Extreme Temperatures
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Snowflake Cold

U.S. Polar blast to chill millions from Minnesota to Texas

Andy Mussoline
Accuweather
Sat, 29 Nov 2014 18:16 UTC
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A fresh blast of frigid air and bone-chilling winds will continue to expand across the Plains and Midwest through Monday, hitting cities from Minneapolis to Chicago and Oklahoma City.

The frigid blast has already dropped temperatures nearly 60 degrees in a 24-hour period across parts of Montana Friday into Saturday. Some locales went from the mid-50s on Friday to nearly 10 below zero F.

The arctic chill will dive south and east through Monday, hitting Minneapolis, Chicago and Oklahoma City with sharply colder air and drastically plummeting temperatures.
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Highs near 40 F in Minneapolis Saturday afternoon will be replaced by teens and single digits Sunday and Monday.

Bone-chilling winds will accompany the cold blast on Sunday, forcing afternoon AccuWeather.com RealFeel® temperatures into the single digits below zero. Chicago's RealFeels will sit in the single digits above zero throughout the day on Monday.

"This latest cold blast will not be nearly as wide-reaching or long lasting as the one that hit the country in the middle of November," said AccuWeather.com Meteorologist Mark Paquette. "The Plains and Midwest will be hit the hardest, while the Southeast will avoid much of the chill."

Oklahoma City will be near record highs in the 70s Sunday before highs plummet into the 30s for Monday. Winds will place RealFeel temperatures in the single digits around daybreak Monday.
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Snowflake

Record snowfall in Pennsylvania; 11.2 inches recorded

Eric Hrin
The Daily Review
Thu, 27 Nov 2014 13:24 UTC
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© Review/Eric Hrin
The only thing area motorists could be thankful for Wednesday was safely reaching their destinations.

And for some, that didn't happen.

A pre-Thanksgiving snowstorm made roads a treacherous mess, sending vehicles slipping, sliding and some even overturning. The snow set a record.

As of 7:30 p.m. in Towanda, Wayne Vanderpool, National Weather Service Co-Op Observer, reported that he measured 11.2 inches of snow, "with it still snowing lightly."

He said it was "the most snow ever measured in Towanda on any November day, since records began back in 1895."

Also, Vanderpool said Wednesday's total set a 24-hour snowfall record for Nov. 26. The old record was 2.5 inches, which he said was set back in 1898.

The snow kept emergency responders busy with calls.

"It's all over the county," said Alan Painter, an assistant chief with the Troy Volunteer Fire Department. "The departments are getting called everywhere." Painter said that with all the snow, there was "no traction" on the roads.

On Wednesday night, Painter stood beside a truck that lay on its side, following a crash, with no injuries, that occurred on Route 14 in Troy Township. He said it was caused by the bad road conditions. A man, who was the only person in the truck, refused treatment.

"It's pretty slippery, a slippery snow," Painter said. "It's one of the early ones. People aren't used to it yet."

Comment: Winter is coming - Ice age fever

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Snowflake Cold

Minnesota reports subzero temperatures; coldest Thanksgiving since 1930


CBS News - Minnesota
Fri, 28 Nov 2014 13:01 UTC
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© CBS
Minnesotans woke up to subzero temperatures on Thanksgiving Day, and if the mercury doesn't make it up into the double digits, the day could be one for the record books.

As of 8 a.m., it was 2 below in the Twin Cities, and 20 below in Bemidji, in northern Minnesota.

Meteorologist Matt Brickman is forecasting a high Thursday afternoon of 10 degrees. And if temperatures don't rise higher than that, it will be the coldest Thanksgiving since Herbert Hoover was president, in 1930.

Snow will fall during the night in some areas, followed on Friday by the possibility of freezing rain.

Comment: Think the past winter was bad? Get ready for mini Ice Age

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Ice Cube

Surprise! Submarine drone finds Antarctic ice a lot thicker than previously thought


RT
Tue, 25 Nov 2014 02:59 UTC
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© Still from YouTube video/AntarcticSurvey
A new type of 3D mapping revealed Antarctic sea ice could be much thicker than previously estimated, shows a study done with the help of a yellow robotic submarine named SeaBed.

