6/26/2023 0 Comments Cold weather polar vortexnothing new - this I'm sure has been happening for millions of years, if not hundreds of millions of years. "The science is not settled, and we have different ideas, but I think the lack of sea ice, the melting sea ice, has been contributing to more of these disruptions - we call them disruptions, or perturbations - in the polar vortex," Cohen said. Note: As Judah Cohen, director of seasonal forecasting at Atmospheric and Environmental Research, told NPR's Here and Now earlier this month, this question is being actively debated among climate scientists. But the likelihood of this happening in the middle of winter? The odds are in favor of very cold air outbreaks in late January. ![]() Right now it's a little too early to say exactly why. But linking that directly to climate change is a very difficult task, and usually we wait until after these events occur to try to come up with attributions for these events. We're going to see 60-degree changes in temperature across the Chicago area in about four days. The rapid swing from very cold to very warm is a bit unusual. I think we've seen similar events of similar magnitude that happen maybe once every decade or so. The cold air is is unusual, but again it's not unprecedented. Is this polar vortex connected to climate change? It's been a meteorological term in use for quite some time. But essentially it's been a phenomenon that's pretty well understood for many decades. I'm not sure why the phrase has all of a sudden caught on - it's got that kind of techy sound to it. It's just a meteorological term that's used to describe this cold air and the circulation that occurs during the winter months over the Northern latitudes. Is there anything new about this? The term "polar vortex" seems to have started being used more often, at least by NPR, around 2014. ![]() It's very much the same dynamic that we're experiencing now. Again, all of this cold air is kind of circulating around the Northern latitudes of the globe, and occasionally a chunk of it will break off and spread south. Hopefully not quite as severe, but it'll bring below-zero temperatures to Northern states in about two weeks.Īnd that cold air outbreak is also connected to the polar vortex? That's kind of an extended-range forecast, but it does look like we're in a very changeable pattern right now, and so another outbreak is possible across some of these areas. ![]() Then another wobble in the jet stream will bring another mass of cold air south across the border with Canada and into parts of the Midwest and Great Lakes. We'll see a change back to above-normal temperatures across much of the region by the beginning of next week. It's not much consolation for those that are experiencing 50-below wind chills today across the Midwest, but relatively short-lived. This is the most likely time of the year that we would experience this type of outbreak: the middle of winter. And so these cold air masses that have been generated over the past several weeks over the Northern climes can more easily translate south into the more Southern latitudes. You have snow and ice cover over a large part of the Northern Hemisphere. It's basically the most likely time for it to happen.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |