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21 dead as record US freeze spreads

[email protected] (Agencies)
January 7, 2014

US_freeze_spreadsNew York/Milwaukee, Jan 9: A DEEP freeze has spread from the US midwest to the east and south, setting record low temperatures from Boston to Birmingham, and leaving 21 people dead.

The midwest and the east experienced temperatures colder than much of Antarctica. All 50 states have seen freezing temperatures, including Hawaii, where it was -8ÚC (18ÚF) on top of Mauna Kea, a dormant volcano.

The big chill started in the midwest over the weekend and has spread to cover about half of the country.

In New York City, the high was expected to be -12ÚC (10ÚF), and in Boston, around -8ÚC (18ÚF).

Across the south, records were shattered like icicles. Birmingham, Alabama, dipped to a low of -14ÚC ( 7ÚF), breaking the record of -11.7ÚC (11ÚF) set in 1970.

The deep freeze dragged on in the midwest as well, with the thermometer reaching -24ÚC (-12ÚF) overnight in the Chicago area.

More than 500 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.

The authorities reported at least 21 cold-related deaths since Sunday including five people who collapsed while shovelling snow.

Earlier:

'Polar freeze' extends to eastern United States, at least 9 dead

Polar_freeze_copyNew York/Milwaukee, Jan 8: 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.

At least nine deaths have been reported across the country connected with the polar air mass that swept over North America during the past few days. Authorities have put about half of the United States under a wind chill warning or cold weather advisory.

Temperatures were expected to be 25 degrees to 35 degrees Fahrenheit (14 to 19 degrees celcius) below normal from the Midwest to the Southeast, the National Weather Service said.

PJM Interconnection, the agency that oversees the electric grid supplying the mid-Atlantic and parts of the Midwest, said electricity suppliers were struggling to keep up with surging demand as the cold forced some power plants to shut.

"This particular cold is far-reaching, and most of our neighbors are experiencing the extreme conditions we are," said Michael Kormos, executive vice-president for operations at PJM Interconnection.

Oil refiners were also hit, with Marathon Petroleum Corp and Exxon Mobil Corp both experiencing cold-related outages.

In Oklahoma, a depleted supply of propane due to extreme weather led governor Mary Fallin to declare a state of emergency, waiving licensing requirements for out-of-state transportation companies to allow them to bring in propane.

Homeless shelters and public buildings took in people who were freezing outside.

Daniel Dashner, a 33-year-old homeless man who typically sleeps under a bridge on Milwaukee's south side, said he opted to seek a spot at a shelter on Monday night.

"Usually if I have four or five blankets, I can stay pretty warm, but when that wind is blowing, I don't care how many blankets I have, the wind blows right through me," he said, as temperatures dropped to minus 6 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 21 degrees celcius).

The extreme cold won't last much longer, according to AccuWeather.com. The frigid air and " polar vortex" that affected about 240 million people in the United States and southern Canada will depart during the second half of this week, and a far-reaching January thaw will begin, according to AccuWeather.com.

Cold's broad reach

Major US cities were in the grip of temperatures well below freezing, with Chicago seeing 2 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 17 C), Detroit 0 F (minus 18 C), Pittsburgh 5 F (minus 15 C), Washington 19 (minus 7 C) and Boston 15 F (minus 9 C).

New York's Central Park recorded the lowest temperature for the date, 4 Fahrenheit (minus 16 C), rising to 9 F (minus 13 C) on Tuesday afternoon with wind chills making it feel much colder, meteorologists said.

At New York's Bowery Mission homeless shelter, the 80-bed dormitory was full on Monday night and 179 other people slept in the chapel and cafeteria, officials said.

Schools in Minneapolis and Chicago were closed for a second day on Tuesday, although Chicago plans to reopen schools on Wednesday. Cleveland remained below freezing after temperatures fell to minus 11 F (minus 24 C) on Monday, breaking a 130-year-old record.

