A deadly ice storm has stranded scores of people on slick roadways and knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of American homes as winter-weary Americans dug in against Mother Nature's latest walloping.
The US national weather service began warning days ago that a "mammoth dome" of arctic air would settle over the eastern United States, creating a "paralysing ice storm".
"The ice accumulations remain mind-boggling, if not historical," the weather service said on Wednesday, warning that more than 2.5cm of ice could fall from Georgia to South Carolina.
The massive storm - which stretched from Alabama to Virginia - was also expected to dump as much as 30cm of snow on Wednesday.
It was set to strengthen as it climbed northward along the eastern seaboard on Thursday, with snowfall totals topping 46cm by the time the storm reaches New England.
Accidents and abandoned cars caused massive traffic jams in North Carolina, with the usually temperate cities of Raleigh and Charlotte transformed into ice- and snow-covered parking lots.
North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory urged residents to stay indoors - even if it means sleeping at work - rather than risk the roads.
"If you're in a safe warm place, stay in a safe warm place," McCrory told CNN.
"We've already had two fatalities and we don't want to see more."
Residents of Atlanta, Georgia simply stayed home, having learned their lesson from the gridlock caused by a much weaker storm two weeks ago that stranded thousands of people.
It took days to clear the highway of abandoned vehicles.
President Barack Obama declared states of emergency in Georgia and North Carolina in order to deploy federal resources to help deal with the storm.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency said it was also in contact with state emergency offices in Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia to assess their assistance needs as the storm builds.
In addition to the FEMA aid, various localities across the region were readying emergency shelters at churches and recreation centres where residents could stay warm should they lose power.
More than 3600 US flights were cancelled Wednesday and airlines protectively cancelled another 3500 on Thursday, according to specialty website FlightAware.com.
Power companies sent out convoys of utility crews to trim tree limbs in advance of the storm's arrival, hoping to head off potentially massive cuts in power.
Georgia Power said its crews were working through the storm to restore power after the freezing rain knocked down power lines and trees.
While it managed to restore power to 70,000 customers by Wednesday afternoon, outages were increasing as the freezing rain continued and more than 130,000 people in the Peach State were without power as the sun began to set.
More than 230,000 customers lost power in South Carolina, local utilities reported.
