German Health Minister Jens Spahn said Wednesday the so-called British variant of COVID-19 is spreading quickly in his country, now accounting for more than 20 percent of all tested cases, and nearly four times the rate of two weeks earlier. Speaking to reporters in Berlin, Spahn said that rate of spread indicates the variant virus strain, first identified in Britain, roughly doubles each week, as has been seen in other countries where it has been found. He said he expects it will soon become the dominant strain found in Germany. FILE – German Health Minister Jens Spahn speaks at the lower house of parliament Bundestag on the start of the coronavirus vaccinations, in Berlin, Germany, Jan. 13, 2021.Spahn said the good news is that overall, the number of new infections is decreasing, a sign that preventive measures, including the current lockdown, are working. He said German health officials will have to be exceptionally careful regarding the British strain when the country starts to ease restrictions. 
 
Spahn said he expects Germany’s vaccination program to “significantly pick up speed” in the next several days. He said vaccination centers are becoming more efficient, and by the end of next week, they should have delivered 10 million additional doses.The health minister urged all those whose turn it is to receive the vaccine do so as soon as possible, so the largest number of people can be protected. He also sought to reassure those reluctant to get vaccinated because of safety concerns.”If a vaccine is approved by the European Union following a rigorous approval process, then it is safe and effective,” he said. Spahn said those who wait also make the situation worse for everyone.”Reason dictates that people should get vaccinated in a pandemic and those who wait risk a serious illness and spreading the virus,” he said. 
 
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A historic winter storm and frigid temperatures that have gripped at least half the United States has left more than 2.5 million Texans without power. Snow and record cold continued Wednesday in the southwestern state where temperatures are forecast to remain at or below freezing. The unusual winter weather created a huge demand for electricity that caused the state’s independently-run power system to fail, exposing issues with its structure.  In an interview, Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo — whose county includes the city of Houston — said some of the outages are caused directly by the weather, and many of those problems are being repaired.  Customers, whose homes are without electric power, wait in line to purchase food and snacks at a gas station in Pflugerville, Texas, Feb. 16, 2021. (Ricardo B. Brazziell/via Reuters)But she said much of what the state is dealing with is a “man-made disaster” stemming from how the electricity grid is managed by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT). She said residents statewide deserve answers. ERCOT President Bill Magness said the system tried to prepare for the storm, but as conditions worsened Monday into Tuesday, several power plants went offline.  Some politicians in the oil- and natural-gas-producing state blamed the problems on green energy sources, saying iced wind turbines were the cause. Magness said some turbines were frozen, but he said twice as much power was wiped out at natural gas and coal plants. He said forcing controlled outages was the only way to avert an even more dire blackout in Texas. As of Wednesday, Magness said ERCOT could not offer a firm timetable for when power might be fully restored. Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott called for an investigation of the agency.  Cold and wintry weather is forecast to continue for at least the next few days in Texas and much of the eastern half of the United States. 
 
