Hell Freezes Over.......
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Town of Hell Freezes over in the US
2 hours ago
As cold weather continues to hit the US, the small town of Hell in Michigan has ground to a halt due to a thick carpet of snow.
Weather records have tumbled across North America, with all 50 US states experiencing freezing temperatures.
Temperatures begin to rise and winds start to slow after brutal 'polar vortex' leaves 21 dead and 11,000 flights grounded
- Winds across the U.S. are set to calm today and the Northeast will feel balmy by tomorrow
- Temperatures will climb in the Midwest and the East - which were colder than Antarctica on Tuesday - but they are still expected to remain below freezing until later this week
- The deep freeze could cost the U.S. economy as much as $5 billion
- All 50 states saw freezing temperatures at some point on Tuesday, including Hawaii, where it was 18F (-8C) atop Mauna Kea, a dormant volcano
- In New York City, Central Park was 5F on Tuesday, the coldest January 7 since 1896
- At least 21 people have died across country since Sunday, including seven in Illinois and six in Indiana
The arctic blast that has shattered temperature records and taken the lives of 21 people across the U.S. will ease its grip on much of the U.S. today, providing relief for millions scrambling to stay warm.
Winds are set to calm and the weather will warm slightly - a day after all 50 U.S. states endured freezing temperatures, and areas of the Midwest and East were colder than much of Antarctica. Even Hawaii experienced the chill as temperatures plummeted to 18F (-8C) atop Mauna Kea, a dormant volcano.
Just yesterday, Atlanta endured a record low of 6 degrees, causing fountains to freeze over and forcing southerners to dig out rarely-worn winter hats and coats, but today the southern city is predicted to see sunny skies and temperatures of 42 degrees.
In the Midwest and East, where brutal polar air has lingered over the past few days, temperatures climbed but were still expected to be below freezing.
On Thursday, highs in the 20s or 30s in much of the Great Lakes and Northeast will seem downright balmy compared to earlier in the week.
In Indianapolis, Timolyn Johnson-Fitzgerald returned to her home after spending the night in a shelter with her three children because they lost power to their apartment. The water lines were working, but much of the food she bought in preparation for the storm was ruined from a combination of thawing and then freezing during the outage.
A man walks beside a frozen wall on a beach in Chicago. At Chicago O'Hare, American put its fueling pumper and tanker trucks in a hangar to keep them from freezing
Frozen over: An image taken by the Today show reveals Minnehaha Falls in Minnesota completely frozen over on Wednesday morning
It's warming up! A forecast for Wednesday shows temperatures across much of the U.S. will creep above freezing, providing relief after a brutal start to the week
Forecast: A map shows Wednesday's expected highs - a stark difference to Tuesday, when areas of the Midwest and East were colder than much of Antarctica
'All my eggs were cracked, the cheese and milk was frozen. And the ice cream had melted and then refroze. It's crazy, but we're just glad to be back home,' she said.
At least 15,000 customers in Indiana were without power early on Tuesday. Utility crews worked to restore service as temperatures plunged into the negative teens, but officials warned that some customers could be in the cold and dark for days as the weather starts to warm.
Experts have predicted that the deep freeze could cost the U.S. economy as much as $5 billion as people were unable to travel to work, shops or restaurants, others were unable to fly on vacation or business trips, and many had to crank up the heat to endure the chill.
'We think that the problem will be short-lived, but we estimate it will cost about $5 billion because of the sheer size of the population affected - about 200 million people in the eastern two-thirds of the country,' Evan Gold, senior vice president at business weather intelligence company Planalytics said
The ease on the freeze comes after the brutal weather led to the deaths of 21 people and grounded thousands of flights.
The mercury plummeted into the single digits and teens from Boston and New York to Atlanta, Birmingham, Nashville and Little Rock - places where many people don't know the first thing about extreme cold. Temperatures in the Midwest and East were colder than much of Antarctica.
'I didn't think the South got this cold,' said Marty Williams, a homeless man, originally from Chicago, who took shelter at a church in Atlanta, where it hit a record low of 6 degrees. 'That was the main reason for me to come down from up North, from the cold, to get away from all that stuff.'
