Georgia, Alabama try to clear vehicle-littered roads as deep freeze pulls in - CNN

Traffic travels along the highway near downtown Birmingham on Tuesday, January 28. A wave of arctic air that settled over the Midwest and Plains is now spreading to the Southeast, bringing snow to several cities.

A man puts sand on the steps of his business in downtown Northport, Alabama, on January 28. Northport is near Tuscaloosa in the central-west part of the state.

A semi slides off the road as the driver tries to avoid another wrecked truck as snow begins to accumulate on Interstate 65 in Clanton, Alabama, on January 28. Clanton lies between the capital, Montgomery, and the state's biggest city, Birmingham.

People walk in the French Quarter in New Ortleans as temperatures drop on January 28.

With temperatures hovering around -10 degrees, commuters wait for a bus in Chicago on January 27.

The Duqusene Incline climbs Mount Washington across the frozen Ohio, Allegheny and Monongahela rivers in downtown Pittsburgh on January 28.

Steam rises from Lake Michigan in Chicago on Monday, January 27.

Workers dump sand across a bridge in Covington, Louisiana, on January 27.

A man jumps off a snow-covered sidewalk to cross a downtown Cleveland street January 27. A minor car accident is in the background.

Ice forms as waves crash along the Lake Michigan shore January 27 in Chicago.

A strong wind kicks up snow Sunday, January 26, in Vadnais Heights, Minnesota, creating drifts over roads and parking lots.

The Cincinnati neighborhood of Mount Adams is shown blanketed in snow on Saturday, January 25.

People walk in a snow squall January 25 in Trenton, New Jersey.

Cars sit in drifts and plowed snow on January 25 in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Icicles frame this shot of pedestrians walking through downtown San Antonio on Friday, January 24.

A North Hudson County firefighter walks in front of an ice-covered vehicle near a building where a six-alarm fire was put out January 24 in Union City, New Jersey.

A tugboat pushes a barge through ice on the Allegheny River in Pittsburgh on January 24.

Kyle Malott scraps the ice off his girlfriend's car near Covington, Louisiana, on January 24.

Ben Eggart pushes Hannah Graham down a hill at Girard Park in Lafayette, Louisiana, on January 24.

Ice floats by the Chicago skyline on Lake Michigan on Thursday, January 23.

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• Atlanta officials urge drivers to stay off streets for 24 hours


• "We've been in the car for over 12 hours," Atlanta resident says


• At least five are killed in weather-related traffic accidents in Alabama

Are you affected by the frigid weather? Send CNN iReport your photos and video of ice, snow and sleet if you can do so safely.

Atlanta (CNN) -- Ten hours after Rebekah Cole left her Atlanta-area office, her trip home was barely halfway over early Wednesday.

Rare snow triggered epic traffic snarls, stranded students at schools and left motorists camped on the roadsides for hours.

Many spent the night hunched over in their cars on freeways as the hushed voices of other motorists wafted into the crisp, cold air.

They talked and walked between cars covered in white powdery snow in the dead of the night.

Cole left work Tuesday afternoon and was still sitting in traffic at 1 a.m. Wednesday. She was preparing to spend the night in her car and hoping it didn't run out of fuel.

"If I get gasoline, I will turn the heater on, keep the windows cracked a little bit," she said.

Cole was not the lone car on the freeway. She was stranded with multitudes of others as cold temperatures dropped even further.

Her story was replicated in the Deep South, from Louisiana, to North Carolina, to Alabama, as snow, freezing rain and sleet laid down a sheet of thin ice in a region not familiar with such weather.

Motorists rushed home at the first sight of snow, creating a traffic nightmare, CNN meteorologist Taylor Ward said.

Georgia and Alabama were especially hit.

"I'm eight months pregnant and have my 3-year-old with me," Atlanta-area resident Katie Norman Horne said on "SnowedOutAtlanta," a Facebook page set up to help stranded motorists.

"We've been in the car for over 12 hours. We are fine on gas but is anyone near on the road and might happen to have any food or some water?"

