Bitter Cold, Destruction after Mammoth Storm

Updated at 7:31 p.m. ET

CHICAGO - A mammoth winter storm left dangerously slick roads and frigid Midwestern temperatures in its frozen footprint Thursday, a day after crushing snow-laden buildings in the Northeast.

Three people were killed when the pickup truck they were in drove off a snow-covered Oklahoma interstate and plunged 80 feet into an icy river. Wind chills dipped to nearly 30 below in parts of the country's midsection as the region began dealing with the storm's aftermath.

3 Killed after Truck Plunges into Okla. River

CBS News correspondent Don Teague reports in Oklahoma heavy snow collapsed the roof of a school, a scene repeated at a school in Georgetown, Mass., Fortunately there were no injuries in either instance.

In Chicago there was no school again Thursday but Lake Shore Drive, where hundreds of cars were buried Tuesday, has finally been cleared.

Chicago Mayor Richard Daley spoke publicly for the first time to defend his city's handling of the storm, which stranded hundreds of motorists in whiteout conditions on the famous Lake Shore Drive. In a city known for punishing politicians for winter weakness, the retiring Daley said when pressed that he wouldn't have handled anything differently and that workers responded well.

"Yes, they did ... They did a very, very good job," Daley said. Lake Shore reopened before dawn Thursday.

Criticism of the city's response to a 1979 blizzard played a major role in Mayor Michael Bilandic's defeat.

The sprawling system unloaded as much as 2 feet of snow across its 2,000-mile path, crippling airports and stranding drivers from Texas to South Dakota, where authorities rescued some motorists from more than 150 vehicles that had become trapped overnight after high winds sent fallen snow drifting onto an interstate in the northeast part of the state. Icy roads were blamed for a 15-vehicle chain-reaction crash in southeastern Louisiana that resulted in a few minor injuries.

Authorities in northeast Oklahoma said the pickup truck that drove into the Spring River on Thursday jumped a guard rail on Interstate 44 shortly before dawn while carrying eight people.

The vehicle became partially submerged, and harsh weather made rescue attempts difficult.

"The ground temperature was 11 degrees below zero, so it would take only a second to become hypothermic in this water and ice," said Lt. George Brown, a spokesman for the Oklahoma Highway Department.

The week's storm had rendered the interstate impassable earlier in the week and the lane in which the pickup was driving had not reopened until late Wednesday. Brown declined to speculate about whether the highway was re-opened prematurely.

In the Northeast, officials had warned homeowners and businesses for days of the dangers of leaving snow piled up on rooftops. As the storm cloaked the region in ice and added inches to the piles of snow already spread across the landscape, the predictions came true. No one was seriously injured, however.

In Middletown, Connecticut, the entire third floor of a building failed, littering the street with bricks and snapping two trees. A gas station canopy on New York's Long Island collapsed, as did an airplane hangar near Boston, damaging aircraft. Roof cave-ins also were reported in Rhode Island.

Some places in the Northeast that have gotten more snow than they usually get all season are running out of places to put it. In Portland, Maine, the downtown snow-storage area was expected to reach capacity after this week's storm — the first time in three years that has happened.

The Midwest was reeling from the storm's wallop as the system swept eastward. Chicago's 20.2 inches of snow was the city's third-largest amount on record.

The system was blamed for more than a dozen deaths before Thursday, including a homeless man who burned to death on Long Island as he tried to light cans of cooking fuel and a woman in Oklahoma City who was killed while being pulled behind a truck on a sled that hit a guard rail.

Airport operations slowed to a crawl across the U.S., though Chicago aviation officials said operations had resumed Thursday at both the city's major airports. Although there were no initial delays, some cancellations continued. O'Hare Airport reported about 1,000 canceled flights and Midway more than 30.