At Least 30 Dead Due to Polar Storm in the United States

SadaNews - The death toll from the bitter cold striking the United States has risen to 30, including seven who died in a plane crash on Sunday night, as the polar freeze continues to deprive over half a million homes of electricity on Tuesday morning.

Temperatures are expected to drop sharply in the coming days due to a polar air mass, especially in the northern regions of the country, where the wind chill could reach minus 45 degrees Celsius.

Heavy snowfall, exceeding 30 centimeters in about 20 U.S. states, has led to widespread power outages.

According to the specialized site "poweroutage.us", over 530,000 customers were without electricity on Tuesday morning, most of them in the southern United States, specifically in Mississippi and Tennessee, where the weight of ice caused power lines to collapse.

More than 175,000 people were affected in Tennessee, and over 140,000 in Mississippi. Additionally, power outages affected about 100,000 customers in Louisiana.

Meteorologist Alison Santorelli told AFP: "Power outages may continue for several more days, as authorities struggle to recover from the storm's effects. Most of these areas lack the means or resources to clear snow and assess damage after such events, as they are unaccustomed to them."

Dave Radel, a meteorologist based in New York, explained to AFP that the snow that fell during the storm was "very dry" and "fragile", meaning that winds could easily disperse it, complicating snow removal efforts and reducing visibility.
Some experts consider this storm to be one of the worst in recent decades in the United States, accompanied by ice accumulations that could have "catastrophic" consequences, according to the National Weather Service.

- Polar Vortex -

These harsh weather conditions have resulted in the deaths of at least 30 people, according to statistics compiled by AFP based on information from U.S. media.

In Texas, authorities confirmed the death of a 16-year-old girl in a skiing accident. Two people died from hypothermia in Louisiana, and another person in Iowa due to a collision accident.

The bodies of eight individuals were found in New York, and an investigation has been launched to determine the causes of death.

On Sunday evening, the crash of a plane during takeoff in a snowstorm in Maine (northeast of the country) resulted in the deaths of seven of its eight passengers, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.

A state of emergency has been declared in nearly twenty states, in addition to the federal capital Washington, leading to significant disruptions in transportation.

Air traffic came to a near standstill at many major airports in Washington, Philadelphia, and New York, with over 22,000 flights canceled since Saturday, and thousands of other flights delayed, according to the flight tracking site "FlightAware".

The storm is linked to a polar vortex, which is a body of air that typically rotates over the Arctic, but has extended southward.

Scientists believe that the increasing frequency of such disturbances may be linked to climate change, although the discussion is still ongoing, and natural fluctuations also play a role.

President Donald Trump, who denies climate change, used the storm as an excuse to reiterate his skepticism about climate risks, writing on his platform "Truth Social": "Can these environmentalists explain to me: What happened to the warming?".