Dangerously cold temperatures blamed for at least nine deaths have wreaked havoc across a wide swath of the U.S., freezing a water tower in Iowa, halting ferry service in New York and leading officials to open warming centers even in the Deep South.
The storm system attacking the Mississippi River and to the east started in Nebraska, swept across Iowa and will dump several inches of snow on Chicago.
The snow that blanketed parts of the Deep South on Friday delighted schoolchildren with an unexpected holiday but also revived panicky memories for many adults of past storms that trapped commuters on interstates for hours.
On Wednesday, the National Weather Service in Greenville-Spartanburg announced that an EF2 tornado did touch down Monday evening at the Hickory Regional Airport based on their preliminary findings.