Icy storm slams Southwest, freezes N. Texas

Associated Press

DALLAS

Freezing rain and stinging winds slammed the Southwest on Friday and made a strangely blank landscape out of normally sun-drenched North Texas: mostly empty highways covered in a sometimes impassable frost, closed schools and businesses, and millions of residents hunkered down for icy conditions expected to last through the weekend.

Earlier this week, many in Texas were basking in springlike temperatures that hit the 80s. But by Thursday, Texas was facing the same wintry blast that has slammed much of the U.S., bringing low temperatures, ice and snow.

The weather forced the cancellation of Sunday’s Dallas Marathon, which was expected to draw 25,000 runners, some of whom had trained for months. A quarter of a million customers in North Texas were left without power, and many businesses told employees to stay home to avoid the slick roads.

Friday’s storm stretched from South Texas, where anxious residents bagged outdoor plants to protect them from the cold, through the Midwest and Ohio Valley and up into northern New England and the Canadian Maritimes.

In California, four homeless people have died of hypothermia in the San Francisco Bay Area since last week, authorities said. One victim was found dead Nov. 28, and the other deaths were discovered in the past two days, Santa Clara County sheriff’s Lt. Dave Lera said at a news conference Friday afternoon.

Lera said three of the victims died at homeless encampments in San Jose, while a fourth died in a garage “with the door opened.”

Police in Arlington, about 20 miles west of Dallas, reported one driver was killed when his car slammed into a truck. Authorities in Oklahoma reported two weather-related traffic deaths.