US governors declare state of emergency amid major winter storm

The first major winter storm of the new year has barrelled into the US mid-Atlantic states, closing down federal offices and public schools in Washington DC, after dumping a foot of snow in parts of the Ohio Valley and Central Plains.

More than 12 centimetres had fallen in the nation’s capital by midday on Monday, according to the US National Weather Service, with up to 30cm in some surrounding areas of Maryland and Virginia. 

The snow was forecast to continue before the system pushes out to sea on Monday evening. 

Severe travel disruptions were expected across the storm’s path, and officials urged drivers to stay off the roads if possible. 

Governors in several states, including Kansas, Kentucky, Arkansas, West Virginia, Virginia and Maryland, have declared states of emergency.

In the wake of the storm, dangerously frigid Arctic air was filling the void, bringing freezing rain and icy conditions to a swath of the country stretching from Illinois to the Atlantic coast. 

The unusually cold temperatures are expected to linger for the rest of the week.

The Central Plains, where the storm dumped heavy snow over the weekend, were already in a deep freeze. 

Parts of Kansas experienced bitter cold wind chills, with values from -15 to -32 degrees Celsius overnight. 

The cold air will persist, with daytime highs only reaching -5C.

The airport in Kansas City recorded 28cm of snowfall, the highest for any storm in more than 30 years, the National Weather Service said. 

The Missouri State Police said it had responded on Sunday to more than 1,000 stranded motorists and 356 crashes, including one fatality.

In Washington, even as the storm struck, Congress met to formally certify Republican Donald Trump’s election as president. 

But federal offices in the nation’s capital were closed.

In the city’s Meridian Hill Park, hundreds gathered for a massive snowball battle, organised by the so-called Washington DC Snowball Fight Association. 

The combatants — many wearing ski goggles for protection — fired volleys of frozen projectiles, as one dog tried to catch the ammunition in its mouth.

“I did not come here to make friends,” Jack Pitsor, who lives across the street from the park, shouted with a laugh before launching a snowball toward enemy lines.

Schools closed, power out

School districts in numerous states shut down due to the storm, including public schools in Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Washington and Philadelphia.

The storm also left more than 330,000 homes and businesses in the central and southern US without power on Monday, data from PowerOutage.us showed.

By mid-afternoon, nearly 1,900 flights within, into and out of the United States had been cancelled, according to the FlightAware.com tracking service. 

Amtrak also cancelled dozens of trains on the busy Northeast Corridor line between Boston and Washington.

The three airports serving the DC area — Reagan National, Baltimore/Washington International and Dulles — were all open, with crews working to clear airfields of snow, but were seeing many flights delayed or cancelled.

Virginia State Police responded to 300 car crashes between midnight and 11am, while the Maryland State Police received 123 crash reports between 1am and 11am, spokespeople for the two agencies said. 

One man died in south-east Virginia after losing control of his pick-up truck around midnight, with police citing both alcohol and the weather as factors, local media reported.

Reuters