Dangerous winter storms hit the South with a lot of snow and twisters. On Sunday, a furious winter storm came from the Midwest and kept moving across the country. It was full of heavy snow, ice, gale-force winds, and tornadoes.
Many people in Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Florida lost power because of the winter storm that hit. Highway patrols said there were a lot of car accidents, and a tornado hit a trailer park in Florida. According to flightaware.com, more than 1,200 flights at Charlotte Douglas International were canceled on Sunday. This is more than 90% of all flights that were scheduled for that day at the airport.
The storm had different effects on different parts of the city. Mississippi’s capital city saw a little snow in the early hours of Sunday, while a small town 25 miles away was hit with more than 8 inches.
Southern cities were on the lookout. In Nashville, 3 inches of snow could fall, while other parts of Tennessee could get a foot of snow in the same amount of time. A tractor-trailer accident near the Tennessee River shut down I-40 eastbound in Humphreys County, so people couldn’t get to their jobs or school. The Tennessee Highway Patrol said there was a long line of cars for a long time.
North Carolina’s streets were covered with snow early Sunday. The National Weather Service said parts of the state could get 2 to 7 inches of snow, and some places could get more than 10 inches.
The weather service said that power outages and damage to trees could happen because of the ice. There might not be a way to get around.
People in Waynesville, North Carolina, said they saw thundersnow. Accuweather said there was a lightning strike during a lot of snow. Thundersnow is rare, but it can happen when there is a lot of snow, Accuweather said. In some places in the state, there was a foot of snow.
North Carolina Highway Patrol spokesman First Sgt. Christopher Knox said that by midday the agency had responded to 300 car accidents and nearly 800 calls for help. This is how it works:
Two people died on Sunday when their car went off the road and hit trees in a median east of Raleigh, North Carolina, killing them.
A single-vehicle crash in South Carolina killed the driver and his passenger, who were both 41 years old and from South Carolina at the time. Investigators think the car was going too fast for the weather, which they called mixed winter precipitation.