Impassable snow and ice halted three Chicago-bound Amtrak trains on Monday, stranding more than 500 passengers overnight in northwestern Illinois.

In the normally mild south, Atlanta recorded its coldest weather on this date in 44 years, as the temperature dropped to 6 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 14 degrees celcius), while temperatures in northern Florida also briefly dropped below freezing, though the state's citrus crop was unharmed, according to a major growers' group.

Among the deaths reported was a 51-year-old homeless man in Columbus, Georgia, whose body was found in an empty lot after spending the night outdoors.

Two men died in Westerport, Massachusetts, while duck hunting on Tuesday when their boat capsized, dropping them into a frigid river, officials said. A third man was rescued.

A large avalanche in backcountry outside the Colorado ski resort area of Vail killed one person on Tuesday and caught up three others who survived and were being rescued, officials said. Avalanche danger in the area was rated as "considerable" due to high winds and recent heavy snows, said Spencer Logan, forecaster with the Colorado Avalanche Information Center.

Four cold and storm-related deaths were reported around Chicago and an elderly woman was found dead outside her Indianapolis home early Monday.

Airlines struggle

The cold snap could cost the US economy up to $5 billion, when lost productivity and lost retail sales are accounted for, estimated Evan Gold, senior vice-president at Planalytics, which tracks weather for businesses. He said about 200 million people in major cities might face "bill shock" for heating.

The deep freeze disrupted commutes on Tuesday, with icy or closed roads and flight delays. Some 2,380 US flights were canceled and 2,912 delayed, according to FlightAware.com, which tracks airline activity. Airlines scrambled to catch up a day after the cold froze fuel supplies, leading to flight cancellations, many at Chicago O'Hare International Airport.

Hardest hit were travelers who had booked trips on JetBlue Airways Corp, which on Monday halted its flights at New York's three major airports and Boston Logan International Airport overnight. Flights had resumed by midday on Tuesday.

Tuesday proved too cold even for some polar bears. At Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago, a 14-year-old female polar bear named Anana mostly remained in her indoor enclosure, where temperatures are 40 F (4 C), said zoo spokeswoman Sharon Dewar.

She said that in their native environment, polar bears build up a layer of fat to help them through the Arctic winter of long periods of sub-zero temperatures. In Chicago, however, she said "we don't create that fat layer in zoo animals because that would normally not be something they would be comfortable with."

Earlier:

'Polar freeze' grips United States, disrupts travel, business

Polar_freezeChicago/Cleveland, Jan 7: A blast of Arctic air gripped the vast middle of the United States on Monday, bringing the coldest temperatures felt in two decades, causing at least four deaths, forcing businesses and schools to close and canceling thousands of flights.

Shelters for the homeless were overflowing and the weather threatened to briefly curtail some oil production in the severe cold described by some meteorologists as the " polar vortex" and dubbed by media as the "polar pig".

Temperatures were 20 to 40 degrees F (11-22 degrees C) below average in parts of Montana, North and South Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan and Nebraska, according to the National Weather Service.

More than half the flights at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport were closed as fuel supplies froze, leaving crews unable to fill aircraft tanks. The afternoon temperature in Chicago was minus 12 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 24 degrees C), making it colder than in areas of Antarctica, parts of which hovered around 32 F (0 C) during the southern hemisphere summer.

The Arctic air was moving toward the east coast where temperatures were expected to fall throughout Monday as low as 0 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 18 degrees celsius) in some areas on Tuesday. The coldest temperatures in years and gusty winds were expected as far south as Brownsville, Texas and central Florida, the National Weather Service said.

The northeast saw unseasonably mild weather and rain, but authorities warned travelers to expect icy roads and sidewalks on Tuesday.

At least four weather-related deaths were reported. In northwest Missouri, a one-year-old boy died Monday when the vehicle he was riding in crashed into a snow plow on an icy highway, according to the Missouri State Highway Patrol.

