(Reuters) – A blast of arctic-chilled air brought dangerous, potentially record-setting cold to a wide swath of the United States on Tuesday, stretching from the Dakotas through to Maine, with snow expected as far south as Alabama and Georgia.
FILE PHOTO: Cars move along a snow-covered road in Denver, U.S., January 22, 2019 in this video grab obtained from social media video by Reuters January 28, 2019. Denver International Airport/via REUTERS
Cities in the Midwest opened warming shelters as temperatures plummeted well below zero degrees Fahrenheit (minus 17.8 degrees Celsius). Regional governments closed hundreds of schools and airlines canceled more than 1,000 flights, including those to Atlanta just days before the National Football League’s Super Bowl.
The Midwest will be the hardest-hit area, with wind chill bringing temperatures down as low as minus 50F (minus 46C) in the Chicago area and northern Illinois by Tuesday evening, the National Weather Service reported.
As much as two feet (60 cm) of snow was forecast in Wisconsin, and six inches (15 cm) in Illinois.
“Listen to the people in your area … We’re taking about what could be a very dangerous situation, especially for those traveling,” NWS forecaster Jim Hayes warned on Tuesday.
He said frostbite was possible within 10 minutes in the intense cold, and that it would take several days for temperatures to increase significantly.
The brutal cold was caused by the polar vortex, a mass of freezing air that normally spins around the North Pole, but has made its way south into the United States.
Washington D.C., Alabama and Mississippi will also experience some snowfall this week, forecasters said.
Parts of north and central Georgia may see about 2 inches (5 cm) or more of snow in the coming days, along with freezing rain and ice-slicked highways. Georgia Governor Brian Kemp shut government offices in 35 counties on Tuesday, and schools across swaths of the state were also closed.
Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines Inc on Monday canceled 170 flights for the city’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport for de-icing efforts ahead of the storm.
Half of the flights out of Chicago’s Midway International Airport were canceled on Tuesday, according to tracking service FlightAware.com.
Blizzard conditions were predicted across parts of the western Ohio Valley and snow was expected through Wednesday from the Great Lakes region into New England.
States of emergency were declared from Wisconsin and Michigan down to Alabama and Mississippi.
Reporting by Rich McKay in Atlanta and Gina Cherelus in New York, Editing by Scott Malone and Bernadette Baum