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Thousands lose power, travel treacherous from latest winter storm

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A winter storm with a combination of ice, sleet and snow began to paralyze parts of central and western West Virginia Thursday morning.

Freezing rain turned to snow in Charleston Thursday morning.

Appalachian Power Company reported outages to nearly 42,000 customers by 7 a.m. Thursday with those numbers expected to climb. Ice is the issue from Putnam County west through Cabell, Wayne and Mason counties.

The greater Charleston area didn’t pick up a lot of ice but freezing rain turned to snow at about 5 a.m. Thursday which created tricky driving conditions.

There were a number of wrecks on Interstate 64 between Charleston and Huntington including a tractor trailer wreck near the westbound St. Albans exit. Wrecks were also reported on Interstate 77 and Interstate 79.

Meteorologists said the icy conditions would move into the southern coalfields by mid-morning creating hazardous conditions.

A second round of precipitation was expected to roll through central and southern counties Thursday afternoon.

The Appalachian Power Company outage map at 7 a.m. showed more than 19,000 customers without service in Cabell County and nearly 9,000 customers in Wayne County with outages.

A Winter Storm Warning remains in effect through Friday morning for the Interstate 64 corridor and the highest elevations of Randolph, Pocahontas, Mineral and Grant counties.

There were many changes in county school schedules Thursday.

Counties closed for the day included Berkeley, Cabell, Gilmer, Jackson, Lincoln, Pocahontas and Randolph counties while school delays were listed in Hancock and Wyoming counties.

Many counties decided on a remote schedule for the day including Barbour, Braxton, Brooke, Calhoun, Clay, Doddridge, Fayette, Greenbrier, Hampshire, Hardy, Harrison, Jefferson, Kanawha, Lewis, Logan, Marion, Marshall, Mason, Mineral, Mingo, Monongalia, Morgan, Nicholas, Ohio, Pendleton, Pleasants, Preston, Putnam, Raleigh, Roane, Taylor, Tucker, Tyler, Upshur, Wayne, Webster, Wetzel, Wirt and Wood counties.

There were some schedule changes at WVU in Morgantown while Marshall University cancelled all in-person classes at its Huntington campus Thursday.





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