Snowstorm slams Northeast, Great Lakes with mass power outages and travel mayhem

A deadly storm that's left a trail of wreckage across a vast swath of the U.S. slammed the Northeast and Great Lakes regions with heavy snow, rain and wind on Thursday, knocking out power, closing schools and disrupting travel in major cities.

Parts of the Northeast received 1 to 2 feet of snow, according to the National Weather Service. By Thursday evening, the weather service reported over 17 inches of snow in Grey, Maine.

The combination of pummeling snow and gusty winds led to whiteout conditions and snow-covered roads in some areas. Many schools and government offices across the region were closed.

"Please stay off the roads today if you can," said Maine Gov. Janet Mills in a post on X. "If you must drive, take it slowly, and always give plenty of room to first responders, plow trucks, and utility crews."

While the heaviest snow was expected to subside by Thursday night, the weather service said periods of snow will continue through Friday. Occasional wind gusts of 20 to 30 mph across New England may also cause reduced visibility and hazardous travel conditions through Saturday.

The weather service issued flood advisories across parts of Illinois, east through Virginia and up to Rhode Island, including Washington, D.C., and New York City. Over 3 inches of rain had fallen in parts of New Jersey as of Thursday morning. The same storm impacted the Great Lakes, and several inches of snow was reported in Wisconsin and Michigan.

Meanwhile, parts of California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Colorado and New Mexico were under weather advisories warning of strong winds, coastal rain and snow in areas of high elevation. A front moving east over the northern High Plains, Great Basin and Southern California regions will linger over the Sierra Nevada Mountains through Saturday, while snow is anticipated to lash the Rockies into the weekend.

Dozens of accidents reported in Maine amid heavy snow

Since Wednesday night, there have been about 46 crashes and slide-offs on the Interstate and Turnpike, according to Maine State Police. Authorities have urged motorists to avoid travel due to the snowfall intensity and deteriorated road conditions.

The National Weather Service in Grey, Maine, recorded heavy snowfall throughout Thursday. The heavy snow band that moved through the region reduced visibility to less than a quarter of a mile, according to the weather service.

"There are trees down all over the place and its difficult to travel on any side road," the weather service in Grey, Maine, said on X, formerly Twitter.

Hundreds of thousands without power; flights canceled

More than 530,000 homes and businesses were without power across the Northeast, especially in Maine, where over 285,000 utility customers were in the dark Thursday night, according to a database maintained by USA TODAY. The Great Lakes region was not spared: Michigan and Wisconsin reported nearly 36,700 outages.

Airports in Boston, New York and New Jersey reported disruptions; there were about 100 cancellations and 150 delays on Thursday afternoon, according to FlightAware, a flight tracking website.

Road closures because of debris, snow and floods were reported across the Northeast on Thursday.

Thunderstorms delay Baltimore bridge recovery operations

Bad weather and swirling currents are limiting recovery efforts in Baltimore harbor where the commercial ship Dali crashed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge on March 26, toppling a huge portion of the span and killing six construction workers.

The current of one knot, underwater visibility of 2 feet and the tangled mass of steel and concrete from the bridge have complicated the work of divers, according to a senior U.S. official briefed on the multi-agency recover effort.

Thunderstorms in the area have delayed operations until Friday, the official said. One container that had been knocked off the Dali has been located, and crews plan to refloat it by Friday.

-Tom Vanden Brook

Damage assessments, cleanup underway in parts of central, eastern US

The large storm system, which has walloped the nation with severe weather conditions since the weekend, spun up tornadoes in Illinois, Kentucky, Ohio, Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia this week, damaging businesses and leveling homes. In areas as far south as Florida, strong winds toppled utility poles and snapped trees. Throughout the Midwest, floodwaters trapped cars in roadways and left people stranded for hours.

"It's devastating," said Sunbright Mayor Karen Melton on Wednesday after a tornado ripped through the small Tennessee city, about an hour northwest of Knoxville. Though there were no deaths of injuries, the damage was immense. "We had a young mother and father holding their babies, an infant and a 4-year-old (when) the tornado ripped the roof of their apartment. ... It was just horrific and sad. But they were safe, she had some scratches, but the babies were safe. That was just a major blessing."

In northern West Virginia, a mudslide washed out over 200 tombstones at a cemetery in Wheeling, a small city at the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, CBS42 reported. The cemetery, which was closed Thursday, is home to thousands of graves, some of which date back to the Civil War.

In Indiana, the storm destroyed homes throughout the Evansville area, including the city's wartime museum, which had to cancel all events and close because it had "heavily sustained damage." Photos posted on the museum's Facebook page show caved-in ceiling tiles and exposed insulation.

Authorities in Georgia continued the cleanup effort following a pair of tornadoes that struck the Atlanta metro area and Crisp County, near the center of the state, late Tuesday night, according to the National Weather Service. In Crisp County, where the tornado had maximum winds of up to 100 mph, about 36 homes were either damaged or completely destroyed.

"This is a dangerous situation: trees still being cut in the area, power lines still down, a lot of equipment moving back and forth," Sheriff Billy Hancock said in a video posted to Facebook on Thursday. "There's still plenty of work to be done."

Officials tie several deaths to powerful storm

At least four people died in Kentucky, Oklahoma and Pennsylvania because of the storm this week.

On Wednesday, two people – a 70-year-old man and an 82-year-old woman – died when their cars were crushed by fallen trees, multiple outlets reported. A young man in Campbell County, Kentucky, died in a traffic accident during Tuesday’s storms, Gov. Andy Beshear said at a news conference Wednesday.

On Monday, a 46-year-old unhoused woman in Tulsa, Oklahoma, died after seeking shelter in a storm drain  KJRH-TV reported.

Major California highway closed again after partial collapse

A major highway in Southern California that collapsed over the weekend when thunderstorms drenched the region has been closed again as more severe weather is forecast for the region.

The Monterey County Sheriff's Office in Salinas announced an evacuation order Wednesday morning for areas of Big Sur ahead of showers and thunderstorms that began Thursday and are anticipated to continue Friday. Officials said residents could evacuate on Highway 1 to the north before "a full road closure" where the collapse occurred last Saturday.

The road "slip out" happened during heavy rainfall that was fueled by the large weather system making its way across the country, which also brought damaging hail to the Midwest.

Contributing: Liz Kellar, Knoxville News Sentinel

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Snow, wind, flood advisories abound as snowstorm slams parts of US