A blizzard hit many parts of Kansas on Monday night into Tuesday morning.
In south-central Kansas, some areas of Hutchinson in Reno County received nearly eight inches of snow; the Halstead area in Harvey County got 7.5 inches, and Kingman got four inches.
The Hillsboro area received seven inches of snow in Marion County, as did the McPherson area.
Closer to the Wichita area, Mt. Hope, in the northwest part of Sedgwick County, received five inches of snow; Valley Center got four inches, and a little more than three inches of snow fell in many parts of the Wichita area.
The Wichita public school district canceled classes for the day because of dangerous wind chills and snow accumulations during the morning commute time period; wind chills during the early-morning hours were in the single digits. Also calling off classes for the day were Newman and Friends universities in Wichita; Wichita State University shifted to remote learning for the day; Butler Community College called off classes in El Dorado, as did many public school districts in the area.
Wind gusts at Wichita's Eisenhower Airport peaked in excess of 45 miles per hour during the overnight hours.
Several traffic wrecks and slide-offs were reported throughout the Wichita area as streets and highways were icy and snow-packed. The Kansas Department of Transportation asked drivers to stay off of highways if possible.
In the Wichita area, the north-bound lanes of Interstate 135 were closed at Hydraulic in the south part of Wichita because a semi-trailer was blocking all the lanes; that closure started at about 9:20 a.m.
East-bound lanes of Kellogg were closed at Hoover in the west part of Wichita at about the same time, also because a semi-trailer was blocking all the lanes.
Another big-rig slid off the road at I-235 & Meridian.
On Monday night, KDOT closed Highway K-96 west of Mt. Hope in the northwest part of Sedgwick County, and KDOT also shut down Highway 50 between Hutchinson & Newton.
“We are working hard to remove all of the cars and semi trucks from the roads before we can open back up,” Trooper Tod Hileman, Kansas Highway Patrol, said on Facebook. “These were the ones that we had to leave last night because it was getting too dangerous.”
The Kansas Highway Patrol says troopers helped with 450 calls from Monday through 5:15 a.m. on Tuesday; the KHP handled 19 injury crashes and 98 non-injury crashes.
Evergy says high winds in excess of 50 miles per hour were the primary cause of power outages overnight and early Tuesday morning for tens of thousands of customers throughout the state.
As of late Tuesday morning, there were still nearly 10,000 Evergy customers without power in Sedgwick County and surrounding counties.
Kansas Governor Laura Kelly issued a state of disaster emergency proclamation Monday evening, allowing resources to be prepositioned to provide state assistance.
At about 10:30 a.m. Tuesday, the Wichita Animal Shelter experienced a temporary closure because of a power outage. The Kansas Humane Society and the Sedgwick County Zoo are both closed Tuesday.