Parts of New Hampshire will be facing a foot of snow by Thanksgiving morning.
The wet and heavy snow began falling around 11:30 a.m. Wednesday. The New Hampshire Department of Transportation has 740 trucks and more than 600 employees working to keep roads clear.
The season's first significant snowfall has knocked out power to about 16,000 New Hampshire residents.
Public Service Company of New Hampshire reports most of its 13,000 outages are in the southern part of the state. Unitil reported about 3,000 New Hampshire customers without power as of 4 p.m.
Outages are being caused not only by heavy snow bringing down tree branches onto power lines, but also car accidents into utility poles. New Hampshire State Police already reported several accidents by Wednesday afternoon.
State Police add that 89 just north of Concord was one of the most dangerous roads to travel Wednesday night. As temperatures dropped, conditions worsened. Police responded to at least 15 cars off the road.
There were several four-wheel drive vehicles off the road and into the woods, other cars smashed into guard rails or just disabled on the side of the road. State police asked NECN to warn drivers that there is a slick coating of ice underneath the snow cover. No serious injuries were reported in any of these crashes.
