Rare freeze, snow grip Southeast
New England braces as “bomb cyclone” moves up Eastern Seaboard
A winter storm dumping rare ice and snow from Florida to North Carolina was expected to strengthen rapidly Thursday as it pushes up the Eastern Seaboard, turning into a violent “bomb cyclone” that could produce blizzard conditions and hurricane-like winds in eastern New England and up to 2 feet of snow in parts of Maine.
Winter weather watches and warnings were in place Wednesday in a continuous 1,300-mile stretch from northern Florida to northern Maine. LaGuardia Airport in New York reported in a late-afternoon tweet that more than 90% of its flights Thursday will be canceled due to the storm forecast.
In Boston, where forecasters predicted 10 to 16 inches of snow, Mayor Marty Walsh announced that public schools would be closed on Thursday.
The storm caps a week of brutal cold across the nation that has left at least 16 people dead.
As the storm gripped the East Coast, Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe and Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal declared a state of emergency in their states through Friday. In the Southeast, winter storm warnings were issued in such usually mild locations as Tallahassee, Savannah, Ga., Hilton Head and Charleston, S.C., North Carolina’s Outer Banks and Wilmington, N.C.
Those warnings for northern Florida also were the first in almost four years.
Snow was reported in Tallahassee on Wednesday for the first time in 28 years, according to Weather Channel meteorologist Mike Seidel.
Sharon Rosenberg, 35, a lifelong Tallahassee resident, and her children caught snowflakes on their tongues and made small snowballs.
The National Weather Service also warned of dangerous driving conditions across the region from icy roads and low visibility. In Florida, authorities on Wednesday shut down a stretch of Interstate 10 east of Tallahassee because of icy conditions.
In Savannah, Mayor Eddie DeLoach urged residents to keep off the roads. City officials, bracing for a rare bout of ice and up to 3 inches of snow, filled dump trucks with sand to spread on major streets. Both the Charleston and the Savannah/Hilton Head International Airports closed Wednesday because of snow and ice. Snow fell in Charleston and in Savannah on Wednesday for the first time since 2010.
William Shaw, a Savannah native, used baby steps to shuffle along a frozen road from his home to the post office. “It almost seems the town is deserted just like in the last hurricane,” said Shaw, 65.
In central Florida, the state’s largest theme parks announced that water attractions such as Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon, Universal Orlando’s Volcano Bay and Sea World’s Aquatica were closed Wednesday because of the cold snap.
Wind chill advisories were in place as far south as Boca Raton, Fla.
The North Carolina Zoo offered halfprice admission, giving visitors a rare chance to see polar bears frolic in their kind of weather.
The brutal weather, fed by punishing cold air sweeping in from Canada, put much of the country in a deep freeze. Wind chill advisories and freeze warnings were in effect from South Texas to Canada and from Montana through New England.
Along the East Coast, the “bomb cyclone,” formed by a process known as bombogenesis, was expected to intensify off New England on Thursday and could generate blizzard conditions from Connecticut to Maine. Winds on Cape Cod could rage from 50 to 60 mph.
Blizzard warnings were also in effect along coastal areas of North Carolina and Virginia, including Norfolk. This is only the second time since the 1980s that Norfolk has been under a blizzard warning.
Travel in the Norfolk area Thursday was predicted to be “very dangerous to impossible,” the weather service said. “It’s sort of akin to a hurricane traveling up the coast,” said Ryan Maue, a meteorologist at Weather.us.