HELL
Even Hell has frozen over - that is, a small town in Michigan, where shops closed up and snowed in neighbors helped each other stay warm.
Bill Jackson clears snow from a car at Myers Autoworld in Anderson, Indiana, Tuesday, January 7, 2014
Lexington Fire Dept. Major Joe Madden, left, and firefighter Casey Wiley, right, looked for hotspots at the scene of an overnight house fire at 238 Swigert Ave. in Lexington, Kentucky, Tuesday
A tugboat makes its way up the icy waters of the Mississippi River on Tuesday, in St. Louis. Tuesday was the worst cold snap in nearly two decades for Missouri
Icicles hang from a bumper of a vehicle in Fort Walton Beach, Florida, Tuesday morning. Like much of the nation, the Florida panhandle experienced freezing temperatures, with overnight lows Monday dipping to around around 18 degrees
Seven people died in Illinois, and six in Indiana. At least five people died after collapsing while shoveling snow, while several victims were identified as homeless people who either refused shelter or didn't make it to a warm haven soon enough to save themselves from the bitter temperatures.
In Missouri on Monday, a one-year-old boy was killed when the car he was riding in struck a snow plow, and a 20-year-old woman was killed in a separate crash after her car slid on ice and into the path of a tractor-trailer.
The big chill started in the Midwest over the weekend, caused by a kink in the 'polar vortex,' the strong winds that circulate around the North Pole. By Tuesday, the icy air covered about half the country, and records were shattered like icicles up and down the Eastern Seaboard.
It was 1 degree in Reading, Pennsylvania, and 2 in Trenton, New Jersey. New York City plummeted to 4 degrees; the old record for the date was 6, set in 1896.
'It's brutal out here,' said Spunkiy Jon, who took a break from her sanitation job in New York to smoke a cigarette in the cab of a garbage truck. 'Your fingers freeze off after three minutes, your cheeks feel as if you're going to get windburn, and you work as quick as you can.'
Farther south, Birmingham, Alabama, dipped to a low of 7, four degrees colder than the old mark, set in 1970. Huntsville, Alabama, dropped to 5, Nashville, Tennesse, got down to 2, and Little Rock, Arkansas, fell to 9. Charlotte, North Carolina, reached 6 degrees, breaking the 12-degree record that had stood since 1884.
NASA's satellite sees a Midwest White Out at 2015 UTC/3:15 p.m. EST on January 6, 2014
Garret Kelenske, 49, works to remove snow on the sidewalk in Muskegon Heights, Michigan on Tuesday as temperatures reached record lows across the country
St. Simon's on the Sound Episcopal Church's fountains were frozen over Tuesday just after sunrise in Fort Walton Beach, Florida where locals are unaccustomed to such temperatures
A vehicle drives through a barely visible intersection of Route 33 and Batavia Stafford Townline Road on Tuesday in Stafford, New York. Dangerously cold polar air snapped decades-old records as it spread Tuesday from the Midwest to southern and eastern parts of the U.S.
Snow covers an Abraham Lincoln statue in Hackley Park on Tuesday in Muskegon, Michigan
Ice forms on rocks on the Brooklyn waterfront across from lower Manhattan in New York on Tuesday
Temperatures were so cold Tuesday that Hell literally froze over - that is, a small town in Michigan, pictured
Everything shutdown in the ominously-named town of just over 200 people, and they all looked to help their neighbors
The deep freeze dragged on in the Midwest as well, with the thermometer reaching minus 12 overnight in the Chicago area and 14 below in suburban St. Louis. More than 500 Amtrak passengers were stranded overnight on three Chicago-bound trains that were stopped by blowing and drifting snow in Illinois. Food ran low, but the heat stayed on.
Many schools and day care centers across the eastern half of the U.S. were closed so that youngsters would not be exposed to the dangerous cold. Officials opened shelters for the homeless and anyone else who needed a warm place.
With the bitter cold slowing baggage handling and aircraft refueling, airlines canceled more than 2,000 flights in the U.S., bringing the four-day total to more than 11,000.
