Deadly snowstorm slams road, air travel in Midwest

CHICAGO (Reuters) - A deadly late winter storm dumped heavy snow on the Midwestern United States on Tuesday, contributing to numerous automobile accidents on highways and flight cancellations as it moved east toward the Ohio Valley and the mid-Atlantic states.

In Chicago, where the National Weather Service issued a winter storm warning through midnight, residents girded for between 4 to 8 inches of snow.

With rush hour underway, wind-whipped snow was falling at a heavy rate throughout the Chicago area, according to the Illinois State Patrol, reducing visibility to less than half a mile and causing heavy delays on roads in the region.

Monique Bond, a spokeswoman with the Illinois State Patrol, said bad weather may have been a contributing factor in a deadly crash on Interstate Highway 70 in Marshall, Illinois near the Indiana border.

A female driver headed east on I-70 crossed the median and crashed into a westbound tanker trunk. The driver of the car and her young child died in the accident.

Most of the other weather-related incidents the state patrol responded to on Tuesday were spinouts involving single vehicles, Bond said.

More than six inches of snow fell at O'Hare International Airport, causing 900 flight cancellations, according to the Chicago Department of Aviation.

Southwest Airlines, which canceled nearly 250 flights out of Midway Airport, resumed flight operations at 6 p.m. on Tuesday, the aviation department said. But delays of an hour or more were common.

At a press conference hosted by Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, the city's Office of Emergency Management & Communications said nearly 300 snow plows were working to keep the city's 4,100 miles of roads clear.

Hundreds of schools were closed in northern Illinois, according to local media. But normal classes were held for the more than 400,000 students enrolled in Chicago's public school system, the nation's third-largest school district.

Roads in northwest Illinois had patches of ice and snow on Tuesday and road crews were bracing in northeast Illinois for the storm, which began dropping snow on Chicago near the middle of the morning rush hour.

In western Wisconsin, a semi-tractor flipped off an Interstate 94 bridge and fully submerged in the Red Cedar River in Menomonie early Tuesday, said Christine Ouellete, a Wisconsin Transportation Department spokeswoman.

Wisconsin rescue crews recovered the body of a man thought to be the driver of the truck and were searching for the body of his co-driver, who was presumed dead, State Patrol Lieutenant Jeff Lorentz said.

Wisconsin's transportation department listed numerous roads as snow-covered or slippery from the storm across southwestern Wisconsin, but no road closings.

Slick roads contributed to numerous crashes and a slow commute across the border in Minnesota. Driving conditions remained difficult along highways in parts of North Dakota.

Minnesota's public safety department reported 215 crashes from 5 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday, but no fatalities.

Several spots around the Twin Cities area reported nine inches of snow and driving conditions on highways throughout the Twin Cities were still listed as "difficult" hours after the storm passed through.

The storm was expected to move eastward over the Ohio Valley and then the central Appalachians and mid-Atlantic states on Wednesday, hitting Washington with its biggest snowfall in possibly two years, the National Weather Service said.

Winter storm warnings were in effect for all or parts of 16 states from the Upper Midwest to the mid-Atlantic on Tuesday, National Weather Service spokesman Chris Vaccaro said.

The storm was forecast to move across Ohio and the Tennessee Valley and merge with a developing storm off the mid-Atlantic states that could produce heavy, wet snow overnight and through Wednesday into the mid-Atlantic states that could bring down trees and power lines, Vaccaro said.

"It will be a wet, heavy, gloppy snow consistent with wallpaper paste," he said.

(Additional reporting by David Bailey in Minneapolis, Jane Sutton in Miami and Ian Simpson in Washington; Editing by Doina Chiacu, Andrew Hay and Bernard Orr)

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Sequester will hit where it hurts: air travel

Ray LaHood speaks to reporters Friday. (AP Video)President Barack Obama's administration on Friday brought out Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood to strike fear in the American public over the sequester right where it hurts: their impatience with air travel.

