The powerful winter storm sweeping across much of the US over the weekend has been linked to at least 15 deaths.
The deaths have been reported from Texas to New England as many parts of the country grappled with heavy snow, ice and dangerous cold.
In Texas, authorities in Frisco said that a 16-year-old died in sledding accident, while in the Austin area, a person was found dead from apparent hypothermia. Louisiana authorities reported two winter storm-related deaths. In Arkansas, a 17-year-old boy was killed in a sledding accident, and in North Carolina, a man was found dead on a highway.
In New York City, Mayor Zohran Mamdani said that five people were found dead outdoors over the weekend. A woman in Kansas was also said to have died from hypothermia and was found covered in snow.
Massachusetts officials have said that a woman died after being struck by a snow plow, and Tennessee officials have reported three weather-related deaths.
As of Monday morning, more than 200 million people from Texas to New England were under cold alerts, with forecasters warning that bitter cold could persist through the week in many regions.
The National Weather Service (NWS) said that “frigid air” would spread across the eastern two-thirds of the county in the coming days, “with widespread sub-zero lows and record cold” expected. The agency said that dangerous wind chills would persist, and “much below-normal temperatures may continue into early February”.
More than 800,000 people were without power nationwide on Monday morning, including more than 250,000 in Tennessee, about 157,000 in Mississippi and roughly 125,000 in Louisiana.
Officials in parts of Mississippi have described the damage caused by the storm as “extensive”, saying that additional crews have been brought in to speed up the “tree removal and clearing” and to help with “restoration of replacing poles and lines”.
Travel was heavily disrupted over the weekend, with more than 10,500 US flights cancelled on Sunday. On Monday, nearly 4,000 US flights had been cancelled, according to flight tracking website FlightAware.com.
The NWS’s Prediction Center said on Monday morning that while snow was continuing across parts of New England on Monday, the snowfall had “concluded for the rest of the central and eastern United States”.
Preliminary snowfall totals have showed that parts of Massachusetts saw as much as 20in (51cm) of snow over the weekend. And parts of Pennsylvania registered 23in.
Major institutions in New York City and Washington DC are closed on Monday, including the New York Public Library, the Smithsonian museums and the National zoo. New York City public schools had also shifted to remote learning on Monday.
The New York area’s NWS office told residents on Monday to expect temperatures to remain below freezing for the rest of the week.
