Updated January 06, 2025 at 16:03 PM ET
At least four people have died and dozens have been injured as a major winter storm moves across several states from the Midwest to the mid-Atlantic, with officials warning those in its path to stay off the roads. Forecasters are predicting up to a foot of snow in some areas.
There have been hundreds of calls for help on the highways and thousands of stranded cars from Kansas to Virginia since Saturday, including a car pileup in Illinois.
In Kansas, where blizzard warnings had been issued across the state over the weekend, at least three people have died in car crashes, according to the Kansas Highway Patrol.
At least one person has died and more than 30 people have been injured in Missouri, according to the Missouri State Highway Patrol.
"Snow is still making its way out of the state, but don't expect conditions to improve quickly – if you saw snow and ice fall yesterday, continue to AVOID TRAVELING today," the Missouri Department of Transportation said in a social media post on Monday. "Our crews are still hard at work, but cleanup will take awhile in these conditions."
Winter storm warning in effect
The National Weather Service issued winter storm warnings in parts of Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C. More than 300,000 customers were without power as of noon ET Monday across Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois and Missouri, according to Poweroutage.us.
Up to 12 inches of snow has been forecast to fall from Ohio to D.C. through Monday night. As of Monday afternoon, some areas surrounding Washington, D.C., have received up to 9 inches of snow, according to a preliminary tally by the NWS. And parts of northeast Kansas have received 18 inches of snow.
The storm is predicted to move out of the East Coast Monday evening, but frigid temperatures means the morning will likely see icy roads. On Tuesday, temperatures are expected to remain below freezing and nighttime temperatures will "fall into the single double digits" until late this week across the Central Plains and states across the Mississippi and Ohio Valleys, according to the National Weather Service.
Across the mid-Atlantic region, temperatures are also forecast to be near freezing during the day and in the teens at night.
These prolonged periods of frigid temperatures will continue to create problems, says Andy Hatzos, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Wilmington, Ohio.
"We're not going to see temperatures get above freezing for at least the rest of the week and some of the low temperatures we're going to have in the mornings will be in the single digits with windchills below zero," Hatzos tells member station WXVU. "So, coming out of a period where we're going to have so much snow — travel difficulties, infrastructure issues, perhaps even power outages in some locations — having that cold temperature is certainly an additional problem people need to be ready for."
Despite closures, electoral vote certification proceeds
Governors of several states affected by the snowstorm — including Virginia, Maryland and Kentucky — issued states of emergency beginning early last week and continuing into this past weekend.
Several county school systems across the affected states are closed Monday, as well as in cities such as Washington, D.C., Philadelphia and Louisville.
In Washington, D.C., Smithsonian museums and the National Zoo are closed, while non-emergency federal employees in D.C. are working remotely.
Metropolitan Police Department Chief Pamela Smith says the city has been preparing for the storm ahead of a number of high-security events — Congress' certification of President-elect Donald Trump's electoral victory on Monday and funeral events for former President Jimmy Carter.
"We've been watching the news, watching the polar vortex as its been coming in this direction. So we've been planning appropriately," Smith says.
The snow did not delay proceedings on Capitol Hill, and a joint session of Congress officially certified Donald Trump's election victory.
Travel disruptions grow
The winter storms also are affecting flight travel across the U.S. More than 5,000 flights traveling into or leaving the U.S. faced delays as of 3 p.m. ET Monday, according to tracking platform FlightAware. More than 2,300 additional flights were canceled.
Snow will also cause delays at major airports, including in New York, Washington, D.C., and Chicago, according to the FAA.
And more than 50 Amtrak trains operating from the Midwest to the Northeast have also been canceled on Monday. Two trains traveling between parts of Virginia and Washington, D.C., have already been canceled for Tuesday.
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