Storm brings white Christmas to Rockies;
soggy weekend to Southeast
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[December 26, 2014]
By Victoria Cavaliere
(Reuters) - A winter storm pushing across
the Rockies on Thursday was expected to drop a foot of snow in some
areas as it fanned eastward, threatening soggy conditions and potential
weekend travel delays across a wide swath of the United States,
forecasters said.
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The storm was one of several predicted to produce snow, rain, fog
and other treacherous conditions in the coming days as millions of
travelers head home after the Christmas holiday, the National
Weather Service said.
Residents in Utah, Wyoming and Colorado awoke to a white Christmas
on Thursday, with 3 to 5 inches of snow expected to fall by early
Friday in Salt Lake City and 4 to 6 inches possible for Denver.
Accumulations of more than a foot of snow were forecast for higher
elevations, according to the Weather Service.
As the storm tracks eastward, the Midwest is expected to see a light
layer of snowfall, cold temperatures and messy road conditions,
forecasters said. Heavy rain with possible flash floods were
predicted for Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia, meteorologists said.
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"For people traveling by ground or air across the Southeast portion
of the country, rain and thunderstorms will be the inconvenience
this weekend," AccuWeather meteorologist Brian Edwards said.
More than 98 million Americans were expected to journey 50 miles or
more from home during the year-end holiday season, with nearly 6
million people traveling by air, according to the American
Automobile Association.
A separate cold front descending on the Pacific Northwest from the
north is expected to bring rain to western Washington state and
Oregon on Saturday, with the Cascade Mountains due for a significant
band of snow, Edwards said.
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"This storm will usher in a very cold air mass as well, turning rain
to snow at lower elevations on Saturday and Saturday night with
rapidly increasing travel problems," he said.
The East Coast has been drying out after several days of soggy
weather, as a storm system that swept the mid-Atlantic states and
New York pushed out to the Atlantic, the National Weather Service
said.
A band of Arctic air early next week will send temperatures plunging
across the Western and central United States before heading east,
promising a chilly New Year's Eve in New York and Washington,
AccuWeather said.
The Arctic chill is expected to push temperatures in Las Vegas below
freezing for the first time since December 2013, the weather
forecaster said.
(Reporting and writing by Victoria Cavaliere in Seattle; Editing by
Steve Gorman and Mohammad Zargham)
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