In Indianapolis, firefighters found the body of an elderly woman outside her home early on Monday.

"It appeared she had been there for a while," said Captain Michael Pruitt of the Wayne Township fire department.

A 58-year-old man died on Sunday in northeastern Oklahoma after he lost control of his car on icy roads, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol said. In Chicago, a 48-year-old man died of a heart attack while shoveling snow on Sunday night.

In oil fields from Texas to North Dakota and Canada, the severe cold threatened to disrupt traffic, strand wells and interrupt drilling and fracking operations.

It also disrupted grain and livestock shipments throughout the farm belt, curbed meat production at several packing plants and threatened to damage the dormant wheat crop.

Life-threatening wind chills

In Cleveland, Ohio, where the temperature was minus 3 degrees F (minus 19 degrees C) and was forecast to drop to minus 6 degrees F (minus 21 degrees C) overnight, homeless shelters were operating at full capacity. Shelter operators had begun to open overflow facilities to accommodate more than 2,000 people who had come seeking warmth.

"There are also going to be people that won't go into the shelters," said Brian Davis, an organizer with Northeast Ohio Coalition for the Homeless. Frostbite can set in within minutes in such low temperatures, according to experts.

The National Weather Service issued warnings for life-threatening wind chills in western and central North Dakota, with temperatures as low as minus 60 F (minus 51 C).

The US cold snap mirrored or outdid freezing weather in parts of the world as Almaty, Kazakhstan where it was minus 8 degrees F (minus 22 C), Mongolia, where temperatures reached minus 10 degrees F (minus 23 C) and Irkutsk, in Siberia, where it was minus 27 degrees F (minus 33 C).

Travel snarled

Some 4,392 flights were canceled and 3,577 delayed, according to FlightAware.com, which tracks airline activity.

Many airlines could not allow their ground crews to remain outdoors for more than 15 minutes at a time. There were hundreds of cancellations by airlines including United, Southwest , and American.

"The fuel and glycol supplies are frozen at (Chicago O'Hare) and other airports in the midwest and northeast," said Andrea Huguely, a spokeswoman for American Airlines Group. "We are unable to pump fuel and or de-ice."

After five days of scrambling to catch up from storm delays, JetBlue said it would halt operations at three airports in the New York area and Boston Logan International Airport from 5pm EST (2200 GMT) Monday until 10am EST (1500 GMT) on Tuesday to give crews time to rest.

The bitter cold combined with blowing snow was complicating rail traffic as well. Union Pacific, one of the largest railroads and a chief mover of grains, chemicals, coal and automotive parts, warned customers on Monday that the weather was causing delays up to 48 hours across Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri and Wisconsin.

Following last week's storm that dumped up to two feet (60cm) of snow on parts of New England, some shoppers opted for the comforts of home rather than venturing out to shop.

Many people did not have the luxury of staying home.

In the western Chicago suburb of Geneva, Beth Anderson, 38, was shoveling the remains of Sunday's snow from her driveway before sunrise on Monday while warming up her pickup truck for the short drive to her job at a mall.

"I just wish I could get the day off too but it would take more than a bit of weather to close down the mall where I work," she said.

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News Network
May 12,2020

London, May 12: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has warned that a mass vaccine for the novel coronavirus may be over a year away and, in the worst-case scenario, may in fact never be found.

In his foreword to the government’s new 50-page guidance on a step by step easing of the lockdown measures in place to control the spread of the deadly virus, the UK prime minister lays out plans for businesses to gradually start reopening with “COVID-19 Secure” measures of social distancing and for the public to use “good solid British common sense” as the economy is unlocked.

“A mass vaccine or treatment may be more than a year away,” said Johnson, highlighting the work being done in the UK by scientists at Oxford University and Imperial College London towards this mission.

“Indeed, in a worst-case scenario, we may never find a vaccine. So our plan must countenance a situation where we are in this, together, for the long haul, even while doing all we can to avoid that outcome,” he said.

