Deadly storm on the move

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Samantha Fox, 18, looks uphill as she scouts an opening for her friend Skylar Rundle, not pictured, to take off during Cannonsburg Ski Hill's opening day on Wednesday, Dec. 26, 2012 in Belmont, Mich. (AP Photo/The Grand Rapids Press, Matthew Busch)

A powerful winter storm system that pounded the nation's midsection, wrecking holiday travel plans and dumping a record snowfall in Arkansas, began lashing the Northeast on Wednesday with high winds, snow and sleet.

The storm, which knocked out power to thousands of homes, mainly in Arkansas, was blamed in at least six deaths.

Hundreds of flights were cancelled or delayed, scores of motorists got stuck on icy roads or slid into drifts and blizzard warnings were issued amid snowy gusts of 30 mph that blanketed roads and windshields, at times causing whiteout conditions.

"The way I've been describing it is as a low-end blizzard, but that's sort of like saying a small Tyrannosaurus rex," said John Kwiatkowski, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Indianapolis.

The system, which spawned Gulf Coast region tornadoes on Christmas Day, pushed through the Upper Ohio Valley and headed into the Northeast Wednesday night. High winds, snow and sleet slickened roads in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut. Forecasts called for 12 to 18 inches of snow inland from western New York to Maine into Thursday.

The National Weather Service said Wednesday night that spotters had reported up to a foot of snow in some Pennsylvania counties. And a mix of snow, sleet and rain accompanied by high winds arrived in western Massachusetts late Wednesday. Forecasters predict 10 to 12 inches of snow in western and central Massachusetts.

The system was expected to taper off into a mix of rain and snow closer to the coast, where little or no accumulation was expected in such cities as Philadelphia, Boston and New York.

The storm left freezing temperatures in its aftermath, and forecasters also said parts of the Southeast from Virginia to Florida would see severe thunderstorms.

Schools on break and workers taking holiday vacations meant that many people could avoid messy commutes, but those who had to travel were implored to avoid it. Snow was blamed for scores of vehicle accidents as far east as Maryland, and about two dozen counties in Indiana and Ohio issued snow emergency travel alerts, urging people to go out on the roads only if necessary.

Some 40 vehicles got bogged down trying to make it up a slick hill in central Indiana, and four state snowplows slid off roads as snow fell at the rate of 3 inches an hour in some places.