United States: Multiple life-threatening temperature conditions combined with dangerous weather front systems will strike areas surrounding the Rocky Mountains after floods took ten lives across eastern states.
More about the news
A storm moving east from the Central Plains toward the Mid-Atlantic region, according to forecasts from the National Weather Service’s (NWS) weather prediction center, will affect this week.
The upcoming Tuesday forecast in Montana’s northern zones predicts temperatures reaching -42.7C, with wind-chill dropping to -51C as the lowest mark.
The weather service expects people in most of North Dakota, along with vast regions of South Dakota and Minnesota, to experience “extreme cold” warnings under wind chill conditions reaching -45.6C.
About the polar vortex
Pressure systems became active again this month during the 10th polar vortex event, which turned out to be the most extreme cold air blast of the season.
The Arctic cold seeped southward toward North America and Europe. A polar vortex describes the low-pressure system of cold air surrounding both poles while its counter-clockwise motion preserves cold air around polar regions.
The phenomenon frequently appears during winter months because it brings major Arctic air intrusion into the United States.
As per the statement by the NWS, the weather system “will produce a swath of both heavy and disruptive snowfall,” news.sky.com reported.
Additionally, it is also stated that “a bitterly cold air-mass containing dangerous wind chills temperatures looks to stretch from the Great Plains to the northeast” – where there is “high confidence for widespread, record-breaking cold” in the central states.
“Wind chills between -30F and -60F are expected across the northern Plains, lingering for multiple days,” NWS added.
“These extreme conditions can cause frostbite within minutes. Sub-zero wind chills will likely extend as far south as Texas, Arkansas, and western Tennessee and Kentucky,” it continued.
Several regions of the Rocky Mountains extending from Colorado to Washington received avalanche alerts as the Utah Mountains exhibited the most dangerous conditions.