Massive winter storm brings frigid temps, snow and ice

Tens of millions of Americans endured bone-chilling temperatures, blizzard conditions, power outages and canceled holiday gatherings Friday from a winter storm that forecasters said was nearly unprecedented in its scope, exposing about 60 percent of the U.S. population to some sort of winter weather advisory or warning.

More than 200 million people were under an advisory or warning on Friday, the National Weather Service said. The weather service’s map “depicts one of the greatest extents of winter weather warnings and advisories ever,” forecasters said.

Tribes throughout the Northwest, Rocky Mountains, Great Plains and Midwest also battled the extreme weather conditions as the storm moved across the country.

On Thursday, the Blackfeet Nation in Montana experienced temperatures below -40 degrees factoring in the wind chill and wind gusts up to 60 mph. Further down the hi-line, the Fort Belknap Indian Community went through similar conditions.

The last few days may have been the toughest for riders taking part in the last Dakota 38+2 Wokiksuye Ride. The annual ride first occurred in 2005 and starts in Lower Brule, South Dakota and ends in Mankato, Minnesota.

The ride begins on Dec. 10 and finishes on Dec. 26, the date 38 Dakota were hanged by the United States government in 1862, which still stands as the largest mass execution in U.S. history.

Lakota spiritual leader Jim Miller had a dream of returning to Mankato by horse and the ride “has become an annual sacred horse ride to carry the message of reconciliation and healing through love and forgiveness, the vision Jim Miller received in his dream,” according to the ride’s gofundme page.

In South Dakota, Gov. Kristi Noem activated the state’s National Guard to haul firewood from the Black Hills Forest Service to the Rosebud Sioux Tribe as some citizens were stranded in their homes with dwindling fuel.

Other tribes also were struggling, including the Oglala Sioux Tribe in the western part of the state, which was using snowmobiles to reach citizens who live at the end of miles-long dirt roads.

But with the vehicles breaking down in the 10-foot drifts, officials were considering using horses to deliver essentials to some homes as they sought help from federal officials.

“A lot of our membership lives in rural areas — getting to them has been a challenge,” President Frank Star Comes Out said. “They run out of fuel, propane, they run out of wood, we even had power outages.”

Wayne Boyd, chief of staff to the Rosebud Sioux president, said that tribe was looking into reports of deaths. During the storm last week, a 12-year-old with a medical condition died after medical responders couldn’t reach the home, Boyd said.

“We have families that are way out there that we haven’t heard from in two weeks,” Boyd said, adding that the tribe was hoping to get a helicopter on Saturday to check on stranded families.

“People are running out of food, houses are freezing up,” he said.

Power outages have left more than 1.4 million homes and businesses in the dark, according to the website PowerOutage, which tracks utility reports. Utilities in Nashville, Memphis and throughout the Tennessee Valley said they were implementing rolling blackouts Friday to conserve power as the region battles an extreme cold front.

And more than 4,500 flights within, into or out of the U.S. were canceled Friday, according to the tracking site FlightAware, causing more mayhem as travelers try to make it home for the holidays.

“We’ve just got to stay positive. Anger is not going to help us at all,” said Wendell Davis, who plays basketball with a team in France and was waiting at O’Hare in Chicago on Friday after a series of flight cancellations.

The huge storm stretched from border to border. In Canada, WestJet canceled all flights Friday at Toronto Pearson International Airport, beginning at 9 a.m. And in Mexico, migrants waited near the U.S. border in unusually cold temperatures as they awaited a U.S. Supreme Court decision on whether and when to lift pandemic-era restrictions that prevent many from seeking asylum.

Forecasters said a bomb cyclone — when atmospheric pressure drops very quickly in a strong storm — had developed near the Great Lakes, stirring up blizzard conditions, including heavy winds and snow.

“The impacts are perhaps far greater than they might be in the middle of winter during a typical weekend without a holiday,” said Greg Carbin, chief of forecast operations for the National Weather Service’s Weather Prediction Center, noting that while the blizzard conditions may set some records, the storm isn’t unprecedented.

Even though fleets of snow plows and salt trucks have been deployed, driving was hazardous and sometimes deadly. A Kansas City, Missouri, driver died Thursday after skidding into a creek. And in the Chicago suburb of Des Plaines, a pickup truck driver was hospitalized after sliding into a pond.

State police in Michigan reported multiple crashes Friday in southwestern and western Michigan, including one in which nine semitrailers also were involved in a pileup. Another multivehicle crash shut down U.S. 131 south of Grand Rapids, and a firefighter and postal worker were hurt in separate crashes.

Activists also were rushing to get the homeless out of the cold. Nearly 170 adults and children were keeping warm early Friday in Detroit at a shelter and a warming center that are designed to hold 100 people.

“This is a lot of extra people” but “you can’t” turn anyone away, said Faith Fowler, the executive director of Cass Community Social Services, which runs both facilities.

In Chicago, Andy Robledo planned to spend the day organizing efforts to check on unhoused people through his nonprofit, Feeding People Through Plants. Robledo and volunteers build tents modeled on ice-fishing tents, including a plywood subfloor.

“It’s not a house, it’s not an apartment, it’s not a hotel room. But it’s a huge step up from what they had before,” Robledo said.

In Portland, Oregon, officials opened five emergency shelters. Fallen trees and power lines have closed roads across the Portland metro area. And nearly 50 miles (80 kilometers) of Interstate 84, a major highway through the Columbia River Gorge, were closed Friday morning.

All bus service was suspended in the greater Seattle area Friday morning due to an ice storm that made travel treacherous.

In far northern Indiana, lake-effect snow rolling off Lake Michigan could boost storm totals to well over a foot in some areas by Sunday, said Mark Steinwedel, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Syracuse, Indiana.

“It’s really going to add up,” he said, predicting “pretty awful travel.”

The weather service is forecasting the coldest Christmas in more than two decades in Philadelphia, where school officials shifted classes online Friday.

In Maine, gusts approaching 70 mph were reported along the coast Friday morning. Atop New Hampshire’s Mount Washington, the tallest peak in the Northeast, the wind topped 150 mph. The governor closed state offices, ferry service to Casco Bay islands was suspended and flooding was leading to some water rescues.

In Boston, rain combined with a high tide, sent waves over the seawall at Long Wharf in Boston and flooded some downtown streets.

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul declared a state of emergency early Friday morning, describing it as a “kitchen sink” storm.

“We’ve had ice, flooding, snow, freezing temperatures, and everything that Mother Nature could wallop at us this weekend,” Hochul said during a news briefing.

It was so bad in Vermont that Amtrak canceled service for the day, and nonessential state offices were closing early.

“I’m hearing from crews who are seeing grown trees ripped out by the roots,” Mari McClure, president of Green Mountain Power, the state’s largest utility, said at a news conference.

In eastern Iowa, sports broadcaster Mark Woodley became a Twitter sensation after he was called on to do live stand ups in the wind and snow because sporting events were called off. By midday Friday, a compilation of his TV stand-ups had been viewed nearly 5 million times on Twitter.

“I’ve got good news and I’ve got bad news,” he told an anchor. “The good news is that I can still feel my face right now. The bad news is, I kind of wish I couldn’t.”