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Winter storm causes more than a hundred car accidents
Officials in Houston, Texas, have warned people to prepare for interruptions and dangerous roads due to a winter storm.
USA TODAY, Storyful
An ‘unprecedented’ winter storm continued its attack on the country Monday, leaving millions of people without power in Texas and causing great devastation in the central and southern US due to the heavy snow and ice.
As of Monday morning, more than 150 million people were in a winter storm warning or winter weather forecast in 25 states, which stretched more than 2,000 miles from southern Texas to northern Maine, the National Weather Service said.
Bitter, record-breaking cold accompanied the storm in the central US. Hundreds of daily record low temperatures are or will be broken during this prolonged ‘polar dive’, the weather service said, ‘with a low record of February and even endangering all the time. ‘According to the Capital Weather Gang, more than 50 million people could see the temperature drop below zero over the next few days.
Power outages were widespread on Monday. In Texas alone, more than 2.3 million customers were in the dark at 8 a.m. local time, according to poweroutage.us, a utility tracking site.
From Sunday: More piles on icy roads, power outages than snow, bitter temperatures fueled by polar vortex, bring great damage to the country
Rotary power outages were initiated Monday morning by the Texas Electric Reliability Council, or ERCOT, meaning thousands were left without electricity for short periods as temperatures dropped near Dallas and Houston in their teens.
“We call on Texans to put safety first,” the council tweeted, urging residents to reduce electricity consumption. ERCOT controls the flow of electric power in the state.
Houston, where the temperature was in the 70s last Tuesday, read in the teens on Monday morning and officials had to advise residents to prepare for dangerous roads that may be similar to those experienced after a Category 5 hurricane.
In Texas, the storm could truly be a ‘one-off generation’ event if taken into account in the devastatingly cold conditions, AccuWeather meteorologist Brandon Buckingham said.
The polar vortex, explained
Temperatures in the Midwestern world are nearing record lows, while a powerful pulse surge is driving a deep freeze over the eastern half of the United States. The bitter cold will bring a quarter of the continental US below zero temperature.
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Thundersnow reported as early as Monday as far south as the Gulf Coast in Galveston, Texas, and Lake Charles, Louisiana, Weather.com reports.
Greg Abbott, Governor of Texas, Governor of Oklahoma, Kevin Stitt, and Governor of Arkansas, Asa Hutchinson, have activated the National Guard units to assist state agencies with tasks, including rescuing stranded drivers.
In a statement Sunday night, President Joe Biden also declared a state of emergency in Texas and ordered federal aid to help state and local response efforts. The statement enables the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Emergency Management Agency to coordinate disaster relief and provide assistance, equipment and resources to those affected by the storm.
Although the snow had to fall across Texas on Monday, the snow and
icy rain is forecast to move north from the Mississippi and Ohio valleys to the northeast on Monday, the weather service said. “According to the weather service, a large amount of snow from 6 to 12 inches of snow is forecast from the Ohio Valley and the eastern Great Lakes to the north of New England.”
Texas hammered with rare snow and ice
A winter storm brought snow and ice deep into Texas, creating winter scenes in areas not known and causing many roads to collapse.
Accuweather
FlightAware reported 2,700 canceled flights across the country for Monday and nearly 150 delays. Another 500 cancellations are forecast for Tuesday. The George Bush International Airport in Houston closed Monday morning due to ice accumulation on runways.
Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of people in the Northwest Pacific have been left without power after a winter storm covered the region with ice and snow over the weekend, making the trip treacherous. About 300,000 people were powerless in Oregon alone, reports poweroutage.us.
Unfortunately, a second winter storm hitting the Northwest on Monday will bring more snow and ice to parts of the South, Middle East and East later this week, Weather.com said.
Contributing Contributions: The Associated Press