By Georgina McCartney and Brendan O’Brien
HOUSTON (Reuters) – A rare winter storm lashed the U.S. Gulf Coast on Tuesday, bringing heavy snow, ice and gusty winds to a region where storm surges are uncommon, while much of the United States remained in dangerous deep ice.
As the storm moved east, crews near Houston were repaving freeways, while downtown streets covered in white were nearly deserted during the morning rush hour.
In downtown Houston, few people went out in the snow as some restaurants and bars remained closed. The Houston Metro was running, but there were few passengers. Schools were closed Tuesday and Wednesday as the city was expected to get about four inches (10 cm) of snow.
“I’ve been in Texas my whole life and I’ve never seen snow this high,” said Ishan Bhaidani, 29, owner of a fintech consulting firm in Houston. “Usually it gets more icy, but this fine snow, this is the first time.”
Authorities in Houston are investigating two possible weather-related deaths, including a homeless man who was found dead near an apartment complex, the Harris County Sheriff told X.
Snow also fell in New Orleans, where as much as eight inches were expected to accumulate by the end of the day, threatening to tie the record set in 1895. The last time the city saw measurable snow was 2009, according to the National Weather Service.
“Stay home and stay off the roads,” a worried New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell said as the wind whipped snow into her face in a video message to citizens on X.
The storm is expected to crawl through Mississippi, Georgia and Florida early this week. Up to five inches of snow is forecast for Mobile, Alabama, which has not seen such accumulations in more than 60 years, according to the NWS.
A blizzard warning was in effect for 31 million people — from south Texas east through Georgia and north to the Carolinas and Virginia — Tuesday into Wednesday morning, the service said.
Hundreds of flights in and out of airports in the region were delayed or canceled Tuesday morning. According to Flightaware.com, about 960 flights departing or departing from Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport were canceled.
Temperatures on Tuesday were expected to drop into the single digits Fahrenheit, well below freezing, across the region. Forecasters and local leaders urged residents to protect themselves from frostbite and take steps to prevent water pipes from bursting.
In the south, the snow, combined with an inch of ice accumulation and wind gusts of up to 40 miles per hour (64 km/h), could make road and air travel difficult for several days, threatening to bring down power lines and trees, forecasters said.
In Southeast Texas, about 30,000 homes and businesses are without power, according to Poweroutage.us.
“While we experienced a few isolated outages, our system generally remained stable,” CenterPoint Energy (NYSE: ), which supplies power to the Houston area, said in a statement.
Texas ports and pilots, who help guide vessels, suspended some operations Monday as cold weather hit the state.
Atlanta, Georgia, and Montgomery, Alabama, opened warming centers and closed government offices in anticipation of the storm. A number of school districts have canceled classes, according to local news reports.
Up north, most of the eastern two-thirds of the United States is experiencing brutally cold temperatures as an arctic front is expected to linger through at least Tuesday.
It was -5 degrees Fahrenheit (-21 degrees Celsius) in Chicago, 5 F in Cleveland and 11 F in New York, the NWS said. Those morning readings compared favorably to the -39 F (-39 C) recorded near Grand Lake, Colorado, the coldest place in the US on Tuesday morning.
