You've heard of lake-effect snow in the Great Lakes. Check out what a larger sea and bitter cold air helped to generate in parts of Japan.

Sign up for the Morning Brief email newsletter to get weekday updates from The Weather Channel and our meteorologists.Without the images, it might be hard to wrap your mind around the amount of snow blanketing the island of Hokkaido in northern Japan.

Heavy snowfall continued Wednesday along the Sea of Japan coast as the season's strongest cold front disrupted rail services in central Japan and air traffic, with the weather agency warning of more snow toward the weekend.