Reuters/AFP/Washington
A winter storm reaching from Texas to New England closed schools, cancelled more than 3,400 flights and stranded hundreds of drivers overnight in Kentucky, where as much as 21.5” (55cm) of snow fell.
A plane slid off the runway at New York’s LaGuardia Airport, according to the New York City fire department.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said on its website that the airport was closed because of an “aircraft incident”.
Delta flight 1086 from Atlanta to New York skidded off the runaway around 11am (1600 GMT) with 125 passengers on board after landing, the airline reported, without confirming any injuries.
Local media reported some on board suffered light injuries.
The plane’s nose was lodged in the fence after the crash, and passengers could be seen climbing out through an exit over a wing and trudging through thick snow.
New York Fire Department said on Twitter there was a fuel leak after the MD88 aircraft crashed.
“Customers deplaned via aircraft slides and have moved to the terminal on buses. Our priority is ensuring our customers and crew members are safe,” Delta said in a statement.
Delta vowed to “work with all authorities and stakeholders to look into what happened in this incident”.
In a Twitter message, the airport said its runways were closed and warned travellers to expect cancellations and delays.
Cancellations were announced for hundreds of school districts, government offices and legislatures in the District of Columbia, New Jersey, South Carolina and Tennessee.
Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear declared a state of emergency yesterday.
“Help is on the way,” Kentucky National Guard Lieutenant-Colonel Kirk Hilbrecht, interviewed on CNN, told drivers stuck in their cars on I-65 as long as 12 hours.
Besides the cars, at least 200 tractor trailers were stuck on the roadway, which officials said was impassable, said Kentucky State Police Trooper Jeff Gregory.
Kaleigh Birman said she was headed from Michigan to Florida for a spring break holiday with her family when her carload of six people and two dogs got stuck overnight on I-65.
“We swerved in and out of parked cars,” Birman told Reuters in a Twitter post, noting that the accumulation became so heavy it forced her car to a standstill, too. “I’m pretty sure everyone is running out of gas.”
The stranded drivers were told yesterday morning that it would take several hours to reopen the roadway and that National Guardsmen would assist them as well as drivers stuck on western Kentucky roads.
The governor said the stranded vehicles were blocking first responders.
National Weather Service meteorologist Andrew Orrison said Kentucky was buried under snow, with 21.5” reported in the city of Radcliff and more than a foot falling elsewhere in the state.
Parts of Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana and Ohio recorded as much as 11” (28cm) of snow, and freezing rain glazed Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama, the weather service said.
After moving out of Kentucky, the storm bore down on West Virginia and northern Virginia, pelting New York City, Long Island and the southern parts of New England.
A total of 3,417 US flights were cancelled yesterday, according to FlightAware.com, with airports in Dallas, Washington, Philadelphia and the New York metropolitan area hardest hit.
Boston might not get any snow from the newest storm, the weather service said.
Only two more inches would break the city’s record annual snowfall total of nearly 108”, which was set in the year that ended in June 1996.
