Rockies, Plains Get More Snow From Tenacious Winter Storm

A powerful storm spread snow from Arizona to the Dakotas on Thursday, after dumping up to five feet of snow in the mountains of the Southwest.

Thirty avalanches were reported in the Colorado mountains as the storm slowly moved eastward.

Colorado Springs, Colo., received 14 inches of snow. The city’s airport, major newspaper and most public schools were closed.

Outlying areas received as much as 20 inches of snow, which fell at a rate of an inch an hour all day. Winds gusting to more than 30 m.p.h. whipped the snow into deep drifts, weather officials said.

The weather also caused problems in western Colorado, where an America West jet with 48 passengers slid off a runway at Durango-La Plata County Airport. No one was injured.

Schoolchildren Stranded

In Arizona, where the heavy snow started Tuesday, 50 grade school pupils and their 13 chaperones spent the night in a Payson church after the National Guard evacuated them from a remote campsite.

Alpine, Ariz., had a winter snow cover of 82 inches, and snow was still falling at midday, National Weather Service officials said. Gila County Sheriff’s Lt. Harry Cain said that perhaps 60 inches of snow had fallen atop the 8,000-foot Mogollon Rim, northeast of Payson.

In Colorado, visibility at Colorado Springs Municipal Airport was so bad “it wasn’t safe for the snow removal crews on the runways,” aviation Director Ed Stricker said. The airport was closed until visibility improved.

Newspaper Canceled

The Colorado Springs Gazette Telegraph decided not to publish an edition for today. It was the second time in 20 years that bad weather kept the newspaper from publishing, said Tom Mullen, the editor.

“It’s a reluctant call on our part, but we are advised that we can’t deliver it so there’s not much call for printing it,” he said.

The snow also extended over central and western North Dakota, western South Dakota, the Nebraska Panhandle, northern New Mexico and Wyoming, where up to six inches of snow fell and five to seven inches more were expected.