A truck driver slides off the highway in icy weather, as he tries to avoid another wrecked truck on I-65, in Clanton, Alabama, on January 28, 2014. Overnight, the South saw fatal crashes and hundreds of fender-benders. Jackknifed 18-wheelers littered Interstate 65 in central Alabama. Ice shut down bridges on Florida's panhandle and the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway, one of the world's longest spans, in Louisiana. Some commuters pleaded for help via cellphones while still holed up in their cars, while others trudged miles home, abandoning their vehicles outright. #

In this aerial photo, traffic is snarled along the I-285 perimeter north of the metro area after a winter snow storm in Atlanta, Georgia, on January 29, 2014. Georgia Governor Nathan Deal said early Wednesday that the National Guard was sending military Humvees onto Atlanta's snarled freeway system in an attempt to move stranded school buses and get food and water to people. Georgia State Patrol troopers headed to schools where children were hunkered down early Wednesday after spending the night there, and transportation crews continued to treat roads and bring gas to motorists, Deal said. #

In this view looking south toward downtown Atlanta, the ice-covered interstate system is empty on a Wednesday morning, after a winter snow storm slammed the city with over 2 inches of snow that turned highways into parking lots when motorists abandoned their vehicles creating massive traffic jams lasting through January 29, 2014. #

Brookhaven police monitor a car fire in a vehicle left overnight by a motorist who was stranded by impassable roads after winter weather moved through Georgia, on January 29, 2014, in Brookhaven, Georgia. #

Claire Woolsey, a Belhaven University student from Ireland, holds onto Serenity Aguilar, 4, as they use a trash bag as a body board to slide down the hills that surround the soccer fields at Belhaven University in Jackson, Mississippi, on January 28, 2014. Students used trash bags, cardboard, storage covers and stripped down skateboards to try to "surf" the hills. #

B.B. St. Roman, executive director of the New Orleans Police Department Homeless Assistance Unit, assists a man to a shelter in New Orleans, on January 28, 2014. The third and nastiest arctic blast of the season hit Louisiana on Tuesday. #

Officer Delaney talks with a crash victim who was involved in a five-car pileup on Johnson Ferry Road in Sandy Springs, Georgia, early morning Wednesday, January 29, 2014. Around Atlanta, nearly all public entities and most businesses were shut down early Wednesday, and officials encouraged would-be motorists not to drive. #

In this view looking south toward downtown Atlanta near the I-75 Chattahoochee River overpass, abandoned cars are piled up on the median of the ice-covered interstate after a winter snow storm slammed the city with over 2 inches of snow that turned highways into parking lots creating massive traffic jams lasting through Wednesday, January 29, 2014, in Atlanta. #

Tristen Daniel and Kayla Morris from Daphne slide down a hill at Wake Forest golf club in Robertsdale, Alabama, on January 29, 2014. A rare winter storm gripped the U.S. South on Wednesday, killing five people, stranding children overnight at their schools, gnarling traffic across many states and cancelling flights at the world's busiest airport. At least five deaths in Alabama were blamed on the icy storm that slammed the region from Texas through Georgia and the Carolinas. #