Ahead of the sequester—across-the-board spending cuts set to take effect March 1 in the absence of a budget deal—the Federal Aviation Administration is planning to reduce expenditures by $600 million, the FAA and Department of Transportation announced on Friday.

LaHood addressed the press at Friday's White House briefing to detail just how badly the department believes that cut would disrupt Americans' travel plans.

"Travelers should expect delays. Flights to major cities like New York, Chicago, San Francisco and others could experience delays up to 90 minutes during peak hours, because we have fewer controllers on staff. Delays in these major airports will ripple across the country. ... Once airlines see the potential impact of these furloughs, we expect that they will change their schedules and cancel flights," LaHood said.

The Department of Transportation announced on Friday that in an effort to maintain safety standards while making necessary cuts under the sequester, 47,000 FAA employees would be furloughed one day per pay period, select midnight air traffic controller shifts would be eliminated, 100 air traffic towers would be closed, and preventative maintenance and equipment provisioning would be reduced beginning in April. The announcement was made by LaHood and Michael Huerta, administrator of the FAA, in a letter sent on Friday to unions and government entities.

Reporters at Friday's briefing questioned why money couldn't be cut from other parts of the department's budget and why the secretary was announcing such severe changes so close to the sequester deadline.

"Are you just basically throwing out whatever sounds like the most severe consequence in order to ratchet up pressure?" one reporter asked.

LaHood scoffed at that suggestion. "The idea that we're just doing this to create some kind of horrific scare tactic is nonsense," he said.

But LaHood, a Republican former Illinois congressman, conceded that political machinations are very much a part of his role in current negotiations, confirming that he had spoken with about "a half-dozen" Republicans and their staffers about the sequester. "They're hoping that maybe I can influence some of the people in my own party," he said.

He was also aggressive in his description of what politicians might face should the department make good on its plans: "Your phones are going to start ringing off the hook when these people are delayed at airports and when their flights are delayed or their flights are canceled or their air tower is closed."

Among the air towers the government marked on Friday for potential closure was the Southern Wisconsin Regional tower in Janesville, Wis., which is located in House Budget Commitee chairman Paul Ryan's district.

Ryan's office did not immediately return Yahoo News' request for comment.

LaHood called on Republicans to "step up" and offer solutions on how to avoid the sequester. Republicans passed legislation last year in the House to buy down the sequester, and Democrats in the current Congress have introduced bills to buy down the sequester.

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Midwest swaddled in snow; travel tough

ST. LOUIS (AP) — Powdery snow, up to a foot and a half in some places, bombarded much of the nation's midsection Thursday, impeding travel and shutting down airports, schools and state legislatures.

The widespread winter storm system swirled to the north and east Thursday night, its snow, sleet and freezing rain prompting winter storm warnings in Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri and Illinois.

Corey Mead, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service's Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla., said the winter storm would be centered in the upper Midwest by Friday morning.

"Even across Kansas, the snowfall rates should continue to taper off through the evening," Mead said.

The system left behind impressive snow accumulations, especially in western Kansas, where 17 inches fell in Hays.

Several accidents and two deaths were blamed on icy and slushy roadways; two people died in crashes Wednesday. Most schools in Kansas and Missouri, and many in neighboring states, were closed Thursday and legislatures shut down in Kansas, Missouri, Arkansas, Nebraska and Iowa.

National Weather Service meteorologist Scott Truett said it was "pouring snow" earlier Thursday, with it falling at a rate of 2 inches per hour or more in some spots.

Topeka, Kan., got 3 inches of snow in a 30-minute period, leaving medical center worker Jennifer Carlock to dread the drive home.

"It came on fast," Carlock said as she shoveled around her car. "We're going to test out traction control on the way home."

Snow totals passed the foot mark in many places: the Kansas cities of Hutchinson, Macksville and Hanston all saw 14 inches, and Wichita, Kan., had 13 inches. A few places in far northern Oklahoma saw between 10 to 13½ inches of snow. Missouri's biggest snow total was 10 inches, shared by the Kansas City metropolitan area, Rockport in the northwest corner and Moberly in the central part of the state.