In New Orleans, which reported a low of 26 degrees, hardware stores ran out of pipe insulation. A pipe burst in an Atlanta suburb and a main road quickly froze over. In downtown Atlanta, a Ferris wheel near Centennial Olympic Park that opened over the summer to give riders a bird's eye view of the city closed because it was too cold.
Farther south in Pensacola, Florida, a Gulf Coast city better known for its white sand beaches than frost, streets normally filled with joggers, bikers and people walking dogs were deserted early Tuesday. A sign on a bank flashed 19 degrees. Patches of ice sparkled in parking lots where puddles froze overnight.
Ice transforms landscape from New York to Alabama
Record-setting freeze grips U.S. East Coast, disrupts travel
Much of the country will continue to shiver Wednesday, with highs shown above
Things will improve on Thursday as the polar vortex straightens out
By Friday, warmer weather will be upon us, with temperatures returning above freezing in various parts of the country
The Chicago skyline is seen behind a large chunk of ice near North Avenue Beach as cold temperatures remain with wind chills nearing minus 30F on Tuesday
Monica Anderson and Tommy Howard jumped up and down and blew on their hands while they waited for a bus. Anderson said she couldn't recall it ever being so cold.
'I'm not used to it. It is best just to stay inside until it gets better,' said Anderson, who had to get out for a doctor's appointment.
The Lower 48 states, when averaged out, reached a low of 13.8 degrees overnight Monday, according to calculations by Ryan Maue of Weather Bell Analytics. An estimated 190 million people in the U.S. were subjected to the polar vortex's icy blast.
Farmers worried about their crops.
Diane Cordeau of Kai-Kai Farm in Indiantown, Florida, about 90 miles north of Miami, had to pick her squash and tomatoes Monday to beat the freeze but said her leafy vegetables, such as kale, will be sweeter and tastier because of the cold.
'I'm the queen of lettuce around here, so the colder the better,' said Cordeau, whose farm serves high-end restaurants that request specific produce or organic vegetables.
PJM Interconnection, which operates the power grid that serves more than 61 million people in the Mid-Atlantic, Midwest and South, asked users to conserve electricity because of the cold, especially in the morning and late afternoon.
Across the South, the Tennessee Valley Authority said power demand in the morning reached the second-highest winter peak in the history of the Depression-era utility. Temperatures averaged 4 degrees across the utility's seven-state region.
In South Carolina, a large utility used 15-minute rolling blackouts to handle demand, but there were no reports of widespread outages in the South.
Natural gas demand in the U.S. set a record Tuesday, eclipsing the mark set a day earlier, according to Jack Weixel, director of energy analysis at Bentek Energy.
In Chicago, it was too cold even for the polar bear at the Lincoln Park Zoo. While polar bears can handle below-zero cold in the wild, Anana was kept inside Monday because she doesn't have the thick layer of fat that bears typically develop from feeding on seals and whale carcasses.
Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn and Indiana Gov. Mike Pence issued disaster declarations, a first step toward seeking federal aid.
The big freeze: Half the US shivers on coldest day for decades
A commuter departs from Union Station with wind chills nearing minus 30F in Chicago (left) as a man struggles to stay warm on the streets of New York City
A man crosses in front of a steam vent in downtown Detroit, Michigan as a deep freeze set in along much of the eastern seaboard
A man walks past a snow encrusted bicycle with wind chills nearing minus 30F on Tuesday, in downtown Chicago
A semi tractor-trailer slid off the side of Indiana 42 in far eastern Vigo County, Indiana Tuesday afternoon
Fire and ice: an early morning blaze ripped through a home on Park Avenue on Jan 7. Ice covered the burnt out home after the fire was knocked down and fire hoses were filled with ice
More than 500 Amtrak passengers spent Monday night on three trains headed for Chicago that were stranded because of blowing and drifting snow in Illinois. Spokesman Marc Magliari said all the passengers, traveling from Los Angeles, San Francisco and Quincy, Illinois, would reach Chicago by train or bus later Tuesday.
