Pat Nabong / Chicago Sun-Times via Associated Press
Friends Parker Melowsky, left, 7, and Quinlynn, 6, walk up Cricket Hill, which overlooks the Chicago skyline, in the Uptown neighborhood after a major snowstorm hit the Chicago area, Saturday, Jan. 13, 2024.
Published Saturday, Jan. 13, 2024 | 9:57 a.m.
Updated Saturday, Jan. 13, 2024 | 12:40 p.m.
O'FALLON, Mo. —
A long weekend of ferocious winter weather loomed across the U.S. on Saturday, as a continuing wave of Arctic storms threatened to break low-temperature records in the nation's heartland, spread cold and snow from coast to coast and cast a chill over everything ranging from football playoffs to presidential campaigns.
As the three-day Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday weekend began, the weather forecast for the U.S. was a crazy quilt of color-coded advisories, from an ice storm warning in Oregon to a blizzard warning in the northern Plains to high wind warnings in New Mexico.
“It's, overall, been a terrible, terrible winter. And it came out of nowhere — two days,” Dan Abinana said as he surveyed a snowy Des Moines, Iowa. He moved to the state from Tanzania as a child years ago, but said “you never get used to the snow.”
In Portland, Oregon, medical examiners were investigating a hypothermia death as freezing rain and heavy snow fell in a city more accustomed to mild winter rains, and hundreds of people took shelter overnight at warming centers. Weather-related deaths already were reported earlier in the week in California, Idaho, Illinois and Wisconsin.
In Iowa, some cars were stuck for five hours in blowing snow on Interstate 80 in Iowa, after semitrailers jackknifed in the slippery roadway, blocking traffic and leaving 100 vehicles trapped. Altogether, state troopers had handled 86 crashes and 535 motorist-assist calls since Friday, State Patrol Sgt. Alex Dinkla said.
Road crews were “working the snow-blowers like crazy," Dinkla said, but high winds were blowing snow right back onto roadways.
Governors from New York to Louisiana warned residents to be prepared for worrisome weather.
Parts of Montana fell below minus 30 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 34 degrees Celsius) Saturday morning, and the National Weather Service said similar temperatures were expected as far as northern Kansas, with minus 50 F (minus 46 C) possible in the Dakotas. In St. Louis, too, the National Weather Service warned of rare and “life-threatening” cold.
“We've had, now, multiple back-to-back storms” parading across the country, weather service meteorologist Zach Taylor said. That typically happens at least a couple of times in the U.S. winter.
Still, to Eboni Jones of Des Moines, it felt unusual for “how much we're getting all within one week.”
“It's pretty crazy out,” Jones said while shoveling snow. e.
Des Moines residents Katy Becker, 26, and her fiance, Dalton Gustafson, 30, were hoping to fly to Florida for a trip to celebrate their engagement and Becker’s birthday on Jan. 16. They got snowed in but planned to try again Sunday.
“Negative 20 to 80 degrees — 100 degree flip in temperature,” Gustafson said.
The air temperature in parts of Iowa could dip as low as minus 14 F (minus 26 C) on Monday, when the state's caucuses kick off the U.S. presidential primary season. And that was to say nothing of the wind: Forecasters said it would be Wednesday before below-zero windchills go away.
Republican contenders Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley and former President Donald Trump all canceled weekend campaign events because of the winter storm.
Across the country, power was out Saturday afternoon in hundreds of thousands of households and businesses, mainly in Michigan, Oregon and Wisconsin, according to poweroutage.us.
In South Dakota, the air temperature Saturday morning was minus 17 F (minus 27 C) at the Crow Creek Sioux Reservation, but a whipping wind of 30 mph (48 kph) made it feel like minus 48 F (minus 44 C). With a homeless shelter already at capacity, tribal leaders opened a gym for others needing shelter.
In New York state, Gov. Kathy Hochul warned of a “dangerous storm” as she announced that the Buffalo Bills--Pittsburgh Steelers NFL playoff game was postponed from Sunday to Monday. Residents of the county that includes Buffalo were told to stay off the roads starting at 9 p.m. Saturday, with the forecast calling for 1 to 2 feet (0.3 to 0.6 meters) or more of snow and winds gusting as high as 65 mph (105 kph).
Kansas City, Missouri, was set to host a frigid playoff game Saturday night, when the Chiefs host the Miami Dolphins. The temperature at kickoff was expected to be minus 2 F (minus 18 C), with the wind making it feel like minus 24 F (minus 31 C).
Still, hundreds of fans lined up hours early outside the Arrowhead Stadium parking lots. Some came outfitted with ski goggles, heated socks and other winter gear they had bought for the game.
Chiefs season ticket holder Keaton Schlatter and his friends had considered trying to sell their seats, as many other fans did.
“But we decided that it’s all part of the experience, and we didn’t want to miss it,” said Schlatter, of West Des Moines, Iowa.
Back in the Des Moines area, Grant Rampton also was making the best of the weather. The 25-year-old was sledding with friends Saturday at a golf course, despite a wind chill of minus 20 F (minus 29 C). He fought off the cold with layers of clothing, insulated socks and constant movement.
“It’s a great state to be in,” said Rampton, a lifelong Iowan. “There’s not as much to do, in winter especially, but you can make your own fun, like out here, sledding with your friends."
___
Peltz reported from New York. Contributing were Associated Press journalists Nathan Ellgren and Mark Vancleave in Des Moines, Iowa; Dave Skretta in Kansas City, Missouri; Julie Walker in New York, Ed White in Detroit, Nick Perry in Meredith, New Hampshire; and Gene Johnson in Seattle.
