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| Tornado damage in Mount Zion, Illinois. A powerful wide ranging storm not only produced the tornadoes, but spread heavy snow, freezing rain, high winds and other weather problems from Minnesota to Quebec and beyond. Photo via Facebook by Storm Chaser Jordan Hall. |
Arguably the scariest part of the storm was a mini outbreak of tornados in Illinois.
Six tornadoes were reported in Illinois. The worst of them hit the town of Mount Zion, Illinois, where eight homes were reportedly destroyed or seriously damaged.
Elsewhere, the trouble was much more wintry.
The storm's powerful cold front brought plunging temperatures across the Midwest and South. In Memphis the temperature dropped from 72 to 53 degrees in just 20 minutes on Sunday.
In the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, two feet of snow had fallen in some areas by Monday morning. Winds were also gusting as high as 60 mph up there, so you can imagine the whiteouts and snow drifts.
In lower Michigan, freezing rain cut power to 115,000 customers.
Parts of Wisconsin got nearly a foot of snow, with amounts over six inches in much of the state.
Snow totals in Minnesota amounted to five to nine inches, which isn't extreme, but the winds gusted to 55 mph in some areas, causing whiteouts on some roads.
A 150-mile section of Interstate 35 was shut down in southern Minnesota and northern Iowa during the height of the storm.
In Ontario, Canada, several highways shut down due to heavy snow, blowing snow and freezing rain. Power was cut to homes and businesses in southern and eastern Ontario due to freezing rain.
Strong winds and snow squalls are threatening more power outages in Ontario. Freezing rain also caused havoc across southern Quebec, including the cities of Ottawa, Montreal and Quebec City.
High winds also swept western New York this morning and early afternoon, cutting power to tens of thousands of customers there. Winds gusted to 72 mph in Lackawanna, New York and 66 mph in Niagara, New York.
The lake effect snow machine is cranking up. One to two feet of snow are expected in western New York's snowbelt areas with up to two feet expected. As of 1 p.m. today, Buffalo was reporting heavy snow with wind gusts to 58 mph.
Video by Live Storms Media showed lakeshore flooding, near zero visibility in snow, near hurricane force winds and a sizable branch falling on the videographer. He didn't appear to be seriously injured.
The ice spread through New York, Vermont and into New Hampshire. About 20,000 power outages were reported in New Hampshire. A section of Interstate 89 had to shut down in New Hampshire due to crashes.
The strong storm was over southwestern Quebec early this afternoon. It will meander toward the Gaspe Peninsula of eastern Quebec by tomorrow, then curl westward to Hudson Bay on Wednesday. That'll ensure a flood of frigid air flowing into the Great Lakes states and Northeast for the next several days.
Unrelated to this storm, strong Santa Ana winds are blowing through southern California. Since they just had that big storm, there's little risk of them starting huge, deadly wildfires, like we saw last January
But since the ground is so wet, it'll be easier for trees to topple in today's strong winds. Rain is coming back to southern California later this week, but the storm won't be as big as the one that hit around Christmas. Still, flooding is a risk on New Year's Eve once again in the L.A. area.
And a program note, I'll have a Vermont-oriented update on this storm late this afternoon.
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