MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Authorities have rescued dozens of people stranded by a blizzard that howled across southern Minnesota and dumped about a foot of snow in some places. In east-central Wisconsin, one person was killed and several others injured Sunday in an interstate pileup involving more than 100 vehicles during whiteout conditions.
The Minnesota National Guard rescued 30 people in Freeborn County on Saturday night, Minnesota Homeland Security and Emergency Management said in a tweet. Sheriff’s deputies rescued an additional 20 people.
Forty-eight people were sheltered at a National Guard armory in Albert Lea, near the Minnesota-Iowa border, while the Owatonna armory housed 24 people stranded by the blizzard.
Gov. Tim Walz declared a state of emergency late Saturday and ordered the guard to help stranded motorists in Freeborn and Steele counties. Conditions were so bad in southern Minnesota on Sunday that state Homeland Security and Emergency Management Director Joe Kelly urged residents to stay home, or to stay in their vehicles and wait for help if stranded on the road.