{"id":77135,"date":"2025-12-09T13:07:32","date_gmt":"2025-12-09T07:37:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=77135"},"modified":"2025-12-09T15:57:01","modified_gmt":"2025-12-09T10:27:01","slug":"sudden-stratospheric-warming-event","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/sudden-stratospheric-warming-event\/","title":{"rendered":"Sudden Stratospheric Warming Event"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><b>Sudden Stratospheric Warming Event Latest News<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Recently, a meteorologist warned of another Sudden Stratospheric Warming (SSW) event that could plunge temperatures below average across parts of the U.S. later this month.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>About Sudden Stratospheric Warming Event<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It refers to a <\/span><b>rapid rise in stratospheric temperatures<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> that weakens or distorts <\/span><b>the <a href=\"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/polar-vortex\/\" target=\"_blank\">polar vortex<\/a> <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(a cold-air mass typically stabilized over the Arctic).<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><b>Occurrence of the Event<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It begins with <\/span><b>large-scale atmosphere waves<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (called Rossby waves) getting pushed <\/span><b>higher into the atmosphere.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">These waves can \u201cbreak\u201d (like waves in the ocean) on top of the polar vortex and weaken it. If waves are strong enough, the <\/span><b>winds of the polar vortex<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> can weaken so much that they can reverse <\/span><b>from being westerly to easterly.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This leads to cold air descending and warming rapidly.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It can lead to a <\/span><b>displacement or splitting of the polar vortex<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, so instead of cold air being locked above the polar region, it can push further south into the mid-latitudes.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3><b>What is the Polar Vortex?<\/b><\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is a large area of <\/span><b>low pressure and cold air<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> surrounding both of the Earth\u2019s poles.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It extends <\/span><b>from the tropopause<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (the dividing line between the stratosphere and troposphere) through the stratosphere and <\/span><b>into the mesosphere<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (above 50 km).<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It <\/span><b>always exists near the poles,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> but weakens in summer and strengthens in winter.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Many times, during winter in the northern hemisphere, the polar vortex will expand, sending cold air southward with the jet stream.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Jet streams are relatively narrow bands of strong wind in the upper levels of the atmosphere, typically occurring around 30,000 feet (9,100 meters) in elevation.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This occurs fairly regularly during wintertime and is often associated with large outbreaks of Arctic air in the United States.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is not confined to the United States. <\/span><b>Portions of Europe and Asia<\/b> <b>also experience<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> cold surges connected to the polar vortex.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0<\/span><b>Source:<\/b> <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.newsweek.com\/sudden-weather-phenomenon-could-hit-us-this-month-11158183\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Newsweek<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sudden Stratospheric Warming event to a rapid rise in stratospheric temperatures that weakens or distorts the polar vortex (a cold-air mass typically stabilized over the Arctic). Read more about Sudden Stratospheric Warming Event, Occurrence, Latest News.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":77131,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[21,4103,22,23],"class_list":{"0":"post-77135","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"tag-prelims-pointers","9":"tag-sudden-stratospheric-warming-event","10":"tag-upsc-current-affairs","11":"tag-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","12":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77135\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77131"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}