Around 60 million people were under weather alerts from the Plains to the mid-Atlantic as a winter storm threatens to slam the regions with heavy snow and crippling ice.
The developing low-pressure system is forecast to affect the regions for the next three days, and includes cities such as Cincinnati, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., Kansas City, Missouri; Omaha, Nebraska; St. Louis and Indianapolis.
On Saturday afternoon, 57 million will remain under winter alerts across 30 states as the strong and impactful storm continues to develop.
The Rocky Mountains and the central and northern Plains will be hit by heavy snow, strong winds and freezing rain. Cities expected to be affected include Wichita, Kansas; Kansas City, Missouri; and Omaha, Nebraska. Blizzard-like conditions are possible due to the combination of heavy snow and strong wind gusts.
“A wintry mix could start as early as this afternoon and transition to snow Sunday afternoon,” the National Weather Service field office in Kansas City said on X. “Wind gusts around 35-40 mph on Sunday could yield possible blizzard conditions.”
Scattered snow showers developed across the Northern Plains Saturday afternoon, with a pocket of freezing drizzle already causing some issues in parts of central Kansas. These showers will continue to develop through the evening.
More than 2.1 million people were covered by a blizzard warning for most of Kansas and part of Missouri on Saturday night, according to the weather service. By early Sunday, the warning was scheduled to cover portions of Northeast Kansas, Northwest Missouri, and Missouri north of the Missouri River, it said.
Such a warning alerts residents to a likelihood of reduced visibility of 1/4 mile or less and sustained winds of at least 35 mph.
Air traffic in and out of Kansas City, Missouri's, international airport was shuttered for a few hours Saturday "due to rapid ice accumulation," airport officials said on X.
Mayor Quinton Lucas said on X that the airfield had to be sprayed with a deicer to defeat ice accumulation and keep surfaces open to aircraft overnight.
"The runways and taxiways at Kansas City International Airport (MCI) are open for flight operations," he declared at 5:22 p.m. CT.
The weather service warned people in the Kansas City metropolitan area to "take it easy" on the roads.
"Freezing drizzle has begun to cover surfaces in a glaze of ice across portions of the KC metro," the weather service Kansas City field office said. "MODOT (Missouri Department of Transportation) and KDOT (Kansas Department of Transportation) are also showing some issues beginning to crop up on roadways."
Kansas City, Missouri, City Manager Brian David Platt said roadways were undergoing deicing, too.
"Our aggressive pretreating of all roads before the storm made quick work of the ice earlier today and we will continue to work 24 hours a day for the duration of the storm," he said on X.
The weather service predicted historic precipitation for parts of Missouri and Kansas. "A swath of heavy snow exceeding 15 inches from northeastern Kansas into north-central Missouri would be the heaviest snowfall in a decade," it said in a national forecast discussion.
From coast-to-coast Saturday, weather-related flight delays were estimated at 6,685. Cancelations numbered about 282, according to air travel tracker FlightAware.com.
At the western end of the low pressure system, Denver International Airport led the globe in delayed flights, with nearly half its departures on Saturday leaving late, according to FlightAware.
By Sunday morning, the storm system will shift over the central Plains, bringing heavy snow and ice from Kansas through the mid-Mississippi Valley. The storm system will gradually shift east through the day, with the biggest impacts in Missouri, Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky.
Sunday will also bring a severe weather risk across the lower Mississippi Valley, putting 7 million people at risk for tornadoes, damaging wind and hail in cities including Jackson, Mississippi; and Baton Rouge, Shreveport and Lake Charles, Louisiana.
Snow will arrive in the mid-Atlantic and central Appalachians overnight into Monday morning. These showers will linger through Monday, ending by Tuesday morning as the system moves offshore. Areas forecast to be affected Monday include Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh.
Kansas, Missouri and Illinois are forecast to receive the highest snowfall totals of anywhere, with 9 to 16 inches. A general 4 to 9 inches of snowfall will stretch from parts of Illinois to the mid-Atlantic, with higher accumulations possible in parts of the central Appalachians.
Significant icing will stretch from Kansas through Virginia, where power outages, tree damage and impossible travel conditions can be expected. Generally, totals will range from 0.1 to 0.4 inches of ice, with extreme amounts of 0.5 to 0.75 inches possible in parts of Missouri, southern Illinois and Kentucky.
In the wake of this system, a significant drop in temperatures is anticipated for the eastern two-thirds of the country. Highs will drop 10 to 25 degrees below average starting Sunday and lasting through Friday. Highs will range from the single digits and teens across the Plains and Midwest, and in the 20s to 30s in the mid-Atlantic and Northeast.
The most extreme temperatures will be in the northern Plains, where overnight lows will dip as low as minus 20, with wind chill values around minus 40. Cold weather advisories are in place from eastern Montana through Minnesota.