Admitting that a vaccine or drug-based treatment is the only “feasible long-term solution”, he said the UK has accelerated this with “promising” vaccine development programmes and a collaboration between Oxford University and pharma major AstraZeneca was a vital step that could help rapidly advance the manufacture of a Covid-19 vaccine when it is ready.

As part of global efforts, he flagged the GBP 388 million in aid funding for research into vaccines, tests and treatment, including GBP 250m to the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations.

“But while we hope for a breakthrough, hope is not a plan,” he said, as he unveiled his plan for starting to lift lockdown restrictions from this week in phases.

Following a televised address to the nation on Sunday night and a statement in Parliament on Monday, the guidance comes into effect in public life across England from Wednesday when people will be allowed one-to-one contact with people other than those they live with, as long as they remain outside and two metres apart.

They are allowed to play sport with a friend or family member from outside their household or socialise with them in the open air for the first time in more than six weeks since the lockdown was imposed.

People are still advised to work from home where possible but start heading into work where necessary, in sectors such as construction and manufacturing, keeping the social distancing norms in place.

Under the step by step plan, by the start of next month non-essential shops will also reopen, with some hairdressers, pubs and cinemas to follow from July. However, as part of a Covid-19 Alert System, if infection rates are seen to be rising again, restrictions would be tightened “possibly at short notice”.

Fines for breaching the new rules will also be increased to GBP 100 and will double for each repeat offence, up to a maximum of GBP 3,200.

Johnson said: "I must ask the country to be patient with a continued disruption to our normal way of life, but to be relentless in pursuing our mission to build the systems we need. The worst possible outcome would be a return to the virus being out of control – with the cost to human life, and – through the inevitable re-imposition of severe restrictions – the cost to the economy. We must stay alert, control the virus, and in doing so, save lives.

“Then, as vaccines and treatment become available, we will move to another new phase, where we will learn to live with Covid-19 for the longer term without it dominating our lives.”

The devolved administrations of Scotland and Wales are putting their own measures in place and keeping the “stay at home” message in place, rather than switch to the new “stay alert” message.

The UK government’s latest messaging has come under attack from the Opposition and other sections of society over a feared lack of clarity for the general public.

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News Network
February 1,2020

Washington, Feb 1: The Indian economy experienced some abrupt slowdown in 2019 due to turbulence in non-banking financial institutions and major reform measures such as GST and demonetisation, but it is not in a recession, IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva has said.

"The Indian economy indeed has experienced an abrupt slowdown in 2019. We had to revise our growth projections, downwards to four percent for last year. We are expecting 5.8 per cent (growth rate) in 2020 and then an upward trajectory to 6.5 percent in 2021," Georgieva told a group of foreign journalists here on Friday.

"It appears that the main reason for this slowdown was the non-banking financial institutions experiencing a turbulence," she said on the eve of Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presenting the annual budget in Parliament on Saturday.

She said India had undertaken some important reforms that over the longer term would be beneficial for the country, but they do have some short-term impact.

"For example, coming with the unified tax system, and the demonetisation that took place. These are steps that over time are beneficial, but of course they might, might be somewhat disruptive over short term," Georgieva said in response to a question.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) Managing Director said that there is not a lot of fiscal space in India. “But we also recognise that the policies of the government on that side, on the fiscal side have been prudent. We will see how the reading of the budget, the submission of the budget goes, tomorrow,” she said.

In the medium-term, she said, the IMF remains optimistic about India. “This is why we see that upswing potential for the growth in the country,” she said.

Georgieva said that the current economic slowdown cannot be described as a recession. "No.... You're far from that. But it is a significant slowdown, not the recession," she said.

The IMF managing Director noted that the consumption in India also slowed down and that contributed to the overall slowdown in the economy. The IMF would be keen to see what India does to get relatively sound macroeconomic fundamentals to pay off in terms of better growth trajectory, she said ahead of the budget.

