Powerful storm lashes eastern US with snow, arctic cold

Updated: 2014-03-04 09:22

(Agencies)

A view of airplanes on a tarmac during a snowstorm at the Washington International Dulles airport in Dulles, Virginia March 3, 2014. A deadly winter storm hit the US East Coast on Monday with freezing rain, snow and near-record cold, cancelling about 2,700 flights, shutting down Washington and closing schools and local governments. [Photo/Agencies]

WASHINGTON - A deadly winter storm hit the US East Coast with freezing rain, snow and near-record cold on Monday, cancelling about 2,900 flights, shutting down Washington and closing schools and local governments.

The latest in a series of weather systems to pummel the winter-weary eastern United States, the storm dumped about 4 inches (10 cm) of snow on the US capital by early afternoon as it swept from the Mississippi Valley to the Atlantic coast, the National Weather Service said.

Brian Hurley, a weather service meteorologist, said temperatures would be about 30 degrees Fahrenheit (15 degrees Celsius) below normal as a cold front settled in from Great Plains to the Atlantic coast.

"It's really, really cold, temperatures dropping into the teens (Fahrenheit, minus-7 to minus-10 Celsius) and the normal highs are around 50 (10 C) at this point," he said.

Icy roads in Virginia were blamed for at least one death on Monday morning when a 30-year-old man drove his pickup truck into an embankment, flipping the vehicle and striking a tree, Virginia State Police said. At least four weather-related traffic deaths in Texas, Oklahoma and Tennessee were blamed on the wide-ranging storm over the weekend.

Although the snow bypassed northern cities including New York and Boston, by early on Monday New York's temperature had already peaked at 23 F (-5 C), Hurley said.

Freeze warnings were in place from the Canadian border into Texas. The main electric grid operator for most of Texas issued a conservation alert due to expected higher demand, and heavy sleet left about 30,000 homes and businesses in Memphis, Tennessee, out of power, Memphis Light, Gas and Water reported.

The storm shrouded Washington, DC, in snow and prompted the US government to shutter its area offices, and Congress put off scheduled votes. Some government employees off work shoveled their sidewalks and then took their children sledding in Maryland.