off the overpass. and a high school basketball player was killed when a pickup truck lost control on a rural road and struck her car. traveling long distance almost anywhere in the country today will be a nightmare. more than 2500 flights today have been cancelled so far on top of the 1300 cancelled yesterday. amtrak is suspending most of its trains south of washington today which will disrupt service further north. even before the storm arrives there. the storm dumping ice and snow on the south is merging with another system, forming a dangerous nor easter. more than a foot of snow may fall and accuweather meteorologist jim dickey has the latest. good morning, jim. good morning. ingredients coming together for a historic winter storm here. we ll start with significant ice across the southeast here today. watching a couple features again. northern brain system moving its way across the plains. southern brain system along the gulf coast, these two will come
customers to be in the dark tomorrow. an army of snowplows and salt spreaders ready for battle. this is one of mother nature s worst kinds of storms that can be inflicted on the south, and that is ice. it is our biggest enemy. reporter: an enemy, officials say, will bear down overnight, coating parts of six states in a dangerous, slippy glaze. experts say the ice could be historic and crippling. now is the time to prepare for this winter storm. reporter: the official warnings reached cell phones and answering machines, urging people to take action. we are getting a little gas in case we lose power so we can fire up the generator. reporter: from dallas to charlotte, residents preparing to be trapped at home for days. mobs of shoppers cleared store shelves of bread, milk and rock salt. our goal is to be overprepared and hopefully underwhel underwhelmed. reporter: heeding the advice,
and i m john muller. it s really amazing how this winter has not affected just the classic places. it s been like everybody sharing in the pain this year. oh, absolutely. all the way down south and we were saying, can we just, if we stop reporting on it, will the weather just clear up? wouldn t that be nice? but the answer, no. and we will begin with that latest winter storm making travel today especially difficult. thousands of flights already canceled. amtrak suspending service on many trains in the east. this major system will hammer the deep south today and move up into the northeast. abc s steve osunsami says dangerous conditions are already occurring. reporter: already heart-break moments on iced over roads across the south. four people died in texas, including a dallas firefighters who fell off this overpass responding to an accident. from the heart of dixie to the carolinas, authorities are telling families to stay home. if you do have to travel, we are encouraging
together to produce an historic winter storm through the end of the day. as far as today is concerned, seeing ice, watching the corridor through atlanta, up towards raleigh, we are talking in some cases over an inch of ice that will bring down trees. power lines widespread power outages expected from a crippling ice storm expected here. from there, the storm strengthens, moves up the coast and taking the classic nor easter snow all the way north into new england. john and marci, back to you. thanks, jim. federal investigators in tennessee are trying to figure out who mailed a deadly package bomb to a retired lawyer. the 70-year-old was killed in the blast and injured his wife. i had a long life as a bankruptcy attorney. of course neighbors are stunned. just the perfect neighbors. we felt like that this was a place that nothing would ever happen. authorities believe this was an isolated incident and that the retired lawyer was targeted. closing arg utilities are
crackers, a blanket. reporter: more than 2,000 flights across this region are canceled. but once again, it s atlanta that s in a panic. this is one of mother nature s worst kinds of storms that can be inflicted on the south. and that is ice. it is our biggest enemy. reporter: authorities are sounding the alarm on cell phones and answering machines, calling the expected ice potentially catastrophic. now is the time to prepare for this winter storm. reporter: up to half an inch could look like this and bring down trees, leaving hundreds of thousands without power. help is already on the way from houston, a texas power company is sending up 60 crews. the traffic nightmare that was atlanta in the snow two weeks ago is fresh on the mind here. we rode along with a sergeant from the state patrol who says the timing of the storm is different. the thing about this storm is, we ve got a heads up on it as far as it ain t going to hit during the commute times. reporter: but it was st