The new study, published in Nature Geoscience, showed that average ice thickness in Antarctica is between 1.4 meters and 5.5 meters. The maximum thickness recorded was 17 meters.

Also, 76 percent of the mapped ice has been tagged as 'deformed,' the study stated, which means that ice crashed together, forming a thicker layers of ice.

"Our surveys indicate that the floes are much thicker and more deformed than reported by most drilling and ship-based measurements of Antarctic sea ice," states the study. "We suggest that thick ice in the near-coastal and interior pack may be under-represented in existing in situ assessments of Antarctic sea ice and hence, on average, Antarctic sea ice may be thicker than previously thought."

SeaBed robot has been involved in two expeditions in Antarctica with scientists from the UK, the US and Australia. The yellow robot is an autonomous underwater vehicle (or AUV) equipped with upward-looking sonar to measure and map the underwater sea ice.

The two-meter robot moved in a "lawnmower" pattern so as not to miss any areas and bounced sound waves off the under-surface of the ice to make its estimates.

Two expeditions took place in 2010 and 2012 and included regions of Weddell, Bellingshausen, and Wilkes Land.

Comment: A dose of COLD reality: The ironic saga of the eco-campaigners trying to highlight global warming and melting ice caps trapped in the freezing Antarctic

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Attention

Manatee from Florida makes rare visit to Texas waters

Ben Hooper
upi.com
Tue, 25 Nov 2014 20:22 UTC
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The manatee is expected to be taken to Sea World San Antonio or a Marine Mammal facility in Galveston.

Authorities in Texas said they are working on a plan to assist an unusual visitor -- the first manatee to visit the Houston area in 19 years.

The Chambers County Sheriff's Office said a deputy spotted the male manatee swimming up a channel Sunday near Baytown and barriers were put in place once the sea mammal settled in a spot next to a warm water outlet.

Sheriff Brian Hawthorne said waters in the area are too cold for manatees this time of year.

"The cold water makes them stressed, it makes them really tired, just like if you or I were out in a snowstorm," he told the Houston Chronicle.

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Snowflake Cold

It was so cold that a plane froze to the runway in Siberia


RT
Wed, 26 Nov 2014 18:04 UTC
- 52C (-61.6F) in Siberia: Over 70 passengers 'push' frozen plane to runway

Freezing temperatures didn't stop intrepid passengers from "helping out" a Russian plane that couldn't move, because its wheels were frozen to the ground. The "selfie" won the day in a remote Siberian town beyond the Arctic Circle.

74 passengers, who were on board, offered the seven-member crew and technical staff to help move the frozen Tupolev Tu-134 plane to the takeoff runway on Tuesday, a spokeswoman for the UTair company told TASS.

"The passengers disembarked to lighten the weight, and then they volunteered to move it," she said.


The temperatures in Igarka, in the Krasnoyarsk region, hit a low of about -52C. Locals, living some 163 km north of the Arctic Circle, are quite used to cold weather, but machines turn out to be more delicate.

Having spent over 24 hours on the tarmac, the airplane's wheels simply froze to the ground. However, the brake system wasn't harmed. According to the company, the ice-covered ground was the reason the plane couldn't be moved. The incident is currently under investigation, and will involve airport staff, the airline, crew and passengers.

Comment: The Russians have the right attitude to cold weather!

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Snowflake

Nearly 60 million in path of East Coast, Appalachian snowstorm - 6-12 inches forecast

Alex Sosnowski
Accuweather
Tue, 25 Nov 2014 15:13 UTC
A storm with rain and heavy snow will cause major disruptions and delays for Thanksgiving travel on the East Coast and in the Appalachians.

According to AccuWeather Chief Meteorologist Elliot Abrams, "In most cases, the worst time to travel in the mid-Atlantic and New England due to the storm will be on Wednesday and Wednesday night."

"The best time to travel will be through Tuesday night in these same areas, with the next best time on Thanksgiving Day."

Rain will initially spread northward along the Interstate-95 with snow and rain to start farther west in the I-81 corridor. However, a change to snow will take place from west to east from northern Virginia to New England.

