Is there a sudden stratospheric warming?

MAJOR STRATOSPHERIC WARMING 2021. Keeping it simple, a Sudden Stratospheric Warming event (SSW) is exactly what the name suggests. It is a sudden temperature rise in the polar stratosphere during the cold season.

Where will the polar vortex hit 2021?

the North Pole
The January 2021 event pushed the polar vortex from its normal position over the North Pole all the way over to Europe and Siberia, nearly pulling it apart multiple times in the process.

How long does a sudden stratospheric warming last?

The sudden stratospheric warming usually takes a few weeks to influence our weather at the surface, or into the next month. Jet streams high up in our atmosphere, in both the northern and southern hemisphere, circumnavigate the Earth from west to east. One of these, the Polar Night Jet, circles the Arctic.

When was the last sudden stratospheric warming?

In September 2019, an extreme, record-breaking SSW event occurred over Antarctica. Goncharenko and colleagues found significant resulting changes in the upper atmosphere in mid-latitudes over the Northern Hemisphere following this event; more observations are available for this region than in the Southern Hemisphere.

In what month does it start getting cold?

You can get a cold year-round, but most people consider the winter months to be common cold season. The viruses that cause colds also spread more easily just after a drop in temperature and humidity. 1 Generally, this means the United States’ cold season starts sometime around September and ends sometime around April.

How does sudden stratospheric warming work?

Every year in winter, strong westerly winds circle around the pole high up in the stratosphere. The cold air then descends very rapidly in the polar vortex and this causes the temperature in the stratosphere to rise very rapidly, as much as 50°C over only a few days; hence the term sudden stratospheric warming.