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| Bob Brown, a building engineer for the Frisco Building in downtown St. Louis, shovels the sidewalk along Olive Street on Monday, Jan. 6, 2014, in St. Louis. (AP Photo/St. Louis Post-Dispatch, |
MINNEAPOLIS
(AP) -- The coldest, most dangerous blast of polar air in decades
gripped the Midwest and pushed toward the East and South on Monday,
closing schools and day care centers, grounding flights and forcing
people to pull their hoods and scarves tight to protect exposed skin
from nearly instant frostbite.
Many across the
nation's midsection went into virtual hibernation, while others dared
to venture out in temperatures that plunged well below zero.
"I'm
going to try to make it two blocks without turning into crying man,"
said Brooks Grace, who was out to do some banking and shopping in
downtown Minneapolis, where temperatures reached 23 below with wind
chills of minus 48. "It's not cold - it's painful."
The
mercury also dropped into negative territory in Milwaukee, St. Louis
and Chicago, which set a record for the date at minus 16. Wind chills
across the region were 40 below and colder. Records also fell in
Oklahoma, Texas and Indiana.
Forecasters said
some 187 million people in all could feel the effects of the "polar
vortex" by the time it spread across the country on Monday night and
Tuesday.
Record lows were possible in the East
and South, with highs in the single digits expected Tuesday in Georgia
and Alabama. Subzero wind chills were forecast up and down the coast,
including minus 10 in Atlanta and minus 12 in Baltimore.
From the Dakotas to Maryland, schools and day care centers shut down.
"You
definitely know when you are not wearing your thermal undergarments,"
said Staci Kalthoff, who raises cattle with her husband on a 260-acre
farm in Albany, Minn., where the temperature hovered around 24 below
zero and winds made it feel like minus 46. "You have to dress really,
really warm and come in more often and thaw out everything."
Even with this nostril-freezing cold, the family still prefers winter over summer.
"You can always put on more layers," she said. "When it gets hot, you can only take off so much."
For
a big swath of the Midwest, the subzero cold moved in behind another
winter wallop: more than a foot of snow and high winds that made
traveling treacherous. Several deaths since Saturday were blamed on the
snow, ice and cold, including a 1-year-old boy who was in a car that
went out of control and collided with a snowplow Monday in Missouri and
three fatal accidents in Michigan.
It took
authorities in southern Illinois using 10-ton military vehicles known as
"wreckers" until early Monday to clear all the chain-reaction accidents
caused when several semis jackknifed along snowy interstates. The crash
stranded about 375 vehicles, but there were no fatalities or injuries,
largely because motorists either stayed with their cars or were rescued
and taken to nearby warming centers, said Jonathon Monken, director of
the Illinois Emergency Management Agency. Others got stuck in the
snowdrifts, including the Southern Illinois University men's basketball
team, which had to spend the night in a church.
In
the eastern United States, temperatures in the 40s and 50s Monday
helped melt piles of snow from a storm last week, raising the risk that
roads would freeze over as the cold air moved in Monday night, said Bob
Oravec from the Weather Prediction Center in College Park, Md. The snap
was set to be dramatic - Springfield, Mass., enjoyed 56 degrees Monday
morning but faced an overnight low of 6.
More
than 3,700 flights were canceled by late Monday afternoon, following a
weekend of travel disruption across the U.S. Airline officials said
de-icing fluid was freezing, fuel was pumping sluggishly, and ramp
workers were having difficulty loading and unloading luggage. JetBlue
Airways stopped all scheduled flights to and from New York and Boston on
Monday. Southwest ground to a halt in Chicago earlier in the day, but
by the evening, flights resumed in "a trickle," a spokesman said.
Authorities
in Indiana and Kentucky - where temperatures dropped into the single
digits and below, with wind chills in the minus 20s and worse - warned
people not to leave their homes unless they needed to go someplace
safer.
The company that operates the power
grid supplying energy to more than 61 million people in parts of the
Mid-Atlantic, Midwest and South asked Monday night that users conserve
electricity because of the cold, especially in the morning and
mid-afternoon.
Meanwhile, utility crews worked
to restore power to more than 40,000 Indiana customers affected by the
weekend storm and cautioned that some people could be in the cold and
dark for days.
Ronald G. Smith Sr. took
shelter at an Indianapolis Red Cross after waking up the previous night
with the power out and his cat, Sweet Pea, agitated.
"The
screen door blew open and woke me up, and it was cold and dark. I got
dressed and I was scared, thinking, `What am I going to do? My cat knew
something was wrong. He was jumping all over the place," Smith said.
Officials
in Chicago and other cities checked on the homeless and shut-ins for
fear they might freeze to death on the street or in their homes.
Between
a heater that barely worked and his drafty windows, Jeffery Davis
decided he would be better off sitting in a downtown Chicago doughnut
shop for three hours Monday until it was time to go to work.
He
threw on two pairs of pants, two T-shirts, "at least three jackets,"
two hats, a pair of gloves, the "thickest socks you'd probably ever
find" and boots, and trudged to the train stop in his South Side
neighborhood that took him to within a few blocks of the library where
he works.
"I never remember it ever being this cold," said Davis, 51. "I'm flabbergasted."
Only
a few hardy souls braved the cold on the Nicollet Mall in Minneapolis,
normally a busy pedestrian area. Many people downtown used the extensive
heated skyway system, where it is warm enough to walk around in office
attire.
Nearly all stores on the skyway were open as usual. Jersey Devil Pizza & Wings was not.
"Apologies ... We are East Coast wimps. Too cold! Stay safe, see you Tuesday," read a sign taped to the door.
