A powerful storm is forecast to deliver heavy snow and strong winds from Utah to Minnesota starting on Monday, just days after another storm pummeled much of the United States.
Forecasters say the worst conditions are expected from Tuesday on, as the storm sweeps from the Central Rockies to the Northern Plains and the Upper Midwest, creating hazardous whiteout conditions and dumping up to two feet of snow in some regions.
As much as 12 inches of snow were expected to fall on Monday in portions of Park City, Utah, and more than four inches were expected across western and central Minnesota, according to the Weather Service’s forecast offices in Salt Lake City and in Twin Cities, Minn.
Winter storm warnings are in effect through Tuesday in Utah.
The snow and high winds will make travel in parts of the affected regions “difficult if not impossible,” Richard Bann, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in College Park, Md., said on Sunday. “A storm this big,” he added, could “pose quite a considerable disruption to daily life.”
The storm is expected to bring blizzard conditions to the Northern Plains on Tuesday and Wednesday, the service said.
The storm comes just days after a severe weather system tore across the Midwest, the South and the East, spawning numerous tornadoes that killed dozens of people and injured scores of others. That line of storms also created heavy snow in the North and fueled wildfires in Oklahoma.
The latest storm system may also deliver hail, thunderstorms and tornadoes from Texas to Illinois on Tuesday, forecasters said.
Spring snowstorms are not unusual, and forecasters said that this one, which will blanket a vast stretch of the United States in more than a foot of snow, has the potential to break snowfall records in some areas.
The National Weather Service warned of “life-threatening cold” for anyone stranded outside in the Northern Plains, with wind chills expected to fall to near or below zero. Widespread gusts of more than 50 miles per hour may cause power outages and other damage, the service said. Heavy snow in parts of Utah, forecasters said, may increase the risk of avalanches.
Mr. Bann, the forecaster, noted that parts of Wyoming were battered by similar snowstorms this year. “This one will just be the latest.”
Johnny Diaz contributed reporting.