Brutally cold weather expected to hit storm-battered US this weekend

Memphis: Memphis residents were urged to boil water and New Yorkers have been warned that roads could be covered with dangerous black ice this weekend as brutal cold and inclement weather continue to sweep across parts of the US.

Bitterly frigid air spilled into the Midwest from Canada on Friday and several states were under advisories as forecasters warned that wind chills dipping to minus 30 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 34 degrees Celsius) could be common through Sunday morning.

Heavier-than-forecast snow fell in New York City, Baltimore and Washington, DC, on Friday. Storms have walloped the Pacific Northwest, Midwest, Plains, South and Northeast with low temperatures, heavy snow, ice storms, freezing rain and high winds for the past two weeks.

With a wind chill, temperatures are expected to drop as low as 15 degrees below zero Fahrenheit (minus 26 degrees Celsius) in large portions of Arkansas, Mississippi, Missouri, Tennessee, Kentucky and Kansas, the National Weather Service predicted.

The bracing weekend weather follows a series of storms blamed for at least 55 deaths around the country, many of them involving hypothermia or road accidents.

Tennessee recorded 19 deaths alone. They included a 25-year-old man who was found dead on the floor of a mobile home in Lewisburg after a space heater overturned and turned off, said Bob Johnson, chief deputy for the Marshall County Sheriff’s Office.

“There was ice on the walls in there,” Johnson said.

Days of cold broke so many water mains in Memphis, Tennessee, that water pressure fell throughout the city. On Friday, Memphis Light, Gas & Water urged all of its more than 400,000 customers to boil water for drinking or teeth-brushing or use bottled supplies. Water systems in about 10 counties had issued boil-water advisories.

It wasn’t clear how long the advisory will be in force. While some 50 ruptures were repaired, utility President Doug McGowen warned of new leaks emerging.

Water officials said some customers were without running water entirely, but declined to provide a specific number.