Transportation officials in affected states urged people to simply stay home.

"If you don't have to get out, just really, please, don't do it," Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback said. Interstate 70 through Kansas was snow-packed, and a 200-mile stretch between Salina and Colby was closed.

In Iowa, visibility was down to a quarter- to a half-mile on some southern and central Iowa roads, the state Department of Transportation said early Thursday evening.

Driving in the region's cities wasn't much better. Richard Monroe, 27, technology manager and marketing representative for the Missouri State University bookstore in Springfield, and eight of his colleagues arrived in Kansas City, Mo., on Wednesday for a conference.

He said a shuttle bus that was taking participants from the Weston Crown Center hotel to Bartle Hall, about five minutes away, got stuck in the snow and then ran into a truck. The vehicle was incapacitated for nearly two hours.

"We saw today that Kansas City is just shut down. I've never seen a big city like this where nothing is moving," Monroe said.

But some people came down with cabin fever, like Jennifer McCoy of Wichita, Kan. She loaded her nine children — ages 6 months to 16 years — in a van for lunch at Applebee's.

"I was going crazy, they were so whiny," McCoy said.

Cases of wine and beer — as well as bottles of scotch and whiskey — were flying off the shelves at Ingersoll Wine and Spirits ahead of the storm's arrival in Des Moines, Iowa.

"A lot of people have been buying liquor to curl up by the fire," wine specialist Bjorn Carlson said. NWS forecasts showed 3 to 9 inches of snow were expected in Iowa overnight, and Nebraska will see an additional 2 to 5 inches.

Heavy, blowing snow caused scores of businesses in Iowa and Nebraska to close early, including two malls in Omaha, Neb. Mardi Miller, manager of Dillard's department store in Oakview Mall, said most employees had been sent home by 4 p.m., and she believed "only two customers are in the entire store."

The storm brought some relief to a region that has been parched by the worst drought in decades.

Vance Ehmke, a wheat farmer near Healy, Kan., said the nearly foot of snow was "what we have been praying for." Climatologists say 12 inches of snow is equivalent to about 1 inch of rain, depending on the density of the snow.

Near Edwardsville, Ill., farmer Mike Campbell called the precipitation a blessing after a bone-dry growing season in 2012. He hopes it is a good omen for the spring.

"The corn was just a disaster," Campbell said of 2012.

Areas in the Texas Panhandle also had up to 8 inches of snow, and in south central Nebraska, Grand Island reported 10 inches of snow. And Arkansas saw a mix of precipitation — a combination of hail, sleet and freezing rain in some place, 6 inches of snow in others.

Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon declared a state of emergency Thursday morning. All flights at Kansas City International Airport were canceled for Thursday night, and officials said they'd prepare to reopen Friday morning. More than 320 flights at Lambert Airport in St. Louis were canceled by Thursday afternoon. Traffic throughout the state was snarled by hundreds of accidents and vehicles in ditches.

The University of Missouri canceled classes for one of the few times in its 174-year history. At a nearby Wal-Mart, some students passed the ice scrapers and snow melt, heading directly to the aisles containing sleds and alcohol.

"This isn't our usual Thursday noon routine," Lauren Ottenger, a senior economics major from Denver, said as she stockpiled supplies.

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Associated Press writers Alan Scher Zagier in Columbia, Mo.; Bill Draper and Margaret Stafford in Kansas City, Mo.; Margery Beck in Omaha, Neb.; John Hanna in Topeka, Kan.; Roxana Hegeman in Wichita, Kan.; Catherine Lucey and Barbara Rodriguez in Des Moines, Iowa; Tim Talley in Oklahoma City; Chuck Bartels in Little Rock, Ark.; and Jim Suhr in St. Louis contributed to this report.

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