and in the state of georgia alone there are around 100,000 customers without power right now and if you think about the ramifications with that, people do not have the ability to heat their home, keep themselves warm but also the pipes inside their home at threat of being frozen. get to the radar quickly, this is my graphic. i want to show you where this storm is headed. the cold front right now located over the east coast, new york, you re in the rain belt so the warm air, but that cold air is coming so you re going to get a thump of snow quickly. it won t last very long. it won t accumulate likely but you ll see the dramatic drop in our temperatures then as we look a little closer into the downwind area of lake erie where polo is currently right now, we know they are going to be in whiteout conditions at least for the next 24 hours minimum but some improvements expected a little further to the west, the great lakes, you ve got it tough for the next several days. jessica. certainly
know are going to be very expensive this year. how are you anticipating it s the storm will impact those heating bills? reporter: yeah, when it gets extra cold, you turn the heat up extra high. and this winter people can expect to spend about 17% more on their winter home heating bills. that s about $1,200 for this winter season. that s because everything that goes into heating your home costs more. heating oil up 45%, natural gas up 25%, electricity up 11%, and propane up 1%. and this is really going to impact low-income americans the most. one in six families reported having a tough time paying their utility bills over the summer. so you can imagine that same impact is being felt now over the winter, and that affects 20 million households across the country. we know that these temperatures are going to stay cold for a little while longer. hopefully they ll warm up. of course as it gets colder, the
those cold temperatures and ice like that can make a big impact. they re just not used to it so stay safe out there, everyone. yeah, thanks to everyone in the field for us. helping us really see how the storm is impacting so much of the country right now. and as you can imagine, it is snarling travel plans at simply the worst time as people are trying to travel for the holidays. spirit airlines flight just made an emergency landing after the crew reported the plane was struck by lightning twice after it took off from philadelphia. alaska airlines has canceled morning departures from seattle and portland because of icy runways there and the faa says ground stops are affecting airports from coast to coast. let s check in with omar jiminez at one of the nation s busiest airports. what are you seeing there, omar? reporter: well, it definitely is busy and between the negative temperatures outside and what s going on inside i would much rather prefer to be inside. i don t have a jacket o
doesn t have to snow but it clearly it is being pounded by the worst of the storm. conditions will deteriorate for them. here where i am in atlanta, the emperor of the north has come in and really dropped our temperatures. we re monitoring it. it s about 20 degrees here, hard for you to see at home. i think we are best way to explain just how coal it is we brought a wet towel out here earlier today and it froze almost instantaneously. gives you any indication of what the roads are like in and around atlanta, in the general georgia area if there s water on the ground, it has certainly froze with this flash freeze that occurred overnight as temperatures dropped a staggering 30 to 40 decks in a matter of six hours. our christmas eve tomorrow forecast has a high expected of 25 degrees. that will be the coldest christmas eve in atlanta s history. the wind is whipping around the state of georgia and the southeast. it has brought down trees, it has taken down electrical poles
heat gets higher, and that s more expensive for americans this year compared to last year, jess. it certainly is. that is a heavy burden, no doubt about it. all right. thank you so much. that is going to do it for me. thank you so much for joining us this afternoon. stay with cnn for all the developments on this monster winter storm. the news continues after a quick break. with a little help. and to support my family s immune health, i choose airborne. unlike some otrs, airborne gives youitamin c and so much more. it s an 8 in 1 immune support formula. airborne. do more. how many rooms are in there? should we go check it out? yeah. we get to stay here all weekend! when you stay at a vrbo. i call doing the door code! .the host doesn t stay with you. it looks exactly like the picture.