and tried to help alexander re. a he tried to direct traffic aroundher. when all of a sudden, a second car came up, ran the girlover, and kept gog. >> reporter: the 14-year-old was rushed to a nearby hospital but die a short time ter. a communicate is outraged. they say trying to cross marlboro pike is frightening. even at marked cross walks. more lighti is needed and the hit-and-run driver needs to turn hielf in. >> [ inaudible ] all i got to say, man up to what you did. >> reporter: alexandria's mother said the rotc and hor roll student deseed better. >> they would not wanto it happen t their child, a child, a moer, a husband, a brher. say something for it toappen like that. just laying there in the middle of the stet. >> reporter: a life cut short. jane watrel, news4 the police prince george's say they don't have a description of that hit and run drive right now. there offering a reward for information that leads to tips. family and friends honored a student murderedsix months ago. dozens of people gathered to dedicate abench. this is in the vienna town green. she wasfound stabbed to death in her c along rou 50 in the middle of the afternoon. her killer has not been found. a formerontgomery county police sergeant has been sentenced for padding her time sheet with shifts that she did ot work. 39-year-o jacqueline davy pleaded guilty for cheatin the countyut of $21,000. e was found guilty of fely eft. >> in 2009, police department officials discovere fraudult time sheet etries on sergeant davies' time sheet. a deeper inquiry discovered they went back to january 2008. >> the sergeant was orderedto pay $5,000 in restitution. coming , honorinthe life of r & b ic teenamarie. >> a fire and rescue missio >> apparently if >>a again. at ast we aren't talking about snow. it is just the cold air andhe wind as well. 34 drees, the current tempature in washington, d.c. 30 i ederick. sterling at 31 degrees. kwanco aroun 33. you d in the wind, 22 in quantico. it feelslike 16 in sterling baltimore coming in with a windchill of 22 degreess well. overnight, teeratures into the 20s. yet again, and it will st windy. wel wake up to a temperature around 24 degrees. b do i expect the windchill to around 10 degrees. tomorrow will be a very windy d cold day. a couple tngs to note, we will be warmer toward the end of the week and the days are now getting longer. >> we like that. thanks. music loversand others are mouing the loss tonight of r & b mic iconteena marie. ♪ >> she died sun afternoon ather home in he sleep in pasadena, california. cording to teenamarie's publicist, s was recovering from a seizure suffered last onth. teen marie had a lasting legacy. she was the first white act to be signed byrincipally black motown in 19. they were not all that qufl that wh they released her first album, it was call wild and peaceful. they did so without her photograph on the cover. she we on to develop a silky and soulfu sound that wasruly unmatched. she was arguably among th st gifted and respected eens of soul music. she was 54 when she died. we've got sports. >> the redskins aren't going but other team are talking about it. the redskins' offense isn't greatut they know how to get the jo done. and me shan i guesshere comes a point in a lot of football players' season when you do one of two things. you eitherlay for the postsson or you play to have a b next season. >> exactly. you're playing with that vacation ima in frontf your mind. hofully they improved on sunda they're all still in this for the fight and they know because of wh mike shanahan has dne with mcnab and some other players, that they'd better show up a give it their all. or they can lose their jobs. >> exactly. with one gae left, this is now officially an evaluation process. no secret, mike shanahan is usinghis time to really take a good look at rex grossman's potential as a starting quarterback. he finished 1 of 39 f 182 yards in sterday's win. but shanahan added, it was good until he was picked off just befo that. rex ossman was playg decent in the first half but wasn really getting the help he needed from his teammates. chris cooley with 72 catches this season, dropped four passes including thisne in the end zone. it w right there. it would have been a beautiful thing. gross man fell apart befo halftime when his pass was intend. mike shanahan added today, after that mistake, he tought grosan never quite got it back together. theottom line, strong performances wereeeded on offense. >> it is one of those offenses that may take a while. a then boom, we're hot. we need to play more consistent in between our streaks of playing low and offense. >> set to drop a couple balls. is unfornate for me. aggravating a week. >> if u look at it onhe positive side, i was able to get a couple first downs. the one ended on is on the nfl blooper ree. there's noeason i'll be that happy about it. >> embarraing, s, but he needs to let himlf off the hook. he is on pace with 72 catches. it wi be the secondmost in his career. in 08, the last time he played l 16 game, he finished with 83. he is stil having aeason up to his potential. >> that was not normal. >>no. slightly inversed. >> no one is ever going to fault mike shanahan for being indecisi. he said if it is for you and ne, he would go for it. something they made good on. the redskins needed to rush themselves. they are 6-10 sothe game was tied. they decided to go for and it the skins delivered. and overork into the end zone. take the lead. >> the coac had my number. i wanted to rform. they made it easy for us. >> i wanted to go for it. i knew we had to get the touchdown. we couldn't leave it up to the fie goal. ty got probablyne of the bestn the league. we all knew we had to get a touchdown andhat's all we preached in the huddle. >> the chances are for you and one, il be going r it on 90% of the tim i just mademy rsonality. if we don't make it, we can stop them in three plays, we'll get ball in positi to kick the field goal. that's just me. >> mi