Houston, we have a snowstorm: Parts of the city’s metropolitan area were under a blizzard warning and could receive four to six inches of snow by Tuesday afternoon. That would be the most significant winter weather event since at least 1960, forecasters said. The National Weather Service advised drivers to stay off the roads “at all costs.” The Texas electricity grid, crippled by a major winter storm in 2021, was holding steady on Tuesday morning.
10 inches in Cajun Country: The first-ever blizzard warning for parts of southern Louisiana and southeast Texas will be in place until noon local time, the Weather Service office in Lake Charles, La., said. Up to 10 inches could fall in some places, and forecasters warned that snow may drop visibility to less than a quarter of a mile. Four to six inches of snow were in the forecast for the city of New Orleans,
Not the usual emergency: Governors across the South, more accustomed to threats from hurricanes than winter storms, issued state of emergency declarations. School campuses were shuttered, in some cases through Wednesday, in Houston and Austin, Texas, New Orleans and Baton Rouge, La., Tallahassee, Fla., and many other communities. There were school delays announced in South Carolina and Georgia as well.
Canceled flights: Houston’s airport system, which includes George Bush Intercontinental Airport, William P. Hobby Airport and Ellington Airport, said it had shuttered all flight operations at midnight. Most airlines at Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport had suspended flights until Wednesday, airport officials said, though they added that the airport would remain open as long as “conditions are safe.”
Cold across the country: The Gulf storm is part of an intense blast of arctic air sweeping across the country this week. It has already brought heavy snow to the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic, and frigid temperatures to the Rockies and the Upper Midwest. Wind chills of minus 30 Fahrenheit in the Texas Panhandle were recorded overnight, along with minus 37 in parts of Iowa.
