Almost 12,000 flights canceled as major winter storm bears down across much of the US

“What really makes this storm unique is, just following this storm, it’s just going to get so cold,” said Allison Santorelli, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. "The snow and the ice will be very, very slow to melt and won’t be going away anytime soon, and that’s going to hinder any recovery efforts.”

Governors in more than a dozen states sounded the alarm about the turbulent weather ahead, declaring emergencies or urging people to stay home.

“Please use these final hours to be prepared, to make sure that you have blankets and warmth and food to make it through this storm,” Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger said Saturday at a news conference. “And every Virginian should stay off the road as of this evening, all day Sunday, and at least into the morning on Monday.”

The Texas Department of Transportation on Saturday posted images of snow-covered highways in the suburbs north of Dallas. Ice and sleet that hit northern Texas overnight moved toward the central part of the state on Saturday. By mid-morning Saturday, ice had formed on roads and bridges in a third of Mississippi’s counties.

Little Rock, Arkansas, was covered with sleet and snow Saturday morning, giving Chris Plank doubts about whether he would be able to make a five-hour drive to Dallas for work on Sunday. While some snow was a yearly event, he could only recall three ice storms in the previous 20 years that he had lived in Little Rock, and that potential ice concerned him the most.

“All of the power lines are above ground, so it doesn't take very much to end up in the dark,” Plank said Saturday morning.

Forecasters say the damage, especially in areas pounded by ice, could rival that of a hurricane.

More than 119,000 outages were reported across the country Saturday morning, including about 51,000 in Texas, 20,000 in Louisiana and nearly 11,000 in New Mexico, according to poweroutage.us.

All Saturday flights were canceled at Will Rogers International Airport in Oklahoma City, and all Sunday morning flights also were called off, as officials aimed to restart service Sunday afternoon at Oklahoma’s biggest airport.

As of 1 p.m. ET, more than 3,700 flights were canceled Saturday across the country, according to the flight tracking website FlightAware. Almost 8,000 flights were called off for Sunday. Among the hardest hit airports were Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, Nashville International Airport and Charlotte Douglas International Airport.

After sweeping through the South, the storm was expected to move into the Northeast, dumping about 1 to 2 feet (30 to 60 centimeters) of snow from Washington through New York and Boston, the weather service predicted.

“Please, if you can avoid it, do not drive, do not travel, do not do anything that can potentially place you or your loved ones in danger,” New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said Saturday. “Instead, I urge every New Yorker who can to put a warm sweater on, turn on the TV, watch ‘Mission Impossible’ for the 10th time, above all to stay inside.”

Bracing for biggest ice storm in a decade

Officials in Georgia advised people in the state’s northern regions to get off the roads by sundown Saturday and be prepared to stay put for at least 48 hours.

Will Lanxton, the senior state meteorologist, said Georgia could get “perhaps the biggest ice storm we have expected in more than a decade” followed by unusually cold temperatures.

“Ice is a whole different ballgame than snow,” Lanxton said. “Ice, you can’t do anything with. You can’t drive on it. It’s much more likely to bring down power lines and trees.”

Crews began treating highways with brine after midnight Saturday, with 1,800 workers on 12-hour shifts, said Georgia Department of Transportation Commissioner Russell McMurry.

“We’re going to do what we can to keep the ice from sticking to the roads,” McMurry said. “This is going to be a challenge.

Frigid temperatures and ice

Utility companies braced for power outages because ice-coated trees and power lines can keep falling long after a storm has passed.

The Midwest saw windchills as low as minus 40 F (minus 40 C), meaning that frostbite could set in within 10 minutes. The minus 36 F (minus 38 C) reading in Rhinelander, Wisconsin, on Saturday morning was the coldest in almost 30 years.

In Bismarck, North Dakota, where the windchill was minus 41 (minus 41 Celsius), Colin Cross was bundled up Friday in long johns, two long-sleeve shirts, a jacket, hat, hood, gloves and boots as he cleaned out an empty unit for the apartment complex where he works.

“I’ve been here awhile, and my brain stopped working,” Cross said.

Workers from The Orange Tent Project, a Chicago nonprofit that provides cold weather tents and other supplies to unhoused individuals throughout the city, went out to check on those who did not or could not seek shelter.

“Seeing the forecasted weather, I knew we had to come out and do this today,” said CEO Morgan McLuckie.

Mardi Gras and classes canceled, Opry performs without audience

Churches moved Sunday services online, and the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tennessee, decided to hold its Saturday night radio performance without fans. Mardi Gras parades in Louisiana were canceled or rescheduled.

Schools superintendents in Philadelphia and Houston announced that schools would be closed Monday.

Some universities in the South canceled classes for Monday, including the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of Mississippi’s main campus in Oxford.

Government prepares to respond

President Donald Trump said via social media on Friday that his administration was coordinating with state and local officials, and “FEMA is fully prepared to respond.”

Nine states have requested emergency declarations, according to a FEMA briefing document released Saturday. The declarations can unlock federal emergency resources. Trump on Friday approved emergency declarations for South Carolina and Virginia, and requests from Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, North Carolina, Tennessee and West Virginia were still pending as of Saturday morning.

“I think there are two parts of this storm that make it unique. One is just a broad expanse of spatial coverage of this event ... You’ve got 2,000 miles of country that’s being impacted by the storm with snow, sleet, and freezing rain,” said Josh Weiss, a meteorologist at NOAA’s Weather Prediction Center. “The other part of this storm that’s really impressive is what’s going to happen right afterward. We’re looking at extreme cold, record cold.”

Associated Press writers Mike Schneider in Orlando, Florida, Rio Yamat in Las Vegas, Julie Walker in New York and Laura Bargfeld in Chicago contributed to this report. Amy reported from Atlanta and Collins reported from Hartford, Connecticut.