System bearing lethal cold to put Virginia on ice

MEMPHIS - A late fall cold snap that has gripped much of the country is being blamed for a handful of deaths and has forced people to deal with frigid conditions, power failures by the thousands and treacherous roads.

Weather forecasters said the weather system was to hit Virginia and the mid-Atlantic next.

Temperatures in Montana and South Dakota were more than 20 degrees below zero during the day Saturday while much of the Midwest was in the teens and single digits. Wind-chill readings were to drop as low as 50 below zero in northwestern Minnesota, weather officials said.

Icy conditions were expected to last through the weekend from Texas to Ohio to Tennessee, and Virginia officials warned residents of a major ice storm likely to take shape today, resulting in power failures and road hazards.

In California, four people died of hypothermia in the San Francisco Bay area, and about a half-dozen traffic-related deaths have been blamed on the weather in several states in the past several days.

More than 100,000 customers in the Dallas area were without power Saturday, with about 7,000 in Oklahoma and thousands more in other states. Some 400 departing flights from Dallas/ Fort Worth International Airport were canceled Saturday morning, the airport said. About 3,330 passengers stayed overnight in the terminals.

Icy, treacherous sections of Interstate 35 north of Dallas were closed for hours at a time during the weekend as tractor-trailers had trouble climbing hills, wrecks occurred and vehicles stalled, authorities said.

Jody Gonzalez, chief of Denton County Emergency Services, said about 200 people were in shelters in the Sanger area after getting stuck on the highway. People in that area of I-35 were driving through ruts in 4-inchthick ice, he said.

Texas Department of Transportation spokesman Michelle Releford said road graders and more sand and salt trucks were being sent to try to ease the ice problems.

“We’re sending in everything we’ve got,” Releford said.

A spokesman with the Denton County sheriff’s office said one person died Saturday when a pickup went off an icy Interstate 35 bridge and into Lake Lewisville.

Transportation officials also said a truck pileup on Interstate 10 in West Texas caused long delays and forced officials to divert some traffic toward New Mexico.

The Texas Department of Transportation said the pileup Saturday was from icy conditions on Interstate 10 at mile marker 190 westbound. The site of the accident was about 160 miles east of El Paso and close to the Interstate 20 interchange.

Officials have not said if there were any injuries.

The Oklahoma Department of Transportation said crews were working Saturday to clear highways in northeastern, southeastern and central Oklahoma that were snow-packed and slick after storms that began Thursday dumped snow, ice and sleet on most of the state.

The Department of Public Safety said westbound lanes of Interstate 40 were shut down near the Oklahoma-Arkansas state line for nearly 2½ hours early Saturday after a tractor-trailer rig jackknifed - and the department warned of hazardous driving conditions on I-35 near the Oklahoma-Texas state line.

Freezing rain and sleet were to hit again Saturday night in Memphis, Nashville and other areas of Tennessee before the storm started surging northeast.

In Virginia, state Emergency Management spokesman Laura Southard said the storm had the potential to be a “historic ice event.”

“This forecast is very concerning to us,” Southard said Saturday. “I’ve worked multiple disasters, but I’ve never worked an ice storm with a forecast like this. It’s just really important for everybody to take extra precautions.”

The weather forced the cancellation of countless events, including today’s Dallas Marathon, which was expected to draw 25,000 runners, some of whom had trained for months, and the St. Jude Marathon in Memphis, expected to include 20,000. However, the football game between Central Florida and Southern Methodist in ice-covered Dallas went on in front of a sparse crowd.

Meanwhile, about 7 inches of snow fell in the Missouri boot heel, according to the National Weather Service in Memphis, and 8 to 9 inches fell in parts of southern Indiana. The storm dumped a foot of snow and more in some areas of Illinois, with police scrambling to respond to dozens of accidents and forcing scores of schools to remain closed.

Ice accumulated on trees and power lines in Memphis and the rest of west Tennessee after layers of sleet fell throughout the region Friday, but most roads were passable Saturday.

Ice had built up on the windshields and roofs of parked cars throughout Memphis into Saturday. Law enforcement reported an increase in traffic crashes, and scattered power failures affected more than 3,000 people, emergency and utility officials said.

Residents were told to prepare for a few days without power, prompting them to rush to stores to stock up on groceries, buy electricity generators and gas up cars.

Parts of north Mississippi were under a winter-weather advisory beginning at 6 p.m. Saturday into today as a second wave of freezing rain moved into the region.

The National Weather Service said Saturday that ice accumulations were not expected to exceed one-tenth of inch - enough for motorists to be cautious with overnight temperatures dropping in the upper 20s to near freezing.

Information for this article was contributed by Adrian Sainz, Jamie Stengle, John Raby and staff writers of The Associated Press.