Thousands of starfish washed up on the beach at Isle of Palms over the weekend.

And it turns out, this happens a few times each winter on Lowcountry beaches.

Usually, strong off-shore winds push them onto the shore at high tide and they're stuck until the tide comes back in. Over the weekend, wind gusts were coming in stronger than 20 miles an hour.

Monday Night, we spoke with Mel Bell, the fisheries management director for the Department of Natural Resources who said this is pretty normal.

Bell said the last time this happened was in December on Fripp Island.

Regular SOTT readers may recall last year's unusual influx of snowy owls into North America from the Arctic (as well as other birds from the tundra and taiga regions). This winter season appears to be shaping up to an unprecedented fourth consecutive irruption year following the invasions of 2011-2012, 2012-2013 and 2013-2014. The following reports are just a small sample of the many that have been seen in the media over the last couple of months:

Last winter brought an unprecedented number of snowy owl sightings in the northern United States, and this winter is turning out to be above average as well.

Scientists believe last year's southward sweep of the arctic species was triggered by a record nesting season in northern Quebec. The Cornell Lab of Ornithology says there was another bumper crop last summer in Nunavut in northernmost Canada.

Snowy owls are being reported on the online eBird database this winter across the northern-third of the Lower 48 states from Washington state to Maine.

Here's some short film footage taken at Beech Hill Preserve in Rockport, Maine (on 30 January 2015), of one of the many snowy owls seen this winter:

Brazilians are hoarding water in their apartments, drilling homemade wells and taking other emergency measures to prepare for forced rationing that appears likely and could leave taps dry for up to five days a week because of a drought.

In São Paulo, the country's largest city with a metropolitan area of 20 million people, the main reservoir is at just 6 percent of capacity with the peak of the rainy season now past.

Other cities in Brazil's heavily populated southeast such as Rio de Janeiro face less dire shortages but could also see rationing.

Uncertainty over the drought and its consequences on jobs, public health and overall quality of life have further darkened Brazilians' mood at a time when the economy is struggling and President Dilma Rousseff's popularity is at an all-time low.

After January rains disappointed, and incentives to cut consumption fell short, São Paulo officials warned their next step could be to shut off customers' water supply for as many as five days a week - a measure that would likely last until the next rainy season starts in October, if not longer.

State officials say they have not yet decided whether or when to implement such rationing, in part because they are still hoping for heavy rains in February and March. Indeed, thunderstorms in recent days have caused lakes to rise a bit.

Still, independent projections suggest that São Paulo's main Cantareira reservoir could run out of water as soon as April without drastic cuts to consumption.

As such, the race is on to secure water while it lasts.

Large hospitals in São Paulo are installing in-house water treatment and recycling centers, among other measures, to make sure they can still carry out surgeries and other essential tasks if regular supply stops.

Biologists with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans in St. John's are hoping to perform a necropsy on a rarely-seen whale found beached on the shore in Point Lance on Saturday.

A dead Sowerby's beaked whale was discovered on the beach in Point Lance on the Cape Shore.

Crews with DFO went to the site with a trailer to haul the carcass to its offices.

Waves of arctic air will bring the lowest temperatures and the harshest conditions of the winter from late this week through the middle of the month.

The arctic air will be pushed along by a couple of Alberta Clipper storms with rounds of light snow in parts of the Midwest and the potential for a couple of heavy snow events in part of the coastal Northeast.

In perspective, the benchmark low, or the coldest it has been thus far this winter, in New York City was 8 F, on Jan. 8. On that same day, the temperature dipped to minus 2 F in Detroit, minus 1 F in Boston, 11 F at Atlanta and 12 F at Washington, D.C.

Like the frigid air during early January, the waves of arctic air moving in could bring disruptions to some of the trains in the northern cities. The prolonged cold penetrating deep into the ground could also cause water main breaks from the Midwest to the Northeast.

According to AccuWeather Meteorologist Brian Lada, "The combination of frigid air will not only be painful to endure for short periods of time outdoors but can bring life-threatening conditions for those not properly dressed."

The dangers will range from difficulty breathing to frostbite and hypothermia.

The first blast of arctic air will sweep from the Midwest to the Atlantic coast through the end of the week.

During multiple days, temperatures will not climb above zero F in northern Minnesota and part of northern Michigan.

While on the coldest days temperatures will climb into the single digits and teens from Minneapolis to Chicago, Detroit, Pittsburgh and Boston, AccuWeather RealFeel® Temperatures will be below zero for many hours on multiple days. Actual nighttime low temperatures will dip below zero on occasion.

Residents of Fanø were treated to an usual sight on Wednesday: the partially rotting corpse of a 12-metre sperm whale.

The rotting corpse of a 12-metre-long sperm whale has washed up on the shore of the Danish island Fanø, local police said on Wednesday.

The massive creature was naturally garnering attention, but the Danish Nature Agency (Naturstyrelsen) warned that curious onlookers should stay away from the whale, which it characterized as "a bacteria bomb".

"Experience from previous whale strandings shows that many people want to go up and touch the dead whale, but it can be deadly as dead whales are often indicted with pathogenic bacteria," the Nature Agency wrote on its website.

A raging sandstorm has swept into Israel, Palestine and Lebanon causing the worst Israeli air pollution in years and whipping up huge waves in the Mediterranean Sea.

The storm, make up of accumulated dust carried from the far reaches of the Sahara Desert in North Africa, also engulfed Cairo for a second day.

Israel's Environmental Protection Ministry said air pollution levels were the country's worst in five years and the storm would last into tonight.

Israeli airports spokeswoman Liza Dvir said flights to and from the Red Sea resort city of Eilat were temporarily grounded due to the weather, though planes still flew through the country's main international hub, Ben Gurion Airport outside of Tel Aviv.

A magnitude 6.9 earthquake struck northeastern Chile on Wednesday, very close to the border with Argentina, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

The quake, initially reported as a major 7.0, was fairly deep at 157 miles (252 km) below the earth, which should lessen its impact.

Its epicenter was located 111 miles (178 km) northwest of the Argentine town of Jujuy.

The 2015 Jakarta floods continue as more heavy rain falls on the Indonesian capital. The National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) of Indonesia confirmed earlier today that 5,986 people have been forced to evacuate their homes after floods continued to inundate wide areas of the city.

Update: Australian news agency AAP are reporting that Jakarta police say that one person has died after being swept away by flood water in central Jakarta.

The heavy rain began on Sunday 08 February 2015. By Monday, west, north, central areas, including the President's palace, were all under water. Traffic, trains and buses were all brought to a standstill, with many streets under water between 30 and 80 cm deep.

Heavy rain in Peru over the last 3 days has caused landslides and flooding in 3 regions of the country according to Peru's National Civil Defense Institute, INDECI.

Arequipa

A storm and heavy rainfall on 09 February affected at least 20 homes and inundated roads in the districts of Sachaca and Cerro Colorado in the province of Arequipa.

San Martin

Areas of San Martin were affected by flooding earlier this year, displacing at least 3,000 people .