Hundreds of flights canceled, 2 people dead in ice storm freezing wide swath of U.S.

Winter weather brought ice to a wide swath of the U.S. on Tuesday, forcing the cancellation of more than 1,700 flights and snarling highways. At least two people died on slick roads in Texas, authorities said.

As the ice storm advanced east Tuesday, watches and warnings stretched from the western heel of Texas all the way to West Virginia. Several rounds of mixed precipitation — including freezing rain and sleet — were in store for many areas through Wednesday, meaning some regions could be hit multiple times, the federal Weather Prediction Center warned.

Emergency responders rushed to hundreds of auto collisions across Texas, and Gov. Greg Abbott urged people to stay off the roads.

Authorities said one person in Austin was killed in a predawn pileup Tuesday. A 45-year-old man also died Monday night after his SUV slid into a highway guardrail near Dallas in slick conditions and rolled down an embankment, according to the Arlington Police Department.

More than 900 flights to or from Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, a major hub, and more than 250 to or from Dallas Love Field were canceled or delayed Tuesday, according to the tracking service FlightAware. At Dallas-Fort Worth, more than 50% of Tuesday’s scheduled flights had been canceled by Tuesday afternoon.

Dallas-based Southwest Airlines canceled more than 560 flights Tuesday and delayed more than 350 more, FlightAware reported.

Fleets of emergency vehicles fanned out on the 1,600 roads affected by the freeze.

In Texas, a sheriff’s deputy who stopped to help the driver of an 18-wheeler that went off an icy highway Tuesday was hit by a second truck that pinned him beneath one of its tires, according to the Travis County Sheriff’s Office. About 45 minutes after the crash on State Highway 130, the deputy was freed from the wreckage and taken to a hospital, where he was in surgery Tuesday afternoon and is expected to survive, officials said.

In another wreck, a Texas state trooper was hospitalized with serious injuries after being struck by a driver who lost control of their vehicle, said Steve McCraw, director of the Texas Department of Public Safety.

“The roadways are very hazardous right now. We cannot overemphasize that,” Abbott said.

As the ice and sleet enveloped Memphis, Tenn., Memphis-Shelby County Schools announced that it would cancel classes Wednesday because of freezing rain and hazardous road conditions. The school system has about 100,000 students.

In Arkansas, Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders declared a state of emergency Tuesday because of the ice storm. In her declaration, Sanders cited the “likelihood of numerous downed power lines” and said road conditions had created a backlog of deliveries by commercial drivers.

One of the main thoroughfares through Arkansas — Interstate 40 — was ice-coated and “extremely hazardous” in the Forrest City area Tuesday, according to the city’s fire department.

“When I-40 shuts down like that, that can be hours of waiting,” said John Gadberry, who lives in Colt, Ark., not far from the highway. “I-40 is usually one of the first things that freezes over due to its slight elevation.”

The storm began Monday as part of an expected “several rounds” of wintry precipitation through Wednesday across Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Tennessee, according to National Weather Service meteorologist Marc Chenard.

The flight disruptions follow Southwest’s meltdown in December, which began with a winter storm but continued after most other airlines had recovered. Southwest canceled about 16,700 flights over the last 10 days of the year, and the U.S. Transportation Department is investigating.