Total snowfall of between 15 and 30cm was expected from southern Ohio to Washington. Hundreds of schools announced in advance that they would not open on Monday due to the storm, including public schools in Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Washington and Philadelphia.
In northern Kentucky and southern West Virginia, freezing rain and sleet will produce “hazardous ice accumulations”, the service said. The back end of the storm system, meanwhile, was producing severe thunderstorms capable of spinning off tornadoes in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.
The storm forced the cancellation of hundreds of flights, including more than 275 in both Kansas City and St. Louis, according to the aviation tracking website FlightAware.
Governors in several states, including Kansas, Kentucky, Arkansas, West Virginia and Virginia, declared states of emergency.
The storm will move offshore on Monday night, but bone-chilling arctic air is set to move in behind it, with daytime temperatures on Monday and Tuesday predicted to be 10 to 20 degrees F below average from the Great Plains to the East Coast, according to the weather service.
