Bad weather and strong winds in the northeast United States killed a baby in Southwick, Massachusetts, after a tree crushed a vehicle and its passengers, authorities said.
This happened while that part of the country experienced dangerous low temperature records this weekend.
On Sunday, however, they turned around and rose to 40 degrees in less than a day.
The accident happened on Friday in the western state of Massachusetts, when a tree fell and crushed a vehicle in the city of Southwick.
The 23-year-old driver suffered serious injuries and the baby, who was her nephew, was killed on impact, the Hampden County District Attorney's office said in a statement.
[Cryosisms or icestorms: the strange phenomenon that threatens thousands of Americans]
In places like New Hampshire, a wind chill, which is the combined effect of wind and cold air on the skin, was reported on Saturday
at -108 Fahrenheit, the lowest ever recorded in the United States,
the Reuters news agency reported.
At the top of Mount Washington, situated on the top of the highest mountain in the Northeast, the temperature reached minus 47 Fahrenheit with winds of 100 miles per hour, according to the Mount Washington Observatory.
A passenger ferry passes Spring Point Ledge Light, Maine, on Saturday, Feb. 4, 2023. The temperature was about -10 degrees Fahrenheit. Robert F. Bukaty / AP
In other cities such as Boston
(Massachusetts)
and Providence (Rhode Island) historical records of more than a century ago were broken
when the temperature reached -10 and -9 degrees Fahrenheit this Saturday, the National Weather Service said.
Boston had closed its schools as a precaution against the cold.
More than 140 million people were exposed to the risky conditions.
More than 142 million people will be exposed to freezing temperatures.
This is the cause of extreme cold
Feb 3, 202302:35
“This is the worst cold I can remember
, and I worked outside many nightclubs for 15 years,” Paul Butler, 45, a homeless ex-Marine who sought shelter in the area, told The Associated Press (AP). South Station transportation hub in Massachusetts.
The drop in temperatures was caused by arctic air combined with rapid cyclogenesis, which is the intensification of a cyclone or low-pressure storm system, Donald Dumont, an expert with the National Weather Service (NWS) said Friday. its acronym in English).
The NWS office in the city of Caribou, Maine, indicated that it received reports of "freeze tremors," also known as icequakes or cryosisms, which are movements that resemble earthquakes and originate when the ground suddenly cracks from the cold.
Some trees split due to sap freezing inside the trunks.
[A Dangerous Combination of Arctic Wind and Low Temperatures in the Northeast US]
Cities in the affected areas took emergency measures such as setting up shelter sites for the homeless.
They also urged people not to leave their homes warning of the danger of frostbite and hypothermia.
“The goal last night was just to keep people alive and safe
,” said Barbara Trevisan, a spokeswoman for the Pine Street Inn, New England's largest provider of homeless services.
A woman carries her dog in the cold, Saturday, Feb. 4, 2023, in Portland, Maine. Robert F. Bukaty / AP
an extreme jump
Conditions were not forecast to persist for long.
This Sunday, for example, temperatures in Boston would rise to 47 degrees Fahrenheit, according to the NWS,
an equally extreme 40 degree change.
“There are a few more hours of arctic temperatures left,” the NWS announced Saturday, predicting that the area would begin to warm by midnight.
“
Most of it will be back above freezing by morning
, going as high as 20 degrees north of the mountains and as high as 40 degrees south tomorrow afternoon.”
This Sunday the authorities confirmed that in "areas with single-digit temperatures, and even below zero, today there are already places in the 40s."
However, the population was advised to be cautious and avoid venturing outside, as the ice may be thawing and cause slips and falls and other accidents.
