A massive winter storm began its assault on the central U.S. on Wednesday, a sprawling system that promised to deliver a messy brew of snow and freezing rain to tens of millions from the Rockies to the Northeast.
About 100 million Americans were under some form of weather alert as of Wednesday morning, the National Weather Service said.
In Chicago, where snow was falling, the Weather Service tweeted, "Consider staying off the roads this morning if at all possible." The Weather Channel named the system Winter Storm Landon.
More than a foot of snow was forecast to fall from Missouri to Maine by the time the storm winds down this week, AccuWeather said.
In the Detroit area, shoppers hauled bags of groceries to stock their kitchens before up to 16 inches of snow was expected to blanket the region Wednesday and Thursday in what the National Weather Service called a "Long-duration event." At the Southgate Meijer store, Mike Cavallero, of Taylor, Michigan, loaded up on more groceries than usual.
Indianapolis is expected to see 6-12 inches of snow during the two days, and areas north of the city could see 12-18 inches, Weather Service meteorologist Ted Funk said. "At that time, we are looking at high snowfall rates,” Funk said. “We are looking at winds blowing 20 to 30 mph. It could cause, at times, here and north of here near-blizzard conditions."
To the south of where the snow falls, a corridor of heavy ice accumulation is likely from Texas through the Ohio River Valley, the Weather Service warned.
The forecast did not call for the same prolonged and frigid temperatures as in the storm in February 2021. The disruptive storm moved across the central U.S. on Groundhog Day, the same day the famed groundhog Punxsutawney Phil predicted six more weeks of winter.
