By Thursday morning power was out for some 50,000 people in Washington state, mainly in the Seattle and Everett areas, following the largest accumulation of snow since 1996 in western Washington.

Seattle – which typically has mild weather – got about three inches of snow while the Hoodsport area saw up to 11 inches of snow.

Freezing temperatures were forecast for the state.

The outages were caused mainly by power lines downed by ice-covered tree limbs.

More than 130,000 people were without power during the peak of the outages.

Schools were closed throughout western Washington, and that region was also under a flood advisory.

Train and airplane passengers were stranded much of Wednesday but transportation officials hoped to resume a normal schedule Thursday.

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