Winter-Weary South Pounded by Sleet, Rain

Thunderstorms, rain and sleet bombarded the winter-weary South today, forcing schools to close in Georgia, leaving thousands without power for a fourth day in Tennessee and threatening to dump up to eight inches of snow on the mid-Atlantic states.

Scores of cars skated off treacherous roads from Arizona to Missouri after a storm raced through on its way to Canada, dropping up to eight inches of snow as it went. In the Pacific Northwest, more than 100 accidents were reported on roads slick with three inches of snow.

Stubborn subzero temperatures clung to the northern Great Plains, and the Coast Guard said today that the long cold spell had left major rivers in the Midwest jammed with ice, slowing commercial traffic as far south as Mississipi and causing several barge accidents.

More than an inch of rain marred a break from freezing temperatures in parts of Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee and Georgia as warm, wet air from the Gulf of Mexico collided with cold from Canada.

Flash-flood watches were posted for eastern Tennessee and the northern third of Georgia.