Storm slams Midwest with snow and ice, closes Des Moines airport

DES MOINES, Iowa -- Snow and ice plastered a wide area of the Midwest on Saturday, disrupting campaigning by presidential hopefuls, making highways hazardous and closing Des Moines' airport.

The National Weather Service posted winter storm and ice warnings across parts of Nebraska, Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, the eastern Dakotas, Illinois and northern Michigan, although some warnings were lifted by midday. Six to 16 inches of snow was forecast in parts of Minnesota.

Much of Iowa was hit by snow, sleet and freezing rain.

Hundreds of flights were canceled at airports in Des Moines, Chicago and Milwaukee. Officials decided to close Des Moines International Airport for several hours after a United Airlines plane slid off a taxiway as it was heading to a runway for a flight to Chicago's O'Hare, said airport spokesman Roy Criss. He said none of the 44 passengers was injured and the airport reopened by mid-afternoon.

At Dane County Regional Airport in Madison, Wis., an incoming Mesa Airlines regional jet flying for United Express slid off the pavement after failing to make a turn onto a taxiway, but no injuries were reported among the 25 passengers, said United Airlines spokesman Jeff Vick.

Madison was expecting three inches of snow and overnight wind gusts of up to 30 mph, an outlook so bleak that even meteorologists were postponing their own events. The University of Wisconsin-Madison's Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences department postponed its annual Solstice Party, which was set for Saturday, until February.

"This is the most treacherous kind of weather that the weather can deliver," said department chairman Jonathan Martin. The storm also complicated plans for some presidential hopefuls drumming up support for the Jan. 3 caucuses that kick off the nomination process.

Republican Mitt Romney canceled three campaign stops planned Saturday in southern Iowa, and former president Clinton canceled a rally for his wife, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, scheduled for Saturday afternoon outside Des Moines.

Heavy ice accumulations on power lines blacked out more than 2,000 customers scattered around Iowa, said representatives of for Alliant Energy and MidAmerican Energy. In Illinois, about 7,100 Ameren customers reported power outages, utility spokesman Leigh Morris said.

Numerous accidents were reported on Iowa highways, said Transportation Department spokeswoman Dena Gray-Fisher.

Freezing rain coated Illinois highways with ice, causing spinouts and accidents, weather officials said. Ice was about a quarter-inch thick in parts of central Illinois, said weather service meteorologist Dan Kelly.

More than 400 flights were canceled at O'Hare International Airport and 25 were reported at Midway International Airport, said Gregg Cunningham, a spokesman for Chicago's Department of Aviation.

In North Dakota, snowy conditions caused numerous accidents, among them a crash on Interstate 94 in Fargo that involved a dozen vehicles including a passenger bus, Capt. Jim Prochniak of the highway patrol said.