There have been 940 confirmed accidents in Atlanta, more than 100 of them involving injuries, said Georgia public safety commissioner Mark W. McDonough.

In Alabama, where freezing rain made driving perilous, at least five people were killed in weather-related traffic accidents Tuesday. The governor declared a state of emergency and deployed 350 National Guard troops.

Stranded travelers sought refuge at strangers' homes, schools even Home Depot, which opened 26 stores to travelers overnight in Alabama and Georgia.

At the stores, some briefly forgot their snow woes and watched movies in break rooms.

"At one store they even opened up an indoor garden area to be a quiet area to open for reading," said Stephen Holmes, a spokesman for the store chain.

They were warned

Everyone had been warned. Atlanta was expecting 1-2 inches.

"The snow was forecast, and people just didn't heed it enough," CNN meteorologist Chad Myers said.

In the morning, when the snow had not arrived, people went to work and school, like nothing was coming.

Then it did.

"Everybody panicked at around the same time afternoon," Myers said. They clogged the streets en masse just as they began icing over.

In the end 2-3.5 inches hit central Georgia. That may not sound like much, but it's usually how much snow falls in the region in a whole year, Ward said.

"People thought ...I can deal with that," Myers said.

They couldn't. "There's literally one spinout after another," he added.

Unexpected eeriness

It's all echoed in what CNN editor Mariano Castillo experienced on his way home from work. His shift ended in the early afternoon, as the chaos began.

"The weather was a great equalizer," he said after sitting in traffic for nine hours. "Didn't matter if you had a late model Mustang or a beater van or a Brinks armored car, your wheels were spinning fruitlessly on the ice and slipping."

Abandoned cars and stranded big rigs stood in what looked like vehicle graveyards, Castillo wrote. Then there was this unusual sound.

"The unexpected voices of commuters talking and walking between cars on the interstate added to the eeriness," he said.

It gave Cole a strange feeling, too.

"You could hear voices, but you couldn't hear where they were coming from," she said.

She was on an overpass, and thinks they came from the interstate below her.

Nothing was moving down there. People who tried to drive up exit ramps to get off the ice. They were stuck.

Stranded in cars, schools

Countless motorists sat on the ice in their cars --- in between droves of cars left abandoned by their owners.

Thousands wondered how they'd get make it through the night as the temperatures headed for the teens.

This included school children on school buses.

At least 50 Atlanta Public School students were still stranded just after midnight, said spokeswoman Kimberly Willis Green.

Others had not left their schools and were set to spend the night there.

The severe weather forced 4,500 students to spend the night in various school buildings in Hoover, Alabama. And there were 800 students stuck in schools in Birmingham, Alabama, officials said.

"Staff is staying with them, feeding them," Birmingham City Schools Superintendent Craig Witherspoon said. "High schools are showing movies."

Hoover sent out school buses to pick up stranded motorists, said Rusty Lowe, executive officer for the city Fire Department. He is hoping to transport as many as 100 people to local shelters with the buses.

Stay home?

In Alabama and Georgia, authorities asked motorists to stay off the roads.

"This is a very dangerous situation," Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley said. "People need to stay at home. They need to stay there until conditions improve."

Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed urged residents to stop driving for at least a day to give crews a chance to clean up.

"The next 24 hours, I really need folks to stay home," he told CNN affiliate WSB. "Go home, give us some time."

The warnings not to drive came too late for countless people. The admonitions to make it home impossible to fulfill.

Early Wednesday, Atlanta mayor Kasim Reed said 30 salt trucks had been deployed.

Until they clear the roads, motorists may be stuck on ice for a while.

The ice is not going anywhere for a day, maybe two, Ward said.

CNN's Ray Sanchez, Steve Almasy, Devon Sayers, Michael Pearson, Holly Yan, Greg Botelho, Kevin Conlon, Dave Alsup, Janet DiGiacomo, Alanne Orjoux, Victor Blackwell, Tom Watkins, Chad Myers, Sean Morris, Dave Hennen, Joe Sutton, Martin Savidge and Jareen Imam contributed to this report.

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