Live: ‘Once-in-a-generation’ storm making holiday travel dangerous

Multiple power outages were reported via PEC and Austin Energy Thursday shortly after extreme weather hit the Central Texas area, according to NewsNation affiliate KXAN.

Current outages for the entire country can be found here: https://poweroutage.us/

More than 2,445 flights within, into or out of the U.S. had been canceled as of Thursday evening, according to the tracking site FlightAware. Airports in Chicago and Denver were reporting the most cancelations.

Maria Castaneda, spokesperson for the Illinois Department of Transportation, called the conditions a “1, 2, 3 punch” ahead of the holiday weekend.

Castaneda urged people in Illinois to avoid going out in this weather and warned to watch out for slick ice on bridges, overpasses and ramps.

Castaneda said if you have to be out, make sure you’re dressed for the cold, have a full tank of gas, carrying windshield wiper fluid, have a charged cellphone and make sure people know your destination and the route you’re taking before you go.

FedEx and UPS hubs might shut down, meaning last-minute presents might not make it, the companies said Thursday.

Amazon says delivery dates shown at checkout do factor in the weather forecast.

Kansas Highway Patrol Trooper Chad Crittenden spoke about the conditions on NewsNation’s “Rush Hour” and said “if you don’t have to be out, don’t.”

Crittenden warned of black ice on the roads and how dangerous it can be if you don’t see it.

Bone-chilling temperatures have created an icy mess on the roads in the Kansas City area.

WDAF’s Jonathan Ketz told NewsNation that the wind chill factor makes for dangerous travel conditions. Transportation officials have warned that overpasses, bridges and hills are particularly slick.

WDAF also spotted two vehicles that had flipped onto their sides next to Liberty Hospital in Liberty, Missouri. Fortunately, no major injuries have been reported.

One person has died in Kansas City Thursday after being pulled from an overturned vehicle in Brush Creek, NewsNation affiliate WDAF reported.

Kansas City Fire Department rescue crews responded to the scene at Dr. Martin Luther King Boulevard and The Paseo around 2:20 p.m. for reports of an overturned vehicle in the water.

A winter storm moving across the central United States hit Colorado, whose residents appear to be heeding warnings from state officials. Master Trooper Gary Cutler with the Colorado State Patrol says there’s been little traffic on the roads.

Meteorologist Cheryl Nelson explains the “bombogenesis”process that is expected to develop overnight.

Some shelters in the Detroit area already were at capacity but still making room.

“We are not sending anyone back into this cold,” Aisha Morrell-Ferguson, a spokeswoman for COTS, a family-only shelter, told the Detroit News.

And in Portland, Oregon, officials opened four emergency shelters. In the city’s downtown, Steven Venus tried to get on a light-rail train to get out of the cold after huddling on the sidewalk overnight in below-zero temperatures.

“My toes were freezing off,” he said, a sleeping bag wrapped around his head, as he paused near a flimsy tent where another homeless person was taking shelter.

The frigid air was moving through the central United States to the east, with windchill advisories affecting about 135 million people over the coming days, weather service meteorologist Ashton Robinson Cook said Thursday.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) issued a warning of extremely cold, below-freezing temperatures expected along the Mexico and United States border.

“Do not risk yourself or your loved one’s life trying to cross the Rio Grande or the desert,” the warning states. “Stay home or remain in a safe shelter and avoid tragedy.”

More than 2,156 flights within, into or out of the U.S. had been canceled as of Thursday afternoon, according to the tracking site FlightAware. Airlines have also canceled 1,576 Friday flights. Airports in Chicago and Denver were reporting the most cancelations.

Among those with canceled flights was Ashley Sherrod, who planned to fly from Nashville to Flint, Michigan, on Thursday afternoon. Sherrod is now debating whether to drive or risk booking a Saturday flight she worries will be canceled.

“My family is calling, they want me home for Christmas, but they want me to be safe too,” said Sherrod, whose bag — including the Grinch pajamas she was planning to wear to a family party — is packed and ready by the door. “Christmas is starting to, for lack of a better word, suck.”

Amtrak, meanwhile, canceled service on more than 20 routes, primarily in the Midwest.

Earlier this week, Chicago’s two main airports said they had 350 pieces of snow removal equipment and 400,000 gallons of pavement de-icing fluid on hand for the storm.

