Polar Vortex

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Ugh, I hate the media's sensationalism of the polar vortex, which really is just at different times a low pressure system or series of low pressure systems that exist near the poles and are strongest in the wintertime.

Sometimes, the media's coverage of the phenomenon makes you think of this:

But "polar vortex" sounds so... cool! *ba dum ksh*

They act like its a new existential threat when it is a common phenomenon that has always been around. It is December, it gets cold and snows. This cold outbreak and the one forecast later this week are not extreme by any means but the network news is giving it more importance then all other stories.

That's not a polar vortex.

That's a polar vortex:

I guess that a "polar vortex" sounds more exciting than a "tropical depression".

That even though the later is more dangerous (hurricanes are a type of tropical depression).

I actually thought that was a poster for an upcoming movie.

That is just normal winter stuff---the Polar Vortex.

The reason why Ezra's area is usually free from Arctic air is because of the Rocky Mountains. West of the Continental Divide, the Rockies tend to block the Arctic Air.

However, there are times when air from Alaska/Siberia, called "Arctic Outflow," seeps into the Pacific Northwest, causing Arctic conditions. Those times are relatively rare, though.

Winter weather conditions here are so rough. It snowed here a couple days ago. Snowed! And the snow stuck to people's laws for almost 24 whole hours! Good thing we were stocked up on food.

On any given day, when there's Arctic air east of the Rockies, it can be 40 in Seattle, about 25 in Spokane, about the same for Missoula, Montana (west of the Divide), yet Minus 20 in Great Falls, MT(east of the Divide).

"Polar Vortex" is actually misused in the media and even television meteorologists. The term originally describes a phenomenon in the stratosphere that occurs in winter over both poles of the earth. Sunlight typically warms the stratosphere as its absorption in the ultraviolet wavelength band is enhanced by the presence of ozone molecules. When the stratosphere falls dark above/below the arctic/antarctic circle, the stratosphere cools. This cool air slowly sinks causing a low pressure center above. Extremely strong winds often circle this area of low pressure, which is why it is called a vortex.

However, it's actually at times when the stratospheric polar vortex weakens and descends into the troposphere that cold air surges away from the poles at the surface. The breakdown of the stratospheric polar vortex in winter is usually what leads to cold outbreaks.

So what the media calls a "polar vortex" is really the opposite: a polar backed up toilet ?

Makes sense.

A vortex is a low pressure zone that causes fluid to flow into it in a spiraling pattern (like the water in a flushed toilet). The media dubs it a polar vortex when it gets backed up and spills outward. Hurricanes and tornadoes are both low pressure zones. And both look like the water in a flushing toilet. But the cold air coming down from Canada on American weather maps acts like water flowing outward from a commode because its from a high pressure zone.

The roads are covered in frozen slush and muck. It's dropping to -18 degrees celsius tonight, -26 with the wind chill factor. I'm sick for the second time this winter with the flu.
I am so moving to B.C. one day.

During very hot summer weather, periods of drought, the climate-crazies tell us warming, tipping points and turning into Venus by 2100 c.e. During bitterly cold polar vortex Siberian Express periods the climate crazies do not warn us of a forthcoming ice age? Why is that?

There is the bulk of the whole scientific community who warns about global warming -and who never take seasons off from warning us.

Then there are "climate crazies" who deny global warming (who also never take a day off).



I have never heard nor seen, or nor heard of, these other "climate crazies" that you speak of who agree with the scientific community that there is such a thing as global warming.

It's suppose to warm up here to 60,then drop to 6 with below zero windchill.That's just rude.
The pack rat forecast agrees.Those little devils climbed up into the lilac shrub and trimmed off half the top branches,grrrrrr.They've made a huge nest in the old outhouse,it would fill a wheelbarrow.Somehow they always know.During mild winters they never attack the shrubbery or take the time to build giant nests.

The climate science consensus that that humans are going to cause the end of the world as we know it as we know is based on modelology not meteorology. The first thing I was taught in computer class back in 1984 is "Garbage In, Garbage Out (GIGO)". To put it in a nicer way the results you get out can be based on human bias of both the programmer and the people entering the data. Unfortunately during my time programming GIGO was repeatedly confirmed. In this case the biases underestimate mother nature and overestimating us humans. The last few years the models have blown near term events and have often widely disagreed on a storm just a few days away. Just this year the GIGO effect was seen in election polls. Yet the consensus is putting in uneqivical faith in the models very long term projections.

Both the consensus of human released carbon as an important to main feature that will cause the end of the world as we know it and the paid opposition that wants to do nothing out of financial interest are going to cause future damage. The consensus is causing time, energy, and political capital to be wasted on efforts that is probably not going to significantly reduce carbon emissions. Time and energy are not being used to help mitigate that the likely natural climate change that will be the end of the world as we know it. The consensus also is preventing money from going into research into possible other human caused global warming such as the heat island effect. While Obama is taking his victory tour in part basted on the Paris agreement, not to many people are going to the Dutch and asking how they built their dike system, and little is being done about the potential future cause of many deaths known as big tall glass office buildings.

One of the bad parts of the consensus is the successful labeling of us that do agree with the consensus as “deniers”, paid shills or both. Deniers was a term first associated with people who did not believe that Holocaust happened. It has been successfully used to group people that the people yelling “denier , “denier”, disagree with as Holocaust deniers, and later people who believe man never landed on the moon and people who are paranoid and delusional in general. If the person arguing with you is labelled nuts whatever he or she is arguing is nuts also, move on.