Lucas Hunter from Pittsburgh, walks to his hotel along Camp Road in Hamburg, New York after a stretch of the New York State thruway was closed down due to high winds
Ana Holmes is pictured through snowy glass at a bus stop on the Grand Valley State University Allendale Township campus Tuesday.
The frozen lighthouse at Pere Marquette Beach in Muskegon, Michigan
A furious blaze engulfed Happy's Pizza shop in Ann Arbor, Michigan today as icicles hung from the traffic signs nearby in the arctic temperatures
Ice hangs on a fire hydrant and hose as Ann Arbor firefighters battled the fire in extreme conditions
The frozen mist from Niagara Falls coats the landscape around Prospect Point at Niagara Falls State Park
Monday's subzero temperatures broke records in Chicago, which set a record for the date at minus 16, and Fort Wayne, Indiana, where the mercury fell to 13 below.
Records also fell in Oklahoma and Texas, and wind chills across the region were 40 below and colder. Officials in states like Indiana already struggling with high winds and more than a foot of snow urged residents to stay home if they could.
'The cold is the real killer here,' Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard said on Monday as he asked schools and businesses to remain closed another day. 'In 10 minutes you could be dead without the proper clothes.'
In Minnesota, officials took the rare step of closing all of the state's public schools on Monday - the first time in 17 years.
Schools across Chicago, Milwaukee and St Louis were also closed, while officials in Washington D.C. and as far south as Atlanta have announced school closures Tuesday.
Gerald Allen, 37, talks on the phone on Tuesday at a Catholic Charities warming center in the old school by St. Michael's Catholic Church in downtown Flint, Michigan
Myron Jackson sleeps on a cot in the hallway at the Atlanta Mission homeless shelter, after their rooms reached their capacity, in downtown Atlanta, Georgia January 7, 2014.
A deadly blast of arctic air shattered decades-old temperature records as it enveloped the eastern United States on Tuesday, snarling air, road and rail travel, driving energy prices higher and overwhelming shelters for homeless people
Ice covers rocks and brush on the break wall at Edgewater Park in Cleveland, Ohio as half the U.S. was battered by winter storm Ion
On Monday the winds made it feel like 55 below zero in International Falls, Minnesota, and parts of the Midwest accustomed to temperatures that are cold - albeit seldom this cold.
But even the coal fields of Virginia and West Virginia, the wind chill was negative 35.
Every major weather-reporting station in Minnesota, North Dakota and Wisconsin reported temperatures below zero at 11am on Monday, and South Dakota would have joined them if not for the reading of 1 at Rapid City.
The coldest temperature reported in a 24-hour period through Monday was -36 degrees at Crane Lake, Minnesota. The warmest: 84 at Hollywood and Punta Gorda, Fla.
On Monday morning, Nashville was 40 degrees colder than Albany, New York. Memphis, Tennessee, was 20 degrees colder than Anchorage, Alaska. And Atlanta was colder than Moscow - either Russia or Idaho.
In the Great Lakes region, temperatures hovered in the negative 20s - before wind chill, which dropped temps to the negative 50s, making it very dangerous to go outside.
Meteorologists have warned about 'dangerous, life-threatening winds', that can inflict frostbite on exposed skin in just 10 minutes.
Temperatures are so cold across the Midwest that antifreeze in residents' cars could freeze. The popular brand freezes at 34 degrees - and the coldest temperature on Monday afternoon was minus 35 in Crane Lake, Minnesota.
'Skin freezes in just five minutes with a wind chill of minus 50,' said HLN meteorologist Bob Van Dillen as wind chills are putting temperatures in northern Minnesota at 60 below zero.
For a big chunk of the Midwest, the subzero temperatures were moving in behind another winter wallop: more than a foot of snow and high winds that made traveling treacherous.
With wind chills as low as 45 below zero at some airports, workers could only remain exposed on the ramp for a few minutes. That made loading and unloading luggage a challenge.
JetBlue Airways stopped all scheduled flights to and from New York and Boston.
American Airlines said temperatures were so cold at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport that fuel and de-icing liquids were actually frozen. United Airlines said its fuel is pumping slower than normal in Chicago