New cold snap adds urgency to winter storm recovery across the South

BELZONI, Miss. (AP) — Hundreds of National Guard troops in ice-stricken Mississippi and Tennessee mobilized Thursday to clear debris and assist people stranded in cars or stuck at homes still without electricity as the Southern states raced to recover from a crippling winter storm before another blast of dangerous cold hits Friday.

The National Weather Service said arctic air moving into the Southeast will cause already frigid temperatures to plunge into the teens (minus 10 Celsius) on Friday night in cities like Nashville, where more than 80,000 homes and businesses still had no power five days after a massive storm dumped snow and ice across the eastern U.S.

Glyn Alexander, 73, endured three days without electricity before deciding to leave her home in Belzoni, a small city in the Mississippi Delta. She was cozier Thursday at a local warming shelter, where a generator kept the indoor temperature at a balmy 82 F (28 C).

“Three days in the cold, sleeping in the cold, eating in the cold,” Alexander said. “I just couldn’t take the cold anymore.”

At least 85 people have died in areas affected by bitter cold from Texas to New Jersey. Roughly half the deaths were reported in Tennessee, Mississippi and Louisiana.

The prolonged freeze left some residents increasingly desperate in a region unaccustomed to such conditions. Emergency dispatchers in Mississippi received calls from people running out of food and medications while stuck at home. In ...