Severe cold is forecast to freeze the northeastern states through the weekend, and hundreds of thousands of Texans remain without power Friday morning following a deadly ice storm that killed at least 10 people.
More than 243,000 customers in Texas were without power, as well as more than 56,000 homes and businesses in Arkansas and 15,000 in Mississippi as of 9 a.m. ET, according to outage tracker PowerOutage.US.
“We were expecting more progress today,” said Jackie Sargent, general manager of utility Austin Energy. “And that just hasn’t happened.”
Austin officials backtracked on initial estimates that power would be fully restored by Friday night and said they no longer had a timeline for restoration as the damage was worse than initially determined.
UPPER MIDWEST, NORTHEAST BRACE FOR ARCTIC EXPLOSIONS BRINGING SUB-ZERO TEMPERATURES, “LIFE-DANGEROUS” PHYSICAL WIND
Icicles cover and hang from a power line after a few days of sleet and snow, Thursday, February 2, 2023, in Richardson, Texas.
((AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez))
The freeze was blamed for at least 10 traffic deaths in Texas, Arkansas and Oklahoma.
However, the southern states were expected to get some relief due to rising temperatures in the region.
Meanwhile, in the northern US, an arctic cold front is expected to move over the Plains, Midwest, and Northeast, causing a wind chill in some areas to plummet below 30 degrees Fahrenheit. 50 degrees below zero.
An ice-covered pedestrian walkway is lined with trees covered in ice from a few days of sleet and rain, Thursday, Feb. 2, 2023, in Dallas.
((AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez))
POLAR VORTEX DRIVES COLD WIND ADVISORY ACROSS THE NORTHEAST AS THE COLDEST AIR IN OVER 5 YEARS
New Englanders were warned that the wind chill could “be the coldest in decades.”
“We take safety very seriously at the highest peaks,” said Jay Broccolo, director of weather operations at an observatory on New Hampshire’s Mount Washington, “and this weekend’s forecast looks pretty tough, even for our standards.”
Icicles of sleet and rain cover a parked Richardson Independent School bus, Thursday, February 2, 2023, in Richardson, Texas. Several school districts in the region have been closed for the past three days due to the winter storm.
((AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez))
The National Weather Service said Friday that temperatures would be 15 to 35 degrees below average in parts of the upper Mississippi Valley, the Great Lakes, the Ohio Valley and the Northeast. On Thursday, the agency warned residents to limit time outdoors and dress in layers, as frostbite and hypothermia can strike within minutes.
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Fox News’ Janice Dean said the cold snap would be short-lived.
Associated Press contributed to this report.
