News

The ice storm that’s blanketed North Texas streets and highways has spawned a new name: cobblestone ice.

Cobblestone ice – sounds poetic, doesn’t it?

Not if you’ve had to drive through it.

A thousand of the world’s top thinkers, business leaders, scholars and entrepreneurs are headed to Dallas this June for an international summit on evolving cities. Monday’s announcement pointed to the arts district as a key attraction.

It’s Day Four of Ice Storm 2013, the massive blast of Old Man Winter that has shut down North Texas schools (yet again?!), covered highways with thick ice, snarled traffic for miles, delayed hundreds of flights and canceled myriad events, including the annual Children’s Medical Center holiday parade and the MetroPCS Dallas Marathon. (Stay up to speed on the storm on KERA’s live weather blog.)

But when life gives you snow, make snow cones, Carleen Michener of Denton told KERA.

Here’s a look at 11 of the more whimsical moments of Icepocalypse 2013.

Five stories that have North Texas talking: more earthquakes hit North Texas; the latest on the winter storm; Kanye and Kim visit Dallas, and more:

At midday Saturday, more than 115,000 North Texans were facing another day of deep-freeze temperatures with no electricity, which means no heat.

Oncor, the company that maintains most North Texas power lines, hopes that power will be restored for many residents and businesses by Sunday night. But that depends on several factors, including weather conditions.

About 100 Dallas workers are dropping sand and salt at this hour, to make roads passable. They’re members of the second 12-hour shift of the city’s Ice Force One road crew. Meet some members of the first shift, who worked midnight to noon Friday.

More than 20,000 runners from 25 countries are planning to run in Sunday’s MetroPCS Dallas Marathon, but icy conditions are not helping ease their nerves. These runners have put in months of training and plan to show up at the starting line no matter what -- unless the race is canceled due to the winter storm.

(UPDATE: Since this story first aired and was posted online, the marathon has been canceled due to the ice storm.)

Nelson Mandela, South Africa's first black president, died Thursday. He was 95.

Tonight at 7, KERA 90.1 FM will air a special documentary “Mandela: An Audio History” that weaves together an unprecedented collection of archival sound materials documenting Mandela’s life story and the struggle against apartheid.