"Warm Arctic waters and cold continental land are combining to stretch the dreaded polar vortex in a way that will send much of the United States a devastating dose of winter weather later this week with swaths of painful subzero temperatures, heavy snow and powerline-toppling ice. Meteorologists said the eastern two-thirds of the nation is threatened with a winter storm that could rival the damage of a major hurricane and has some origins in an Arctic that is warming from climate change."
"The polar vortex, a patch of bitterly cold air that often stays penned up in northern Canada and Alaska, is being elongated by a wave in the upper atmosphere that goes back to a relatively ice-free part of the Arctic and snow-buried Siberia. As the bone-chilling temperatures sweep through the U.S., they'll meet with moisture from off California and the Gulf of Mexico to set up crippling ice and snow in many areas."
Warm Arctic waters and unusually cold continental air are elongating the polar vortex, driving a major winter storm across much of the United States. The eastern two-thirds of the nation faces subzero temperatures, heavy snow, and powerline-toppling ice, with forecasts showing impacts from New Mexico to New England and across the Deep South. About 230 million people may experience temperatures of 20 degrees Fahrenheit or colder and roughly 150 million could face snow or ice. The pattern has origins in a warming, relatively ice-free Arctic interacting with snow-covered Siberia, and the cold will meet moisture from the Pacific and Gulf to generate crippling ice and snow that could persist into February.
Read at www.mercurynews.com
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