shanahanand the redskins mig have a little advantage nt week because of weathr. next up, the giants at 4:15.m. instead of 1:00. th giants are still suck in wisconsin bcause of yesterday's izzard in new york. they're in a must-win decision and they need some help. yesterday they took on the ckers and they were awful. tom kaufman, not a happy camper. is players don't want toee hill get this fired up. aaron dgers back missing from last weekith a concussion. toe middle to gordie nelson. and nelson says it is good to have you back. yards after the catch. the packers went up. no interceptions. meanwhile, eli manning. here. the eagles clinched the nfc east. so green bay controlled its own playoff destiny. ifhey win sunday against the bears, they're in. elshere in the nf the 49ers ha fired their head coach, mike singletary. they will miss the playoff for the eighth straigh season and a couple programmingnotes. the sund night game between the kings and eagles, that has been stponed. it will kick off tomorrow nigh right heren nbc 4. an next week's game between the rams and shawks which will decide the nfc west has been moved to sunday night football. do you follow me? >> i've gout so far. >> sounds good. the capitals are gearing up for their match-up with the pengui and in time they're returning to their winning ways themselves play one more game before traving to pittsburgh at heinz eld. it continu throughou the weekend both day andnight. ta a look at this video. ere are concerns about the weatheror the new years day winter classic. temperaturesre expected to be the 50s. he concern is rain which could reeze instantly caing an uneven surface. it could be postponed or delayed. it is expected to go ons scheduled. as w continue leading up to the big win classic. time to meet one of the biggest asse sets. >> my name is brook. number 21. the toughestguy, johner 69. he is a comtitor, someone you don't want to cros i get the stanley cup for the day, i would lethem enjoit, a barbecue at the house, probably have a road hockey game. sething to play for. bruce bood roe reminds me, i don't know who. he is ique and humble and entertaining. you never knowwhat you're going to get. i don't think there ar a lot of people like that. >> i don't know. i really like to play hockey so i guess playing hockey. >> he c't wait to play in the winter classic. that will be saturday, new years day. we'll be the bringing you the coverag brooks laich after t cap lost lat year, fixed a fas tire on the side of the road. remember that? >> they took cell phone picture. >> they were very excited. then who is this guy? coming up, retairs trying weather the stor andor all you, you can we' not talking about christmas sales, walmart and walgreens are among, are just two of the stores reminding people t spend any leftover ney in their flexible speing accounts. some stores are now using prominent signs and special w pages so tat consumers kn their fsa dollars eire at the end of the year. next year, over the counter dications, for example, will t be fsa eligible exenses. despite a steady unemployment rate, retailers are having their best holiday sales in years and even the blizzard can'tstop the red hot sale season. brian mooretakes a look. >> reporter: it has been a huge holiday sale season and retailers are lookingto end 20 in the blac the whiteout on the east coast isn't helping but not ev old man winter can stop a die hard shopper. >> ultimately, we tnk the blizzard won'tave a tragic effect on the retail industry. if anything, it might just displace some of theales that we wouldave sustain day after christmas a move them later into the week. >> reporter: bargainunters are ck. and thgh a trd of gifts may be going back, stores are expected to ca in on gift cards. >> bought him a ps 3 for christmas. we're shopping fo him. >> reporter: the bggest boom was online where sales jumped 15%. >> we've seen conspicuous consumption come back. people are willing to ligh their hous. >reporter: cars were back on e ligs and so were pickup trucks. >> the economy is starting to recover. small business is back. there's sense with the consumer that thingre getting better. >> reporter: u.s. retailers ending the year with a bang, and some serious bargains. brian ore, nbc news, washington. >> oicial sale figures won't be out until late next week but they have ready revised the estimates and revised it wards. >> anything change since last we talk? >> yes. >> no. >> what are the headlines again on the weather? >> still cold, very windy and warming toward tend othe week. that's the best news out of. ts the bestay out of the rest of theear is still to come we're currently at 34 degrees. partly cloudy to mostly clear skies. windchills, 24 with a actual temperatureof 34. still windy and very cold. actual temperatures, to about 28 degrees toward hagerstown. right now toward leonardtown, about four inches of snow. 33 degrees right now. your four day recast, a high of8 degrees. still windy. 41 on wnesday. 44 on thursda and then wha i think will be the best afterno of the month of december, of course, it is ming on the very last dave december. we'll see a high of 47. 2011, we star in the 50s. thearmest temperature in a month. the temperatures wl be falling fter a storm system brings us rain late saturday and into the day on sunday. thanks. couple days ago, a guy in ohio got the besthristmas gift anyone could ever want. he g his life when his anybody ved him from a fi. fire officials near cleveland say brent cruthers went to his neghbor's house the deliver christmas dinner. he had no idea there was a fire raging inside. but when nobody answered the front door, he went around to the back. that's when he saw the flames and the smoke. he push his way in. and reued his neighborho had been sufring from schmoll inhalation. apparentlyhat fire started from food that had been left over on the stove. the guy who wasaved made the point, if his neigor hadn't come to sa him, hadn't me in to take him out, the coner w