Wild Weather Halts Flights, Dumps Snow and Knocks Out Power

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(Bloomberg) — Blizzards, wildfires and thunderstorms swirling toward the eastern US have knocked out power to thousands and grounded hundreds of flights across the Midwest.

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Heavy snow touched off blizzard warnings from South Dakota to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula on Sunday, the National Weather Service said. Meanwhile, high winds are shaking power lines and tree branches from Texas to upstate New York, while raising the wildfire risk across the Great Plains. 

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Nebraska Governor Jim Pillen has declared an emergency and mobilized the state’s National Guard to help. Wildfires have evacuations and scorched more than 500,000 acres (202,340 hectares).

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The risk of severe thunderstorms, tornadoes and hail will spread on Sunday from the central Mississippi Valley to the Mid-Atlantic, including the Washington DC and Richmond, Virginia, areas on Monday, the US Storm Prediction Center said. 

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“All of a sudden, Mother Nature is having a fit,” said Bob Oravec, a senior branch forecaster at the US Weather Prediction Center.

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The wild weather has had widespread effects on transportation and power supplies across the Midwest, and the heavy snow and cold are forecast to push into areas that depend heavily on natural gas for heating, raising fuel demand days before the arrival of astronomical spring.

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As of 11:15 a.m. New York time, 1,492 flights into and around the US had been canceled, mostly in Minneapolis and Chicago, according to FlightAware. More than 171,000 homes and businesses across the US were without power, notably in Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan, PowerOutage.com said. 

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Xcel Energy had cut power in Colorado’s Boulder and Jefferson counties to guard against equipment sparking wildfires on Saturday but restored it since then. Snow in the area has cause additional unrelated outages. 

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High winds Sunday will only make that worse, Oravec added. In addition to the fire threat in Nebraska, governors Tim Walz and Tony Evers of Minnesota and Wisconsin, respectively, have declared emergencies as snow piles up. In Michigan, Governor Gretchen Whitmer activated the state’s emergency operation center. 

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Minneapolis may get upwards to 21 inches (53 centimeters) of snow, the National Weather Service said. More than 30 inches are forecast to the east, across parts of Wisconsin and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, before the systems starts to wind down Monday and Tuesday. The snow will be driven by winds gusts up to 60 miles (97 kilometers) per hour. 

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“Travel could be very difficult to impossible.” the weather service said. “The hazardous conditions will impact the Monday morning commute.”

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Michigan’s Upper Peninsula has already seen almost 21 feet of snow this season, Oravec said, “I don’t know when it’s going to ever melt.”

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Chicago will be spared the worst, seeing mostly rain and the potential for possibly 1 inch of snow overnight. However, the city will be shaken by high winds late Sunday. Across the border, orange winter storm warnings have been posted across parts of Ontario and Quebec, where as much as 20 inches of snow may fall and gusts are forecast to reach 50 mph in places, according to Environment and Climate Change Canada.