National Guard carries out highway rescues after monster winter storm unloads blizzard conditions, turns deadly
Whiteout conditions have deteriorated Kimball, Nebraska on March 13 to the point where visibility is next to impossible.
A monster winter storm that slammed the Rockies and central Plains contributed to the deaths of a Colorado State Patrol corporal and a Texas lineman on Wednesday, officials report.
The 'bomb cyclone' packed blizzard conditions, hurricane-force wind gusts, and hazardous travel.
The storm turned deadly when a Colorado State Patrol corporal was struck and killed by a vehicle while he was outside helping a car that slid off of Interstate 76 in Weld County, Colorado.
A Volvo lost control and ran into Corporal Daniel Groves, 52. Corporal Groves, a veteran of nearly 12 years for the State Patrol, was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead.
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis said on Twitter that Groves will be remembered as a hero.
Xcel Energy confirmed the death of a lineman during the wind storm recovery efforts near Hereford, Texas, local Texas news station KCBD reports.
The incident reportedly happened around 8:30 p.m. local time. No other details were given regarding the death.
The National Weather Service deemed the storm a "cyclone of historic proportions."
As the blizzard developed, heavy snow lashed northern Colorado, including Denver, western Nebraska, eastern Wyoming, central South Dakota, and southeastern North Dakota.
Gov. Polis declared a state of emergency on Wednesday and activated the Colorado National Guard to assist with search, rescue and safety operations. Nebraska Gov Pete Ricketts issued a state of emergency on Tuesday.
Hundreds of motorists were stranded around the Colorado Springs area and surrounding interstates. The Associated Press reported that numerous accidents occurred on interstates 25 and 70 in Colorado.
Many roads remained closed in Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas, South Dakota and Iowa on Thursday morning due to snow and flooding. This includes stretches of I-80 and I-70.
The storm strengthened over the High Plains on Wednesday with the rate of intensification resulting in bombogenesis, which occurs when the barometric pressure rapidly plummets, crashing more than the 0.71 of an inch threshold in a 24-hour period. The rare weather phenomenon is often referred to as a "bomb cyclone."
National Weather Service (NWS) offices logged roughly 350 wind gusts reports of 50 mph or more during a 24-hour period.
Some locations were hit with hurricane-force wind gusts. The NWS has received more than 92 reports of damage.
Wind gusts near 100 mph occurred with the snow in Colorado Springs, Colorado, according to AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Dave Samuhel said.
A 103-mph wind gust was reported at Guadalupe Mountains National Park.
Airlines canceled almost 2,000 flights and delayed another 2,700 due to the wind and severe weather.
"The powerful winds also led to structural damage, widespread tree damage, power outages and difficult driving conditions," Samuhel said.
A portion of the above corridor was expected to receive 12-18 inches of snow with an AccuWeather Local StormMax™ of 26 inches possible in some places by the time the storm is finished. Indeed, some places in Colorado reported more than a foot of snowfall by late afternoon, according to the National Weather Service (NWS).
"Snowfall totals so far are as high as 16 inches in the mountains of Colorado, with 7.1 inches reported in Denver and about 4 in the Boulder area. Many schools, including those in the Denver area, have already been canceled for Thursday," AccuWeather Meteorologist Faith Eherts said.
The storm also tangled with barometric pressure records across the southwest and middle of the nation. According to preliminary NWS data, Colorado and New Mexico broke all-time low barometric pressure records on Wednesday.
The old records stood at 28.82 inches of Mercury (975.8 millibars) in La Junta, Colorado, in 1973, and 28.90 inches of Mercury (978.7 millibars) in Clayton, New Mexico.
A reading of 28.78 inches of mercury (974.6 millibars) was recorded Wednesday at the Dodge City Regional Airport in Kansas, breaking the previous record of 974.9 millibars, which was set in 1960. Additionally, the NWS office in Dodge City reports that it was the lowest barometric pressure since 1900 due to erroneous data back in the 1870s and 1880s.
The NWS office confirmed on Thursday that the state's overall record of 28.67 inches of mercury (971.2 millibars) remains intact.
Click here to download the free AccuWather app to know how much snow will fall in your area.
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