The storm will bring mostly snow to the I-81 swath in Virginia, Maryland and Pennsylvania, I-84 in southeastern New York state, as well as much of interior New England, where a general 6-12 inches of snow are forecast.

In anticipation of delays or cancellations, several airlines, including US Airways, American and Delta, have announced they will waive change fees for passengers scheduled to fly into airports in the line of the storm.
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Some places across the Hudson Valley and New England could even have snow totals exceeding a foot.

"The storm should rapidly strengthen off the coast of New England on Wednesday night, leading to strong and gusty winds, especially near the coast," stated AccuWeather.com Meteorologist Ben Noll as he discussed the impacts in this storm scenario.

Comment: See video coverage courtesy of Accuweather here.

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Igloo

U.S. Great Lakes ice cover develops earliest in over 40 years

Mark Torregrossa
Mlive.com
Mon, 24 Nov 2014 21:42 UTC
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© Chris Clark/MLive.com
Here's what Lake Michigan looked like in February 2014.
Ice is already starting to develop on Michigan's Great Lakes. This is the earliest ice on some of the Great Lakes in at least 40 years. According to the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory, on November 20, 2014, three of Michigan's Great Lakes had ice starting to form. Lake Superior and Lake Michigan were one-half percent ice covered, while Lake Huron had one percent ice. Lake Erie was not reporting any ice as of Nov. 20, 2014.

Decent early season ice coverage records date back to 1973. Last Friday was the earliest date that all three Great Lakes already had ice since the better reporting of early season ice began. Lake Superior actually had ice forming on November 15th of this year. That is the earliest ice on Lake Superior in the good data set.

Lakes Superior, Michigan and Huron had ice 10 days earlier this year than last year. Lake Superior only had five and a half months without any ice on the lake.

Comment:
  • U.S. - Weeks ahead of schedule, ice visible on Lake Superior

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Attention

An Ice Age indicator? Unusually high number of snowy owls migrate early to Wisconsin

Paul A. Smith
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Sat, 22 Nov 2014 19:14 UTC
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Snowy owls, such as this one spotted in the Milwaukee area in 2012, have arrived again in the state.
Several strong cold fronts in November helped deliver a wintry landscape to Wisconsin earlier than many would have liked.

If you're looking for a positive, here's one: the new whiteness isn't just snow.

At least 31 snowy owls have been recorded in Wisconsin this month, according to Ryan Brady, research scientist with the Department of Natural Resources and bird monitoring coordinator for the Wisconsin Bird Conservation Initiative.

Like the early snow accumulation, the number of owls is unusually high for this time of year, according to Brady.

"It's probably a record," Brady said. "Thankfully, it's the kind of record that doesn't require shoveling and plowing."

The number of snowies in Wisconsin this month is even more extraordinary considering last year - which featured the largest number of the birds in the U.S. in decades - only one snowy owl had been seen in the Badger State by mid-November.

Snowy owls are large, charismatic birds that breed in the Arctic in summer and disperse in varying degrees to the south in winter.
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Igloo

Winter is coming - Ice age fever

Dr. Mark Sircus, Ac., OMD, DM (P)
Dr Sircus.com
Fri, 21 Nov 2014 02:06 UTC
Iceage_1
© drsircus.com
The news of this winter has not even begun because we are still five weeks away from that equinox. Yet you would never know it watching what is going on in upstate New York and the rest of the United States that recently saw record-breaking cold in all fifty states.

Like all kids, growing up I heard of such things as ice ages and that we were overdo for one. You know once in every 10,000 years kind of trip, and I thought well ok, that is the pattern, but must take a long time to come on so I will never have to worry about it in my lifetime!

But not so, says Professor William Patterson of the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada, and his colleagues. Using the most precise record of the climate from paleo history ever generated they tell almost the same story we saw in the movie The Day After Tomorrow, when the world went stone cold from one week to another. Buffalo looks like act one on our screens.

Patterson, a world expert, also thought it would take time to come on but lo and behold, the scientific evidence suggests otherwise. Robert Felix, author of Not by Fire but by Ice, thought that ice ages begin in less than 20 years. His site is the best place to keep up with the cooling news, which is heating up, according to religious disciples of manmade global warming that never was.
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