ST. LOUIS (AP) — Middle America was overwhelmed by weather Thursday, with snow in the north, tornadoes in the Plains, and torrential rains that caused floods and transportation woes — and a sinkhole in Chicago.
Seemingly every community in the Plains and Midwest was under some sort of watch or warning. Up to a foot of snow was expected in parts of Minnesota and the Dakotas. Snow and ice closed highways in Colorado. Rivers were surging beyond their banks from downpours in Missouri, Iowa and Illinois. Tornadoes caused scattered damage in Oklahoma. Frost warnings were in effect in Kansas and Oklahoma as a cold front pushed out warmer air.
"It's a classic spring storm in many ways," Mark Fuchs of the National Weather Service said. "There's a wide variety of weather, a big temperature difference."
Consider St. Louis. On Wednesday the temperature reached 85 degrees. Strong storms passed through on Thursday, and by Friday, the temperature is forecast to be around 40 degrees.