Hundreds of thousands of people across the midwestern and eastern states were without power, and even more were stuck at home instead of going to work and school, on Monday morning as a historic winter storm dumped — and continues to dump — several inches of snow on them.
A staggering 23 states are under winter storm warnings and advisories from the National Weather Service (NWS), according to Newsweek, with warnings in place in Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, and Delaware.
Alaska, Nevada, Idaho, Wyoming, Arkansas, Tennessee, Montana, New York, Vermont, Wisconsin, and Iowa are all under winter weather advisories, the outlet stated.
Official state of emergencies have been declared in Kentucky, Virginia, West Virginia, Kansas, Arkansas, Maryland, and Missouri, while New Jersey has a state of emergency in place for several counties, Newsweek reported.
About 270,000 customers had no electricity across Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, West Virginia, and Virginia as of 3:00 p.m. on Monday, according to tracking website PowerOutage.us.
The number of powerless households in those states was nearly 300,000 when the New York Post viewed the website earlier in the morning, the outlet stated.
Public and private schools alike across the Washington, DC, Maryland, and Virginia area shut down on Monday as the area receives upwards of six to eight inches of snow, letting hundreds of thousands of children stay home in the freezing weather.
In his state of emergency announcement, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore (D) urged residents to “please stay off the roads” and to “charge your communications devices in case you lose power.”
Dozens of schools in Pennsylvania have shut down or had two-hour delays as well, according to WTAE.
Over in Kentucky, Jefferson County Public Schools also canceled classes for its nearly 100,000 students, WLKY reported.
Another heavy round of snow is expected to slam the mid-Atlantic region on Monday evening, according to WUSA9.