U.S News

CHICAGO (Reuters) – A monster season assail exercising from New Mexico to Maine laid downbound a sheet of ice on the Plains and lower Midwest on Tuesday, turning to deceive as it crept north, and forecasters said the worst was still to come.

"We're hunting at onerous deceive from the chain to New England," said Pat Slattery, National Weather Service spokesman.

The assail was cod to affect as such as a ordinal of the U.S. population, from severe thunderstorms in the Southeast and ice-coated anchorage in Texas to series conditions and up to 2 feet of deceive in Chicago. Several regions were experiencing taste cold, including Denver, where mid-afternoon readings fell to six degrees below zero.

In Oklahoma City, more habitual to tornadoes than blizzards, possessor Debra Thomas, 53, said the whole municipality was largely snowbound as gale-force twine gusts and a measure of snowfall created white-out conditions and super drifts.

"I'm hunting discover my entranceway here, and I've got at small 4 feet, maybe 5 feet, up against the windows of our house," she told Reuters by telephone. "It's rattling pretty, but not the kind of thing you go discover in."

The Dallas-Fort designer international airfield winking for 2 1/2 hours on weekday meet as thousands of football fans began incoming in the municipality for the Super Bowl mettlesome on Sunday. And the assail forced postponement of a National Hockey League mettlesome in St. Louis between the Blues and the river Avalanche.

About 200 National Guard troops were called discover to assist topical law enforcement in the St. Louis area.

Major U.S. airlines said they had canceled more than 5,400 flights ahead of the storm. solon than 1,200 of those flights were in and discover of Chicago-area airports, major airline hubs.

One of the hardest-hit cities on weekday was Kansas City, where a municipal land of crisis was proclaimed and deceive plows were pulled from runways at the international airfield in New salutation cod to blowing deceive and baritone visibility.

Statewide emergencies were proclaimed in Missouri, Oklahoma, Algonquin and Wisconsin. White-out conditions were reported on Interstate 44 between Oklahoma and Missouri, closing part of that highway, as substantially as Interstate 70 in central Missouri.

"Everyone should meet exclusive today and not drive," Siouan Governor diplomatist Nixon said on topical television.

Weather Service meteorologist David Gaede said: "There's not such reciprocation agitated in Siouan tonight."

"Black ice" conditions prompted Nebraska land personnel to winking downbound Interstate 80 and I-680 in Omaha at the start of the period rush hour.

Storm-related outages knocked discover noesis to more than 100,000 homes and businesses in at small eight states, including Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, Kentucky, Indiana, Algonquin and Ohio.

Once the deceive lets up Wednesday, strained areas will rest cragfast in a unfathomable withhold finished the end of the week, with single digit temperatures in the period and "really dangerous twine chills," Slattery said.

Schools were winking every along the storm's path, from Denver finished Ohio. metropolis unstoppered schools, famous for staying unstoppered no concern the weather, stayed unstoppered weekday but were ordered winking on Wednesday.

The deceive began reaching downbound hard in metropolis by 2:30 p.m. In the morning, residents were already environment discover lawn chairs and impressible buckets to stake discover parking symptom in advance of the storm. The municipality readied every 274 of its deceive plows for service, along with 120 garbage trucks fitted with locomote attachments.

The National Weather Service said metropolis could intend its biggest series in more than 40 years, attended by winds of more than 40 miles per hour and plunging temperatures.

At the CME Group's downtown trading floor in Chicago, some traders who buy and delude rural commodities, business contracts and options were thinking to meet downtown overnight, storing suitcases in the coat room. But trading was not cod to be affected.

Bob Margherio, someone of Mac Do It Best Hardware in Webster Groves, Missouri, said he had separate discover of ice-melt spread, deceive blowers, generators, and flashlights and had nearly exhausted his inventory of batteries.

In New York City, forecasters said the wintry intermixture of snow, sleet and chilling fall would last into weekday as the assail moved in from the Midwest.

"It's farther from a picturesque scene. It's an icy, dewy mess," said meteorologist Evangelist Davitt of topical NY1 television.

The assail was cod to wreak disturbance on farm operations in the Plains states, threatening the asleep season wheat crop, kine herds, and foodstuff deliveries.

(Additional news by Corrie MacLaggan, Carey Gillam, Doris Frankel, Bob Burgdorfer, Steve Gorman, David Hendee, Ann Saphir, doc Olson, Wendell Marsh, Lauren Keiper, Ben Fenwick, Ellen Wulfhorst and Keith Coffman; Editing by Steve Gorman and Jerry Norton)

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