One thing that is important for India is that budgetary revenue have been below target. "The country knows that. The finance minister knows it. They need to increase budgetary revenue collection so they can improve their fiscal position. I said it's tight on the spending side, but I also want to stress that there is room to improve collection on the revenue side," she said.

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News Network
June 19,2020

United Nations, Jun 19: Half of the world's children -- one billion every year -- are affected by physical, sexual or psychological violence, suffering injuries and death because countries have failed to follow established strategies to protect them, the first report of its kind from the UN has said, with experts noting that the coronavirus-related lockdowns have left far too many youngsters stuck with their abusers.

While nearly all countries (88 per cent) have laws in place to protect minors, less than half (47 per cent) say they strongly enforce them, said the Global Status Report on Preventing Violence Against Children 2020 launched on Thursday.

Because countries have failed to follow established strategies to protect children, about one billion are affected each year by physical, sexual or psychological violence, it said.

"There is never any excuse for violence against children," WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.

"We have evidence-based tools to prevent it, which we urge all countries to implement. Protecting the health and well-being of children is central to protecting our collective health and well-being, now and for the future," he said.

The report -- launched by the World Health Organisation, the UNICEF, the UNESCO, the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General on Violence against Children and the End Violence Partnership -- charted progress in 155 countries against the "INSPIRE" framework, a set of seven strategies for preventing and responding to violence against children.

The report signaled a clear need in all countries to scale up efforts to implement them. It included the first ever global homicide estimates specifically for children under 18 years of age -- previous estimates were based on data that included 18 to 19-year olds.

According to the findings, in 2017, around 40,000 children were victims of homicide.

"Violence against children has always been pervasive, and now things could be getting much worse," UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore said.

"Lockdowns, school closures and movement restrictions have left far too many children stuck with their abusers, without the safe space that school would normally offer. It is urgent to scale up efforts to protect children during these times and beyond, including by designating social service workers as essential and strengthening child helplines," she said.

UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay said during the COVID-19 pandemic, and the related school closures, "we have seen a rise in violence and hate online – and this includes bullying".

"Now, as schools begin to re-open, children are expressing their fears about going back to school. It is our collective responsibility to ensure that schools are safe environments for all children. We need to think and act collectively to stop violence at school and in our societies at large," Azoulay said.

Stay-at-home measures including school closures have limited the usual sources of support for families and individuals such as friends, extended family or professionals.

This further erodes victims’ ability to successfully cope with crises and the new routines of daily life. Spikes in calls to helplines for child abuse and intimate partner violence have been observed, the report said.

While online communities have become central to maintain many children's learning, support and play, an increase in harmful online behaviors including cyberbullying, risky online behavior and sexual exploitation have been identified.

“Whilst this report was being finalised, confinement measures and the disrupted provision of already limited child protection services exacerbated the vulnerability of children to various forms of violence," said Najat Maalla M’jid, Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General on Violence against Children.

Of the INSPIRE strategies, only access to schools through enrolment showed the most progress with 54 per cent of the countries reporting that a sufficient number of children in need were being reached in this way.

Between 32 per cent and 37 per cent of the countries considered that victims of violence could access support services, while 26 per cent of the countries provided programmes on parent and caregiver support; 21 per cent of the countries had programmes to change harmful norms; and 15 per cent of the countries had modifications to provide safe physical environments for children, the report said.

Although a majority of countries (83 per cent) have national data on violence against children, only 21 per cent used these to set baselines and national targets to prevent and respond to violence against children, it added.

The report said about 80 per cent of countries have national plans of action and policies but only one-fifth have plans that are fully funded or have measurable targets. A lack of funding combined with inadequate professional capacity are likely contributing factors and a reason why implementation has been slow.

"Ending violence against children is the right thing to do, a smart investment to make - and it's possible. We can and must create a world where every child can thrive," Howard Taylor of the End Violence Partnership said.

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