Polar Vortex could hit the US in January as weather patterns shift unusually early
The Polar Vortex is on the move unusually early this year, forecasters have revealed – and say it could strike the US in January.
A recent study claimed Arctic sea-ice loss is causing the Polar Vortex to shift and as a result, winters are expected to get longer and more bitter. Now, forecasters say it is ‘unprecedentedly early’.
The Polar Vortex hit the US hardest in 2014 , affecting 200 million people and causing billions of dollars in damages, but climatologists told DailyMail.com that, thankfully, it won’t be as severe this time around.
‘The winter of 2014 was a really extreme case, as the cold was so persistent and it was focused on one area, which makes it very hard to reproduce,’ Judah Cohen, a climatologist at Atmospheric and Environmental Research in Lexington, Massachusetts, told DailyMail.com.
‘Normally when a vortex stretches it eventually bursts, but in 2014 it just kept stretching and bouncing back.’
‘That event was highly unique and very hard to duplicate, I’m not saying it is impossible, but there are no signs that we are going to get a repeat.’ Experts say the polar vortex is already on the move this year – which could be very troubling later on. ‘There has been an unusual weakening, but it is unprecedentedly early and if we look at it chronologically it should hit in January,’ said Cohen.
‘Researchers are attributing the weakening in the study it to see-ice, which is contributing to the shift.’
Read more:Â www.dailymail.co.uk
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