Missouri Grinds to a Halt in Snowstorm : Weather: Highways and businesses close under more than a foot of precipitation that reaches into Michigan. Bitter winds add to misery.

COLUMBIA, Mo. — More than a foot of wet, heavy snow closed highways, schools and businesses Thursday in Missouri and dumped a mixture of rain and snow from the Ozark Mountains to Michigan, authorities said.

“The highways closed themselves, what with all the cars stuck,” Columbia Police Chief Earnest Barbee said.

Columbia, in the center of the state, recorded 13 inches of snow.

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Classes were canceled for the first time in 20 years at the University of Missouri.

Government workers in the state capital of Jefferson City went home early and Interstate 70 in Missouri was effectively closed by blowing and drifting snow.

But Barbee said accidents were relatively minor because conditions prevented drivers from gaining speed. The scene outside a truck stop in Strafford, Mo., on Thursday morning was like nothing clerk Mary Hulsey had ever seen.

“There are a good 200 to 250 (vehicles) stuck here. The lot’s completely full,” she said. “There are people everywhere. The exits (from the highway) are blocked. Nobody can go anywhere.”

Tow truck companies reported waiting lists as long as five hours as hundreds of stalled, stuck vehicles kept police phone lines ringing nonstop.

Holden, Mo., and Blue Jacket, Okla., reported 14 inches of snow. Winds were howling at 45 m.p.h. at Columbia, causing zero visibility in blowing and drifting snow. Some parts of Missouri have reported drifts of two to four feet and wind chills as low as 10 degrees below zero.

Snowfall totals also topped a foot in parts of northeastern Oklahoma, northern Arkansas and eastern Kansas.

Iowa police reported that visibility was near zero along Interstate 80 and other highways on its eastern border with the Mississippi River. At least five highways in western Illinois were closed by snow, police there said.

While the band of snow extended from the Ozarks up through southern Wisconsin, rain turning to snow fell from Chicago eastward. A messy mix of rain and snow pelted Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, where blustery winds and low clouds added to problems that caused flight delays of up to 90 minutes.

The storm started out as a minor front early this week that largely passed by flood-stricken California, but it picked up moisture and energy from the Gulf of Mexico before steam-rolling into the Midwest.

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“There’s so little cold air to work with, so it tends to be a heavy, wet snow that’s difficult to move around with shovels or plows,” said forecaster Mike Palmerino of Weather Services Corp. He said snow will extend into Ontario, Canada, while the U.S. East Coast, where recent record-high temperatures have made it feel more like spring than winter, will receive rain.

As of Thursday afternoon, no serious accidents or injuries had been reported because of the storm. On Wednesday, however, the snow was blamed for a traffic accident that killed a 23-year-old woman in Missouri. And 14 people were injured in a chain-reaction accident near Okemah, Okla.