Dec. 26—
Storms and ice made travel across parts of the South treacherous today,
leaving thousands of homes and businesses without power and grounding hundreds
of flights.
Up to a foot of snow and two inches of ice covered parts of Texas, Arkansas,
Oklahoma and Louisiana as the cold wave moved eastward across the southern
Great Plains. Highways, schools and airports shut down in those areas because
of the dangerous conditions, which were blamed for at least two traffic
deaths in Oklahoma.
In Texas, American Airlines, apologizing for
the disruption on one of the year’s busiest travel days, said it canceled
738 flights, or 60 percent of its capacity at its main hub at Dallas-Fort
Worth Airport.
“We recognize that any flight cancellation
is an inconvenience, but feel it is much better for passengers to remain
where they are rather to fly into potentially icy and severe conditions,”
said American vice president Tim Doke in a statement.
Delta Airlines said the weather also forced
it cancel a “significant number” of flights.
“It’s about as bad as it gets for travel.
We expect it to continue and conditions may get worse before we get any
improvement,” said meteorologist David Andra at the National Weather Service
office in Norman, Oklahoma.
Freezing Temperatures, Slippery Roads
Despite ice and winter storm warnings from The National Weather Service,
travelers tested the slippery roads today — at great risk.
Early this morning, Oklahoma authorities reported
a rash of accidents with the first sign of sleet and snow. In Nowata County,
50 miles north of Tulsa, a 13-year-old boy was killed when he lost control
of his go-cart and hit a pickup truck at a snowy intersection. Two adults
also died in a wreck on a frozen stretch of Interstate 35 in Payne County,
35 miles north of Oklahoma City.
In parts of the Arkansas, National Guard troops
in humvees had been going out to the highway to rescue drivers stuck in
snarled traffic, officials said. Some exasperated drivers just abandoned
their vehicles. Stuck and abandoned vehicles hampered troopers’ efforts
to clear roads.
In Texas, authorities closed some highways.
“We can’t salt the roads fast enough,” said Garza County, Texas, deputy
constable Cliff Laws.
Four traffic deaths were blamed on the storm
in New Mexico, and Oklahoma had three deaths.
Power Troubles
Several communities opened shelters across southern Arkansas after
more than 100,000 homes and businesses lost electricity because of ice-heavy
limbs falling on power lines.
“Going to sleep last night you could hear
trees popping all over the woods,” said Billy Ray McKelvey, managing editor
of the
De Queen Daily Citizen newspaper, which was unable to go
to press today.
The power troubles spilled over from Monday
night when, according to Ed Bettinger, a spokesman for Public Service Co.
of Oklahoma, about 20,000 power customers were left in the dark in the
southeast part of the state because of freezing rain building up on trees
and power lines.
“What the freezing rain does is it coats trees,
tree limbs, and power lines. It causes trees to break and fall over when
they get weighted down,” he explained.
Northern Exposure
The Northeast woke up to bone-chilling temperatures Christmas Day and
again this morning. With winds in excess of 35 mph, Boston saw their wind
chill dive to close to 30 degrees below zero.
The cold forced a group of history buffs in
Pennsylvania to cancel their traditional re-enactment of Washington’s crossing
of the Delaware river.
In New York, Mayor Rudolph Giuliani said the
city was taking extra precautions for the homeless.
“The city has extra people that go out and
try to bring people in, of course it’s an emergency situation now so that
we can actually just take people off the street.”
There is no break in sight for the cold spell.
Meteorologists say the current weather pattern may bring a major snowstorm
to the East coast on Thursday. 
ABCNEWS’ Jim Williams and Lisa Starks, Reuters and the Associated
Press contributed to this report.
