Cold Arctic air meets warm, humid air from the Gulf of Mexico, setting the stage for this weekend's ice storm. During the spring and fall, this clash of air masses often spawns severe storms and tornadoes -- but during the winter, the result can be an equally devastating, and much more widespread ice storm. Beginning on Friday and lasting through the weekend, a slow-moving storm developing over the Southwestern US will bring a stretch of precipitation across the midsection of the country. Over 30 million Americans are under some type of wintry watch, warning, or advisory from this storm, and 10 million of those fall under an ice storm warning, which is where most of the significant impacts from the storm will occur. The hardest hit states of Oklahoma, Kansas, and Missouri will see up to an inch of ice coating trees and roads -- making travel impossible and potentially bringing power outages to millions of residents this weekend.

Source: CNN January 13, 2017 17:47 UTC