Travel remains difficult in Twin Cities, southern Minnesota as snowstorm winds down

Gusty winds, blowing snow and icy road conditions continue to make for hazardous travel conditions across the Twin Cities and much of southern Minnesota, even as a powerhouse storm that dropped several inches of snow Dec. 28 begins winding down.

“The worst of it is over,” said Joe Strus, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Chanhassen.

But for anybody who needs to get to work or drive for any other reason, “folks need to take it slow this morning,” Strus said, noting that blizzardlike conditions could still make roads slick.

The Weather Service downgraded blizzard and storm warnings to an advisory level until 6 p.m. Monday.

Interstate 35 remains closed this morning from Albert Lea south to the Iowa border, as does Hwy. 71 between Sanborn and Redwood Falls. Hwy. 60 between St. James and Windom remained closed due to “numerous crashes,” the Minnesota Department of Transportation said.

No travel is advised in much of southern and western Minnesota, MnDOT said.

Winds howling at more than 40 mph is blowing snow around, creating “dangerous visibility concerns” and creating challenges for plow drivers, said MnDOT spokeswoman Anne Meyer.

A sloppy, watery mix of snow that fell early Sunday and froze to roads has made it challenging for plow drivers to scrape them clean, leaving slick spots for drivers to navigate, she said.

“Watch out for those today,” Meyer said.

In the metro where mainline roads remained ice- and snow-covered, 180 plows were on the job.

“They will be out there for a while,” Meyer said.

The adverse weather conditions meant the Monday Minnesota Star Tribune didn’t make it to most doorsteps. The Star Tribune ceased printing the newspaper in Minneapolis as it closed its printing plant Saturday. The paper is now printed in Iowa and trucked up to Minnesota.

As of 6 a.m. about 30% of Metro Transit buses were behind schedule, with an average delay of five minutes, the agency said. No major delays were reported for either the Blue or Green Line trains, the agency said.

The ill-timed storm caused chaos Sunday at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, where scores of flights were canceled or delayed. As of 8 a.m. Dec. 29, about 60 cancellations, including inbound and outbound flights, were reported, far fewer than Sunday when about 200 cancellations were reported out of nearly 900 total airline operations, said airport spokesman Jeff Lea.

Snow stopped falling about 3 a.m., giving crews time to get runways in good condition for Monday’s early flights, Lea said.

“Airlines will need time to recover across their systems,” Lea said. Other airports, especially in the Northeast, were facing weather challenges Monday.

Minnesota State Patrol troopers responded to 25 crashes, five spinouts and five jackknifed semis from midnight to 5 a.m. across the state. That was on top of a rash of incidents the day before.

Minneapolis called a snow emergency on Sunday and it remains in effect Monday. St. Paul followed suit and it will begin at 9 p.m. Monday. Several suburbs had, including Crystal, Osseo, Bloomington, New Hope, Brooklyn Center and Hopkins.

Snow totals included 7 inches in Burnsville, 6.5 inches in Otsego, 6.2 inches in Maple Grove, 6 inches in Apple Valley, 5.8 at MSP airport, and 5.6 inches in Chanhassen, according to early reports to the National Weather Service.

The center of the storm has moved onto Canada, but the effects will be felt all day in the Twin Cities and most of Minnesota, Strus said.

Winds will continue to blow snow across roads most of the day. They also will create bone-chilling cold with windchill values as low as minus 25 in greater Minnesota and minus 10 to minus 15 in the metro.

“It will be pretty cold out there,” Strus said.