Sunday, January 26, 2014

Relentless Surges of Arctic Air Continue

The blasts of Arctic air have been relentless so far this January for many cities east of the Rockies. A new surge of frigid air will pour southward from Canada behind an Alberta Clipper that will bring snow to the Midwest and Northeast Sunday into Monday. By Monday and Tuesday, temperatures in some cities may rival what we saw in early January.

There's been some more chatter about the "polar vortex", which became a popular catchphrase to describe the blast of bitter cold air at the start of the month. However, just like in early January, this term is being used misleadingly from a meteorological perspective since the actual center of the Northern Hemisphere polar vortex never really moves through the atmosphere above the United States - rather, it remains anchored farther to the north.

There is nothing extremely unusual about this weather since the polar vortex is always present in the winter and there are always spokes and always surges of cold air during the winter in our hemisphere. In any given place or time, the surge of cold air can be more or less intense and travel a longer or shorter distance from the pole.

http://www.weather.com/news/weather-forecast/arctic-cold-finish-january-20140117

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