Wintermaggedon Arrives; Emergencies Declared In a Dozen States

Everyone gets a snow day once in a while. Even politicians and the media, both of which could probably use one. 

NBC News calls this a “potentially historic” winter storm that will hammer the US from Maine to New Mexico, and from Wisconsin to the Florida Panhandle. It will hit hardest in the mid-Atlantic region, apparently, which means that the media centers of New York City and Washington DC will be entirely focused on it. That doesn’t mean the coverage will overstate the threat, either, even if the coverage of this storm will distract from other stories. The ice predictions alone raise real concerns about the risks for a vast swath of America’s population over the weekend:

• A potentially historic, massive winter storm will slam more than half of the United States today, moving east as it brings heavy snow, widespread ice accumulation and dangerous cold.
• At least 172 million people are under some form of winter weather warnings through Sunday.
• Up to a foot of snow is likely on the northern side of the system from Oklahoma to Massachusetts, according to the National Weather Service. On the southern side — which includes Texas, the Carolinas and Virginia — mixed precipitation is more likely.
• Gusty winds are expected to drop wind chills below zero, with minus 50 degrees Fahrenheit possible in the northern and central Plains. Severe to catastrophic ice accumulation is possible and could lead to prolonged power outages, worsen the impacts of the cold weather and create hazardous travel conditions.
• At least a dozen states have declared emergencies.

In other words, take this seriously. Be safe. Don’t travel for any significant distance in these or adjacent areas unless necessary, although that may not be much of an option anyway. At the far southern edge of this storm, the Dallas-Fort Worth airport has already canceled over a thousand flights, and that alone would be enough to snarl national air travel:

At DFW Airport, the central hub of American Airlines, the current cancellation total had reached 1,036 shortly by 8:21 a.m., according to flight tracking site FlightAware. Nearly half of those cancellations came from American, which has already slashed 501 flights from its schedule.

Envoy Air and PSA Airlines, which are wholly owned subsidiaries of American, had already canceled a combined 337 flights on Saturday, according to FlightAware.

Southwest Airlines, which is headquartered at Love Field, has already slashed 136 flights that were set to operate there on Saturday, FlightAware showed. Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines also canceled three Saturday flights at Love Field, according to FlightAware.

People in central Texas have already begun preparing for the worst storm in five years. When I went to the store yesterday, some items had been cleared out, mainly staples, although that extended to some oddities. All of the precut carrots were gone, for instance, and most of the canned clams. Packaged deli meats were short on supply too, and inventory on dairy items were on the low side. Of course, the trauma from the massive power outages in 2021 during a similar kind of storm remains vivid in the memories of Texans, Greg Abbott and ERCOT insist the state is prepared this time around:

After the state experienced extensive power outages and freezing temperatures for more than 100 consecutive hours during a winter storm in February 2021, the Texas Legislature mandated weatherization of power facilities. This required the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) to establish weather emergency standards for generation and transmission facilities in the ERCOT region.

The first phase of the winter weather emergency preparedness standards was adopted in October 2021 and summer weather standards in September 2022.

In the years since, ERCOT — which operates the power grid for most of Texas — has erred on the side of overpreparation, ERCOT CEO Pablo Vegas told The Dallas Morning News last winter.

Abbott declared a state of emergency two days ago and has the National Guard on alert:

We will soon see whether Texas learned its lesson from 2021. And whether other states have learned those lessons, too. 

Fox News has continuous live updates on the storm today, and perhaps into the weekend. Keep checking back for news on the developments on the ‘historic’ winter storm. The media will likely give this blanket, priority coverage all weekend long, and maybe that will be a good break for all of us. Let’s just hope the news stays good. 

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