Millions brace for blizzards as tornadoes strike
DALLAS — A massive storm blowing across the country spawned tornadoes that wrecked homes and injured a handful of people in parts of Oklahoma and Texas, including the Dallas-Fort Worth area, as much of the central United States from the Rocky Mountains to the Midwest braced Tuesday for blizzard-like conditions.
An area stretching from Montana into western Nebraska and Colorado was under blizzard warnings, and the National Weather Service said as much as 2 feet of snow was possible in some areas of western South Dakota and northwestern Nebraska. Ice and sleet were expected in the eastern Great Plains.
The storm system was expected to hobble the upper Midwest with ice, rain and snow for days, as well as move into the Northeast and central Appalachians with snow and freezing rain by late Wednesday, forecasters said. The severe weather threat also continues into Wednesday for Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and the Florida Panhandle, according to the Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla.
In the South, a line of thunderstorms that moved across North Texas and Oklahoma in the early morning hours brought tornadoes, damaging winds, hail and heavy rain, said National Weather Service meteorologist Tom Bradshaw. Authorities on Tuesday reported dozens of damaged homes and businesses and several people injured in the suburbs and counties stretching north of the Dallas-Fort Worth area.
In the Fort Worth suburbs, photos sent by the North Richland Hills Police Department showed a home without a roof, a tree split in half, and an overturned vehicle in a parking lot. About 20 local homes and businesses were damaged, the police said.
In nearby Grapevine, police spokesperson Amanda McNew reported five confirmed injuries, but no fatalities and no life-threatening injuries.
A tornado warning prompted the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, located near Grapevine, to issue a shelter-inplace order Tuesday morning, asking passengers to move away from windows, the airport announced via Twitter. Nearly 1,000 flights into and out of area
airports were delayed, and over 100 were canceled, according to the tracking service FlightAware.
Downed power lines also shut down parts of U.S. 69, said Troy Hudson, the emergency management coordinator in Fannin County.
Meanwhile, a tornado damaged the Oklahoma town of Wayne shortly after 5 a.m. Tuesday. There were no deaths or injuries due to the tornado, McClain County Sheriff ’s Capt. Bryan Murrell said. But authorities said there was widespread damage to Wayne, which is about 45 miles south of Oklahoma City.
National Weather Service meteorologist Doug Speheger said wind speeds reached 111-135 mph and the tornado was rated EF-2. It was likely on the ground for about two to four minutes, according to the weather service.