Winter Wallop: Southwest Gets Hit by a Blizzard

(NECN/CNN: Elizabeth Corridan) - "Dangerous, if not impossible." That's how forecasters are describing travel conditions in parts of the West and Midwest Tuesday.

A mean dose of winter weather is leaving travelers wondering if they'll ever make it home for the holidays.

"It's Christmas! We're supposed to get home!" said one traveler.

Spinouts line the highways from New Mexico to Kansas. Several highway deaths have been reported, including a prison guard and an inmate who died when a transport van rolled in a crash on an icy Colorado road Monday.

Blizzard conditions and subzero windchills are expected to persist.

In New Mexico, busy Interstate 25 was shut down Monday; it's one of many major arteries closed until conditions improve.

"I'm trying to get back to Colorado Springs, where we live and the kids are trying to catch a flight in Denver to get up to Spokane, Washington, so you know we're just a little disappointed here but we'd rather be safe than, you know, sorry," said another traveler.

A frustration shared by drivers in at least five states who say this storm couldn't have come at a worse time, but for anyone wishing for a white Christmas, this storm may have arrived just in time.

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