At least 35 dead after winter storm hits U.S., with more Arctic air expected for southern states

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At least 35 deaths have been reported in U.S. states afflicted with severe cold, according to local officials.

The National Weather Service had warnings for extreme, dangerous cold in effect Tuesday morning from Texas to Pennsylvania, where some areas were forecast to see wind chills as low as minus -29 C.

Much of the U.S. wasn’t forecast to get above freezing all day Tuesday, with temperatures plunging again overnight. Thermometers in northern Florida were forecast to sink to -3.9 C late Tuesday into early Wednesday.

The brutal cold lingered after storms over the weekend and Monday dumped deep snow across more than 2,100 kilometres from Arkansas to New England and left parts of the South coated in treacherous ice.

When the massive winter storm descended on the Northeast and parts of the South over the weekend, Lisa Patterson planned to stick it out at her family’s home in Nashville.

But after she and her husband lost power, trees fell onto their driveway and their wood stove proved no match for the frigid temperatures. Along with their dog, the couple had to be rescued and taken to a warming shelter.

“I’ve been snowed in up there for almost three weeks without being able to get up and down my driveway because of the snow. I’m prepared for that. But this was unprecedented,” Patterson said.

A Kroger grocery store in Nashville remains closed and without power on Monday, after an ice storm hit the city. (Travis Loller/The Associated Press)

The family was among many across Tennessee and other parts of the South that have fled to warming shelters as crews worked to restore power to hundreds of thousands of households as a new influx of arctic air is expected to spur freezing temperatures Tuesday in places already covered in snow and ice.

At least 35 deaths reported

Three brothers ages six, eight and nine died Monday after falling through ice on a private pond near Bonham, Texas, said Fannin County Sheriff Cody Shook in a news release Tuesday. The two older boys were pulled from the water by first responders and a neighbour and then taken to a hospital, while the youngest was recovered after an extensive search of the pond. Bonham Independent School District said it was devastated by the loss.

Two people were run over by snowplows in Massachusetts and Ohio, fatal sledding killed teenagers in Arkansas and Texas and a woman’s body was found covered in snow in Kansas. In New York City, officials said eight people were found dead outdoors over the frigid weekend.

In Kentucky, Gov. Andy Beshear warned that the temperatures could become so frigid that as little as 10 minutes outside “could result in frostbite or hypothermia.”

And forecasters said it’s possible another winter storm could hit parts of the East Coast this weekend.

WATCH | How this storm froze vast swaths of North America:

This storm just froze half of North America

A massive winter storm has buried millions under a historic blanket of snow and ice, locking much of North America in a dangerous Arctic air mass. CBC’s Johanna Wagstaffe breaks down the rare atmospheric collision of a polar vortex and an atmospheric river — two extreme weather phenomena that combined to create this record-breaking, high-impact event.

There were still 550,000 power outages across the country Tuesday morning, according to poweroutage.com. Most of them were in the South, where weekend blasts of freezing rain caused tree limbs and power lines to snap, inflicting crippling outages on northern Mississippi and parts of Tennessee. Officials warned that it could take days for power to be restored.

In Mississippi, Gov. Tate Reeves said Monday at least 14 homes and 20 public roads had major damage in the aftermath of the state’s worst ice storm since 1994. The University of Mississippi cancelled classes for the entire week as its Oxford campus remained coated in treacherous ice.

New York City saw its snowiest day in years, with neighbourhoods recording 20 to 38 centimetres of snow, forcing the nation’s largest public school system to shut down.

In Nashville, Nathan Hoffner sent his four-year-old son to stay with his son’s mother after his rental house in lost power midday Sunday. He and his roommate layered up with clothes and several blankets overnight and by the next morning the temperature inside the home had dropped dramatically.

“I saw my breath in the house,” Hoffner said.