Dangerously cold temperatures across the U.S. are causing school closures and upending travel.
The freezing temperatures are affecting much of the Rockies, Great Plains and Midwest. A wide swath of the South is also impacted, from Texas to Alabama.
Schools in Chicago, which has the fourth-largest school district in the country, have closed their doors Tuesday. Classes are also canceled in cities like Denver, Dallas, Cincinnati and Portland, Oregon.
In Oregon, nearly 50,000 homes were without power Tuesday morning, part of widespread outages that began Saturday, according to PowerOutage.us. In Texas, over 27,000 were without power, and nearly 19,000 were without power in Mississippi.
Deaths are also being reported amid the winter weather, including at least four in Portland, Oregon, including two who died of hypothermia, according to The Associated Press. The deaths of three homeless people in Milwaukee are being investigated, with the suspected cause being hypothermia.
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Winter storm warnings were in effect across the south on Tuesday morning. Areas of Mississippi and Tennessee saw temps drop to 10 degrees Monday night.
The extreme weather also grounded flights in some areas across the country.
Over 3,300 flights within, into or out of the U.S. were canceled Monday, and over 10,000 were delayed. On Tuesday, more than 1,200 flights had already been canceled as of 8 a.m., with the same number delayed.
The frigid temps have been affecting the country for days, causing even the NFL Wild Card playoff game between the Buffalo Bills and Pittsburgh Steelers to be postponed from Sunday to Monday as snow blanketed Highmark Stadium in Orchard Park, New York.
The weather also led to a depressing turnout for the much-anticipated Iowa Republican caucuses Monday night, where former President Donald Trump came out on top.
On Wednesday, 250 million Americans will experience below-average temperatures. The extreme cold will persist across much of the country through the end of the week.
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