Leanne Galligan shovels out her driveway after a winter storm, Wednesday in Portland, Maine. The region is set to take another hit tonight as another storm blows through.(Photo: Robert F. Bukaty, AP)
The weather should be perfect in Glendale, Ariz., for fans headed to the Super Bowl, but those watching the game throughout the Midwest and Northeast are in for some treacherous drives home.
A massive storm stretching from Nebraska to Maine will dump snow, ice and freezing rain on Sunday, getting progressively worse throughout the night in the Northeast. Forecasters declared a blizzard warning for Chicago, predicted up to a tenth of an inch of ice on Ohio roads and up to 14 inches of snow in parts of Massachusetts.
The good news? The brunt of the storm isn't expected to hit Boston, the heart of the New England Patriots nation, until well after midnight.
"As long as they get home at a reasonable hour, it's shouldn't cause too much of a problem," said Alan Dunham of the Taunton, Mass., office of the National Weather Service.
The storm was battering much of the Midwest early Sunday, with a mixture of ice, snow and sleet blanketing several states.
Chicago was among the hardest hit cities, with up to 8 inches of snow reported by early morning. Airlines had already canceled nearly 1,900 flights into Chicago-area airports and that figure was expected to grow throughout the day.
Tammy Chase of the Chicago Transit Authority said officials had dispatched bus and rail crews to ensure the system continued running throughout the day. "We are working very closely with the city's Office of Emergency Management to monitor conditions," she said.
As the storm moves east, it will dump even more snow on a region still digging out from last week's blizzard.
In Massachusetts, Dunham said some areas still have up to 30 inches of snow on the ground and could get an additional 14 inches throughout the day on Monday. Boston Mayor Marty Walsh ordered several roads in the region closed due to last week's storm, adding to the road closures that are usually ordered during major sporting events.
This storm could be even worse for the small town of Henniker, N.H., which lost nearly its entire fleet of snow-clearing equipment in a fire at the town's garage Friday night. Henniker residents now have to rely on two pickup trucks and a front-end loader, which were parked outside the garage when the fire started, to clear their roads.
"This puts the town in a bad spot," Henniker Fire Chief Steve Burritt told the Concord Monitor newspaper. "Not that there isn't a solution, but it's going to be a challenge."
The heaviest snowfall is expected throughout the day Monday before the system clears out over the Atlantic Ocean. And while the rest of the week looks relatively calm in the snow department for the Northeast, Dunham said the dry air that follows will be cold. Very cold.
"We're looking at low temperatures for Monday night to be zero to 5 above," he said.
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