Northeast plunges 50 degrees in 'polar vortex'

BUFFALO, N.Y., Jan. 7 (UPI) —

The "polar vortex" that froze the U.S. Midwest caused a Northeast weather whiplash Tuesday as temperatures fell 50 degrees overnight as the brutal cold arrived.

Buffalo, N.Y., the state’s second-most-populous city, braced for up to 3 feet of snow and wind chills of at least 30 degrees below zero Fahrenheit.

New York counties west of the Catskill Mountains along the northern border of Pennsylvania expected wind chills of at least 40 below, the National Weather Service said.

The western New York snow was part of a lake-effect blizzard that crossed that part of the state after strong, sustained frigid winds from the arctic cyclone crossed over Lake Erie, picking up energy and water vapor, the weather service said.

The sucked-up water then froze and fell as snow on the lake’s eastern downwind shores.

The blizzard was expected to create "near impossible driving conditions overnight with blinding snow conditions during the day Tuesday," weather service meteorologist Dave Zaff told the Buffalo News.

"Western New Yorkers have experience with snow, but this is something different — this is snow with extreme arctic cold," Gov. Andrew Cuomo said as he declared a state of emergency in 14 western counties and shut parts of the state’s key east-west interstate highway.

The blizzard was a brutal element of a massive, excruciating cold front stemming from the polar vortex arctic cyclone that plunged the eastern third of the country as far south as Atlanta and Birmingham, Ala., into single digits early Tuesday.

"The cold temperatures with the gusty winds will result in dangerously cold wind chills across most of the Eastern Seaboard," the weather service said early Tuesday.

High temperatures in much of the Northeast dropped from the mid-50s Monday to single digits overnight. The plunge was compounded by sustained 20-30 mph winds, and gusts topping 50 mph, making the temperature feel at least 20 degrees colder.

The deep freeze also resulted in air-travel havoc, with more than 1,800 cancellations as of early Tuesday and some 1,000 delays, flight-tracking website FlightAware.com said.

JetBlue Airways said the combination of bad weather and new Federal Aviation Administration rules led it to cancel all flights into and out of Boston and the New York-area airports from 5 p.m. Monday until at least 10 a.m. Tuesday.

The FAA rules, which started Jan. 1, mandate a minimum rest period for pilots of 10 hours before they report for duty, up from 8 hours.

Some 4,500 flights were canceled Monday, mostly in the Midwest and Northeast, bringing the total cancellations since Thursday to nearly 20,000 — almost matching the number of flights canceled after Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

Many airlines at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport said Monday it was too cold to fuel or de-ice their planes.

Temperatures in Chicago, which were 12 below zero Monday, and in other parts of the Midwest were expected to begin "a slow moderation" Tuesday, the weather service said.

Temperatures in Chicago and Milwaukee — both situated on the western shore of Lake Michigan — were expected to rise to 4 degrees above zero Tuesday, AccuWeather said. Wind chills would make it feel like 11 to 13 below.

The high temperature in Minneapolis, known as the "city of lakes," was forecast to be minus-1, with wind chills approaching minus-35.

Most Midwest colleges and universities said they would resume classes by Tuesday afternoon, although Northwestern University, which had no classes Monday, remained closed, the Chicago-area university said.

Hundreds of school districts, from North Dakota, Minnesota and Wisconsin east to Ohio and as far south Tennessee, also remained closed because of the single-digit cold, a United Press International spot check indicated.

Other school districts, including in North Carolina and parts of Louisiana, said they would be on 2-hour delays.

Raleigh, N.C., was forecast to reach a low of 9 degrees Tuesday morning, breaking the record low of 15 degrees for the day set in 1988. Baton Rouge, La., was expected to drop to 14 degrees.