Biden Meets With FEMA, Issues Warning on Powerful Winter Storm

President Joe Biden steps off Marine One in Washington on Dec. 16, 2022. (Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

President Joe Biden on Thursday warned travelers to “leave now” or face canceled flights and other travel issues ahead of a large winter storm sweeping across the United States that has already brought impacts to the Plains and Midwest regions.

“I encourage everyone, everyone to please heed the local warnings. We’ve tried to contact 26 governors so far in affected regions,” Biden told reporters at the White House, adding the system is “not like a snow day” before he entered a meeting with Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the National Weather Service (NWS). The president has not issued any disaster declarations or emergencies over the storm.

A map posted by the NWS on Thursday showed officials have issued blizzard and winter storm warnings across dozens of counties spanning several states due to the weather. A bulletin posted by the agency says conditions could become life-threatening in some areas due to excessive snowfall, ice, and well-below-normal cold temperatures.

As of Thursday afternoon, the map shows winter storm and blizzard warnings were issued from eastern Montana to parts of Michigan and western New York due to the storm.

“At the forefront of the impressive weather pattern is a dangerous and record-breaking cold air mass in the wake of a strong arctic cold front diving southward across the southern Plains today and eastward into the Ohio/Tennessee Valleys by tonight,” a bulletin said. “Behind the front, temperatures across the central High Plains have already plummeted 50 degrees F in just a few hours, with widespread subzero readings extending throughout much of the central/northern Plains and northern Rockies/Great Basin.”

The frigid air will move through the central United States to the east, with windchill advisories affecting about 135 million people over the coming days, weather service meteorologist Ashton Robinson Cook said Thursday.

Winter storm and blizzard warnings were issued for millions of Americans on Thursday as a winter storm brought harsh conditions and heavy snow across the Midwest and Plains regions. Regions shaded in orange are under blizzard warnings, while regions shaded in pink are under winter storm warnings. (NWS)

Forecasters are expecting a bomb cyclone—when atmospheric pressure drops very quickly in a strong storm—to develop near the Great Lakes, which will increase winds and create blizzard conditions, Cook said, according to The Associated Press. Already, roads in rural stretches of western South Dakota were blocked, leaving people stranded with dwindling supplies of food and heating sources.

As of Thursday, tracking service Flightaware.com shows that 1,800 flights have been canceled within the United States while another 4,200 flights were delayed.

Local Conditions

In Texas, temperatures were expected to quickly plummet Thursday, but state leaders promised there wouldn’t be a repeat of the February 2021 storm that overwhelmed the state’s power grid and was blamed for hundreds of deaths.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, in a news conference Wednesday, was confident the state could handle the increased demand for energy as the temperatures dropped. “I think trust will be earned over the next few days as people see that we have ultra-cold temperatures and the grid is going to be able to perform with ease,” he said.

In famously snowy Buffalo, New York, forecasters predicted a “once-in-a-generation storm” because of heavy lake-effect snow, wind gusts as high as 65 mph (105 kph), whiteouts, and the potential for extensive power outages.

The NHL postponed the Buffalo Sabres’ home game against the Tampa Bay Lightning and rescheduled it for March 4. Denver, also no stranger to winter storms, was the coldest it has been in 32 years on Thursday, when the temperature dropped to minus 24 (minus 31 Celsius) in the morning at the airport.

In Charleston, South Carolina, a coastal flood warning was in effect Thursday. The area, a popular tourist destination for its mild winters, braced for strong winds and freezing temperatures.

According to the weather service map, about half of the lower 48 states—between Washington state to Florida—are under various winter weather alerts such as wind chill advisories.