A powerful and rare winter storm swept across the South on Tuesday, bringing the first-ever Blizzard Warning to the Gulf Coast and blasting communities from Texas to Florida to the Carolinas with record-shattering snow that snarled travel and brought daily life to a halt.

A major winter storm that slammed Texas and the northern Gulf Coast is spreading heavy snow, sleet and freezing rain across parts of the Florida panhandle and eastern Carolinas

From Texas through the Deep South, down into Florida and to the Outer Banks of North Carolina, snow and sleet made for accumulating ice in New Orleans, Atlanta, Jacksonville, Florida and other major cities.