Despite a warming climate, bone-chilling winter cold can grip parts of the U.S. In a study appearing in Science Advances, ...

Even in a warming climate, brutal cold snaps still hammer parts of the U.S., and a new study uncovers why. High above the ...

In A Nutshell A major study of 42 years of data shows severe winter storms have shifted northwest, away from the traditional ...

Three factors are combining to increase the likelihood of a weaker polar vortex this winter, the website reports. And a ...

Stratospheric polar vortex changes still trigger brutal U.S. winter cold snaps and extreme weather despite a warming climate.

The polar vortex – everyone's favorite wintertime whipping boy – is actually a gigantic, circular area of cold air high up in the atmosphere that typically spins over the North Pole ...

The polar vortex is a broad region of freezing air that lives above the North Pole. It can make for frigid weather when the jet stream, which usually holds it in place, bends and lets that cold ...

The polar vortex is essentially a large area of low pressure and cold air surrounding both of Earth’s poles. It constantly sits over the poles but expands in the winter.

The stratospheric polar vortex is smoother, smaller and more circular. It doesn’t exist year-round — instead it’s a whirlpool of frigid air that forms in the fall as the upper atmosphere cools.

The polar vortex split will help cause temperatures to plummet and potentially set the stage for some snowstorms. A recent strong "sudden stratospheric warming" event has caused the vortex to weaken.

“The polar vortex is often considered a part of that mechanism,” Butler wrote in her email. The 2018 paper that found a link between weaker vortices and severe winter weather, ...