Remember the scene in the science fiction movie “The Day After Day”? The abnormal weather caused thousands of miles of ice in the United States, and people scrambled across the border to flee to Mexico. In the past few days, the severe cold wave weather in southern Canada, the continental United States, and Mexico is comparable to scenes in the movie. The low temperature of blizzard has caused at least 23 deaths in the United States.
–
access:
–
America under the low temperature of blizzard
According to the Xinhua News Agency, as of the evening of February 16th, Eastern Time, the low-temperature blizzard that has struck many states across the United States has caused at least 23 deaths.
According to US media reports, the causes of casualties include tornadoes and fires.HeatingCauses fires, traffic accidents and carbon monoxide poisoning.
In cold weather, the Southwest Electric Company, which supplies power to 14 states across the country, was overwhelmed. The worst affected was Texas, which almost never snows. The local temperature once dropped to -19°C, the lowest since 1989. Widespread power outages caused millions of people to plunge into darkness in the cold, and with it were emergency situations such as water cuts, heat cuts, work stoppages, and tight food supplies.
Biden directly declared Texas a state of emergency.
Due to the power outage, local people used candles to boil water for cooking.
Lighting method under special circumstances
This is the style of painting for Texas residents who are totally uncomfortable with snow.
Outdoor roads are “like an ice rink”, driving or walking are very dangerous, and rescue has become difficult.
The direct cause of large-scale power outages in Texas is that the extreme cold weather has caused the entire energy system to fail to operate normally. The equipment in Texas has not experienced such extreme cold weather, and the entire system has been “frozen.”
In this regard, the local people are very dissatisfied. The radio host made swear words directly on Twitter, believing that the government and the power company were malfeasanced, and they were obviously inadequate in dealing with the extreme cold weather.
A Texas CBS News reporter also tweeted ironically that Texas, a state that claims to be an energy-producing state, cannot even supply energy in its own state.
According to federal statistics, Texas generates more power than any other state in the United States, and its power generation is almost twice that of second-place Florida. However, due to the outdated power supply equipment, in the cold temperature, almost all forms of local power supply-thermal power, wind power, nuclear power, solar power have failed: under the blizzard, some natural gas and coal-fired power plants were forced to shut down, and wind turbines were also destroyed. Frozen, the solar panels were also covered by heavy snow.
More deadly, the state of Texas, known as the “Lone Star State”, uses the only independent power system in the United States, which means that its power grid is not connected to other states. Therefore, when extreme weather such as snowstorms occurs, it must be Most parts of the state cannot get power assistance from other states.
At the same time, under the impact of the cold wave, people urgently need electricity for heating, which has greatly increased the demand for electricity in Texas.
Under the extreme imbalance of supply and demand, Texas electricity prices soared nearly 200 times. According to data from the Texas Electric Reliability Commission (ERCOT), which manages the local power grid, earlier this week, Texas wholesale electricity prices exceeded $10,000/MWh.
Texas electricity prices soared nearly 200 times
In addition, extreme weather has caused a large-scale suspension of energy production, restricted oil and gas transportation has affected neighboring countries, semiconductor factories have been forced to shut down, animal husbandry is facing a crisis of water and food shortages, cotton and other planting industries have suffered heavy losses, flight delays and highway icing, the new crown The progress of vaccination and distribution has slowed…
US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention spokesperson Jasmine Reid said on the 16th that because the snowstorm will continue to affect the vaccine distribution hubs in Memphis, Tennessee and Louisville, Kentucky, vaccine distribution across the United States is expected to occur in the next few days. “Large-scale delay”.
Look at this process from the FY-3 D satellite monitoring chart
The FY-3 D satellite monitoring results show that strong cold air affects most of the United States, bringing rain, snow and freezing weather.
The picture shows the geostationary satellite cloud image monitoring at 16:00 and 22:00 on February 16, 2021, at 4:00 and 10:00 on February 17 (Beijing time). The cloud top brightness temperature in a large area of the northeastern United States is as low as -40°C.
The true-color composite image produced using the data of the Fengyun-3 D satellite at 4:25 (Beijing time) on February 17 shows that there is a large area of snow cover in the middle of the United States, starting from North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan in the north. A total of 18 states as far south as Louisiana and Mississippi are covered with snow.
Through the weather satellite snow monitoring thematic map of the United States, it can be calculated that within the visible range of the clear sky, the snow cover of the central United States is about 1.32 million square kilometers. (Note: The snow area is the visible area of clear sky)
What caused this extreme weather?
Affected by the combined effects of the Arctic vortex, the Pacific vortex and the Mexican low trough, southern Canada, the continental United States, and Mexico encountered this severe cold wave weather process.
As western Canada blocked the development of high pressure, it “reached” the Arctic Circle, and the low trough of Mexico built a “bridge” for the cold air from the Arctic to descend to the west coast of the United States. In addition, the strong water vapor in the south caused widespread rain, snow and freezing in the United States. the weather.
The picture shows the 500hPa circulation situation at 20:00 (Beijing time) on February 17.Graphics/Li Hui
Similar to the super-strong cold wave that affected our country at the beginning of the year, under the background of climate change, weather systems such as polar vortices have become more unstable, exacerbating the occurrence of extreme weather.
In fact, as early as the beginning of this month, the northeastern region of the United States had just encountered a severe snowfall of once in a century. At that time, Mount Ellington in Morris County, New Jersey reached 890 millimetres of snow within 24 hours, breaking the record of 810 millimetres of snow in a single day set in April 1915 in Bergen County, New Jersey. At least 7 people were killed in bad weather.
In the context of climate change, extreme weather that occurs once in a century seems to be more and more common. It can not help but make people reflect that it is urgent to improve disaster prevention and mitigation capabilities, and it is imperative to deal with climate change.
– .