With the upcoming weather forecast being so severe, it is important to plan ahead to keep your pets safe as the temperatures drop. NewsNation affiliate WDTN in Ohio shared a few of the Humane Society’s tips to keep in mind when it comes to your pet’s safety during this inclement weather.

Moderate to heavy snow is not too far away and moving into Indiana soon, along with a big blast of arctic air, reports the WANE Live Doppler 15 Fury Storm Team.

Dangerous wind chills were observed across the Portland metro area on Thursday morning, plunging temperatures to zero degrees with wind gusts over 40 miles per hour, the National Weather Service said.

In the Columbia River Gorge, wind gusts topped 85 miles per hour, with a corresponding wind chill of 14 below zero, the agency said.

Such frigid temperatures are unusual for the region, according to Andy Bryant, hydrologist at the National Weather Service’s Portland office. He said temperatures were the coldest they have been since 2014.

“It is rare,” he said. “It certainly doesn’t happen every winter.”

“This event could be life-threatening if you are stranded with wind chills in the 30 below to 45 below zero range,” according to an online post by the National Weather Service in Minnesota, where transportation and patrol officials reported dozens of crashes and vehicles off the road.

More than 1,846 flights within, into or out of the U.S. had been canceled as of midday Thursday, according to the tracking site FlightAware.

Airlines have also canceled 931 Friday flights. Chicago’s O’Hare and Midway airports and Denver’s airport were reporting the most cancelations. Freezing rain forced Delta to halt departures from its hub in Seattle.

Already, roads in rural stretches of western South Dakota were blocked, leaving people stranded with dwindling supplies of food and heating sources.

“It’s just kind of scary for us here, we just kind of feel isolated and left out,” said Shawn Bordeaux, a Democratic state lawmaker, who said he was running out of propane heat at his home near Mission on the Rosebud Indian Reservation because snow drifts made it impossible for a delivery driver to re-supply him.

Michigan State Police prepared to deploy additional troopers to help motorists. And along Interstate 90 in northern Indiana, crews were braced to clear as much as a foot of snow as meteorologists warned of blizzard conditions there starting Thursday evening. About 150 National Guard members also have been deployed to help snow-bound Indiana travelers.

“This event could be life-threatening if you are stranded with wind chills in the 30 below to 45 below zero range,” according to an online post by the National Weather Service in Minnesota, where transportation and patrol officials reported dozens of crashes and vehicles off the road.

In Montana, temperatures fell as low as -50 at Elk Park, a mountain pass on the Continental Divide. Several ski areas announced closures Thursday because of the extreme cold and winds. Others scaled back offerings. Schools also closed, and several thousand people lost power.

Denver, also no stranger to winter storms, was the coldest it has been in 32 years on Thursday, when the temperature dropped to -24 in the morning at the airport.

Amtrak has canceled service on more than 20 routes, primarily in the Midwest. Service between Chicago and Milwaukee, Chicago and Detroit, and St. Louis and Kansas City, Missouri, was suspended through Christmas Day.

Watch: Dr. Jeremy Cauwels, Chief Physician at Sanford Health in Sioux Falls City, South Dakota, discusses the dangers of frostbite and the risk of hypothermia from exposure to cold temperatures.

Read more here.

Chicago is bracing for a wind chill into -30 degree territory as the area experiences a so-called bomb cyclone.

Watch as NewsNation affiliate WGN’s Chip Brewster and News Nation meteorologist Gerard Jebaily discuss the science behind our nation’s weather and take a look at the long-range outlook.

President Joe Biden has warned Americans to take seriously a storm that is spreading severe cold, snow and wind. He said Thursday in the Oval Office that “this is not like a snow day when you were a kid.”

The NHL postponed two games scheduled for Friday because of a major winter storm that began rolling across the eastern two-thirds of the U.S. and Canada, bringing blizzard conditions and bone-chilling temperatures.

Buffalo’s home game against Tampa Bay was postponed on Wednesday, and a day later the NHL postponed Detroit’s visit to Ottawa until Feb. 27.

So far Thursday, more than 1,700 flights are canceled and more than 2,600 are delayed across the nation, according to FlightAware.

Get the latest here.

As Scott Sabol, a meteorologist at NewsNation affiliate WJW, explains, a blizzard is “three straight hours with winds at 35 mph sustained, not gusts” with falling and/or blowing snow that causes “visibility to drop under a quarter of a mile.”

The tidbit that may come as a surprise is snow does not have to be falling the entire time for a blizzard to occur and there is no specific temperature that must be hit to qualify.