Name: Heavy snow snarls Midwest traffic as millions travel for Thanksgiving
Uploaded: 2025-11-27T00:44:47.041Z
Duration: 5 min 25 s
Description: Across the Midwest, the first snowstorm of the season came at the worst time for Thanksgiving travel. Heavy snow fell in parts of Minnesota, North Dakota and western Wisconsin -- as much as 17 inches in some places. Jonah Kaplan reports, and Rob Marciano has the forecast.

Across the Midwest, the first snowstorm of the season came at the worst time for Thanksgiving travel. Heavy snow fell in parts of Minnesota, North Dakota and western Wisconsin -- as much as 17 inches in some places. Jonah Kaplan reports, and Rob Marciano has the forecast.

Minnesota

A severe snowstorm struck the Midwest, particularly affecting Minnesota, North Dakota, and western Wisconsin, just as millions of Americans began their Thanksgiving travel. The storm brought up to 17 inches of snow in some areas, wind gusts over 40 mph, and resulted in more than 400 crashes and over 500 slide-offs, with authorities attributing many incidents to drivers traveling too fast for the conditions.

The weather also impacted air travel, contributing to thousands of flight delays and heavy congestion at major airports and highways nationwide. Meteorologists warn that another weather system is expected to bring additional snow to the Midwest and rain to the Northeast over the weekend, while cold air will dominate much of the eastern United States during the holiday period.

Heavy snow snarls Midwest traffic as millions travel for Thanksgiving

Turning now to the many travelers who are facing some challenges from the weather. Rob Marciano will have the forecast in a moment, but first, Jonah Kaplan will have the latest on the Midwest snowstorm. Jonah. Across the Midwest, the first snowstorm of the season came at the worst time for Thanksgiving travel. Heavy snow fell in parts of Minnesota, North Dakota, and western Wisconsin on Wednesday, as much as 17 inches in some places. Wind gusts over 40 miles per hour caused whiteout and blizzard-like conditions. Dash cam video from Hartwood, North Dakota, shows a truck narrowly missing firefighters as they worked to rescue stranded drivers. And one man was killed while clearing snow near Duluth, Minnesota, after snow and strong winds snapped a tree branch. We're inside the main dispatch center for the Minnesota State Patrol, and according to officials, so far there have been more than 400 crashes and more than 500 slide-offs and spin-outs, and counting. Minnesota State Patrol Lieutenant Mike Lee. People crashing or going off the road, we can contribute most likely to speed. They're just driving too fast for conditions. The winter storm warning ended before noon, but that didn't make the drive much easier for people like Marcos and Sheila Rodriguez, who took a much-needed break at this rest stop. What's the best piece of advice for driving in the snow? Please just keep your distance. Keep your distance and slow down. You hit that ice, it doesn't matter what vehicle you drive. And again, those numbers, more than 400 crashes in a place that's accustomed to snow. How does that happen? Well, it's the first snow of the season. Maybe people forget what it's like out there. Also, according to crews in the field, the salt doesn't take to the road as well the first time as it does as it piles up later in the season. Takes a while for that muscle memory to kick in. Jonah Kaplan, thank you. Now to meteorologist Rob Marciano, who is tracking the holiday weather for us. Rob, good evening. Hey, good evening, Jerica. It's certainly nasty stuff in the Midwest, but here in New York, the past few hours, when they filled up the 34 giant balloons here on 81st Street that will march downtown during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, the weather's been perfect. Many's ready, but will they fly tomorrow? Because the wind's gonna kick up. That's gonna be an issue. So let's get to the maps and show you what we think's gonna happen. The winds will increase tonight anywhere from 23 to 25 at the start of the race. Could gust to 30, 33, 34 miles per hour by the end of the race, and that's crucial because that is the threshold to where they won't fly the balloons. I think at the very least, they're probably gonna pull them down and make them fly a little bit lower, but it's gonna be very, very close. You can see the gusts get to 32, maybe 34 miles an hour, according to this particular computer model. The culprit is the load that brought that snow to the Midwest. That's gonna be spinning up through the Great Lakes more in the way of lake effect snow there. We've got warnings that remain up, and the cold air is certainly pouring in behind it. Hot on the heels, though, of that one is another system that's gonna be coming into the Midwest with more snow from Minneapolis, Milwaukee, Chicago, Des Moines, maybe Detroit as well, Saturday night into Sunday morning, and then all rains into Sunday afternoon here in the Northeast. Certainly a disruptive storm, but the big story's gonna be the cold air for the eastern two-thirds of the country for Thanksgiving Day. So bundle up, and in some cases, hold onto your hats and have a safe and happy holiday. All right, Rob Marciano, thanks so much. Well, millions of Americans are traveling by car, including senior transportation correspondent, Chris Van Cleave. It's go time for many of the more than 73 million Americans AAA expects to drive 50 miles or more this Thanksgiving, and we are among them, starting before sunrise. This is what you wanna see if you are driving somewhere for Thanksgiving. It's more than 400 miles from Charlotte, North Carolina to Washington, D.C. No issues for us getting to the Raleigh Airport, but look at the traffic jam greeting flyers arriving at LAX, while winter weather across the North contributed to thousands of flight delays. Since last Thursday, about 15.6 million people have passed through TSA checkpoints. Millions more are expected today. So I'm ready to get there. If I could drop the plane myself, I would. We're prepared for the snow and the rain. We've got everything packed. Outside Nashville, traffic was a bumper-to-bumper crawl, and it was no peach near Atlanta. The traffic was downright terrible, and the Big Apple looked like a big parking lot. Jamie Halstead and her sons started their drive at 5 a.m., hoping to beat all the traffic between Georgia and D.C. So how long have you been in the car, right? Like eight hours. Like eight hours. It's 2.40, and we've hit our first bit of real traffic here in Petersburg, Virginia. We're crawling along at seven miles an hour. As the afternoon turned to evening, it did not get better. Thanksgiving traffic hitting rush hour, the annual tradition of time racing towards the holiday while the car inches its way home. We've got about another 30 miles or so on Interstate 95 before we'll get to D.C., and we're moving at about 12 miles an hour. So that's gonna take probably an hour now for the drive home on Sunday. Expect busy roads and busy airports if you're flying. That's probably your peak of the peak, Jerrica. All right, Chris Van Cleave for us. Thank you.

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