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Japan began its long-awaited coronavirus vaccination program Wednesday. The first shots took place at a Tokyo hospital just hours after the hospital received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.  As many as 40,000 doctors and nurses across the nation will receive the first doses of the vaccine, with the eventual goal of inoculating a total of 3.7 million medical personnel by March, followed by about 36 million citizens 65 years of age and older.   Japan’s vaccination program is off to a slow start, with health authorities only formally approving use of the two-dose Pfizer-BioNTech drug on Sunday. Officials asked Pfizer to carry out further tests on the vaccine in addition to earlier tests that had been conducted in several other countries. Taro Kono, the country’s vaccine minister, told reporters Tuesday the additional testing was conducted to reassure the Japanese people of its safety.  Vaccinations are not compulsory in Japan, and while Kono voiced confidence he could reach front-line workers and elderly people, he acknowledged he needed to formulate a plan for successfully reaching younger people and encourage them to get the shot.A medical worker fills a syringe with a dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccine as Japan launches its inoculation campaign, at Tokyo Medical Center in Tokyo, Feb. 17, 2021.Along with Pfizer-BioNTech, Japan has also signed contracts to procure millions of doses of the vaccine from AstraZeneca and Moderna, enough in all for 157 million people. The country is hoping to get enough people vaccinated in time for the postponed Tokyo Summer Olympic Games, which are scheduled to begin in July. Japan is the last member of the Group of Seven (G7) industrialized nations to begin the shots.  Meanwhile, about 80,000 doses of the new COVID-19 vaccine developed by U.S. drugmaker Johnson & Johnson arrived in Johannesburg, South Africa, late Tuesday night. The government will begin administering the Johnson & Johnson vaccine to health care workers later this week as part of an observational study. A total of 500,000 doses are expected to be shipped to South Africa within the next few weeks, along with another 20 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. South Africa had purchased 1 million doses of the two-shot vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University, but abandoned plans to use the drug after a study revealed that the vaccine was less effective against a variant of the coronavirus found in the country. Health Minister Zweli Mkhize told parliament Wednesday that South Africa will share the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine with the African Union, which will distribute it throughout the continent.   The single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine has not been formally approved for use by any country, but the company says results of a late-stage clinical trial shows it is 85% effective in preventing serious illness or death from COVID-19, even against the South African variant. In the United States, President Joe Biden said Tuesday night the country will have more than 600 million doses of coronavirus vaccines, enough to inoculate “every single American” by the end of this July.  Biden made the pledge during a question-and-answer session in Milwaukee, Wisconsin that was televised on cable news network CNN.  When asked by moderator Anderson Cooper when the United States will return to normal, Biden said by next Christmas “we’ll be in a very different circumstance, God willing, than we are in today.”  The White House announced earlier Tuesday that the federal government will increase the amount of COVID-19 vaccines that states receive each week from 11 million doses to 13.5 million doses. The president also said that states should prioritize public school teachers in their vaccination efforts as part of a strategy to reopen schools to full-time in-person classes.   
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It’s as if the world has been turned upside-down, or at least its weather. You can blame the increasingly familiar polar vortex, which has brought a taste of the Arctic to places where winter often requires no more than a jacket. Around the North Pole, winter’s ultra-cold air is usually kept bottled up 15 to 30 miles high. That’s the polar vortex, which spins like a whirling top at the top of the planet. But occasionally something slams against the top, sending the cold air escaping from its Arctic home and heading south. It’s been happening more often, and scientists are still not completely sure why, but they suggest it’s a mix of natural random weather and human-caused climate change. This particular polar vortex breakdown has been a whopper. Meteorologists call it one of the biggest, nastiest and longest-lasting ones they’ve seen, and they’ve been watching since at least the 1950 s. This week’s weather is part of a pattern stretching back to January. “It’s been a major breakdown,” said Jennifer Francis, a climate scientist at the Woodwell Climate Research Center on Cape Cod. “It really is the cause of all of these crazy weather events in the Northern Hemisphere.” “It’s been unusual for a few weeks now — very, very crazy,” Francis said. “Totally topsy-turvy.” Record cold in warmer placesRecord subzero temperatures in Texas and Oklahoma knocked millions off the power grid and into deep freezes. A deadly tornado hit North Carolina. Other parts of the South saw thunder snow and reports of something that seemed like a snow tornado but wasn’t. Snow fell hard not just in Chicago, but in Greece and Turkey, where it’s far less normal. Record cold also hit Europe this winter, earning the name the “Beast from the East.” “We’ve had everything you could possibly think of in the past week,” said Northern Illinois University meteorology professor Victor Gensini, noting that parts of the U.S. have been 50 degrees (28 degrees Celsius) colder than normal. “It’s been a wild ride.”A man walks at Filopapos hill as snow falls, with the ancient Acropolis hill and the Parthenon temple, in background, Athens, on Feb. 16, 2021.It was warmer Tuesday in parts of Greenland, Alaska, Norway and Sweden than in Texas and Oklahoma. And somehow people in South Florida have been complaining about record warmth that is causing plants to bloom early. In the eastern Greenland town of Tasiilaq, it’s been about 18 degrees (10 degrees Celsius) warmer than normal, which “is a bit of a nuisance,” said Lars Rasmussen, a museum curator at the local cultural center. “The warm weather makes dog sledding and driving on snow scooters a bit of a hassle.” Several meteorologists squarely blamed the polar vortex breakdown or disruption. These used to happen once every other year or so, but research shows they are now close to happening yearly, if not more, said Judah Cohen, a winter storm expert for Atmospheric Environmental Research, a commercial firm outside of Boston. The spinning top gets toppledThe polar vortex spends winter in its normal place until an atmospheric wave — the type that brings weather patterns here and there — slams into it. Normally such waves don’t do much to the strong vortex, but occasionally the wave has enough energy to push the spinning top over, and that’s when the frigid air breaks loose, Gensini said. Sometimes, the cold air mass splits into chunks — an event that usually is connected to big snowstorms in the U.S. East, like a few weeks ago. Other times, it just moves to a new place, which often means bitter cold in parts of Europe. This time it did both, Cohen said. There was a split of the vortex in early January and another in mid-January. Then at the end of January came the displacement that caused cold air to spill into Europe and much of the United States, Cohen said. Both Cohen and Francis said this should be considered not one but three polar vortex disruptions, though some scientists lump it all together.  While both the vortex and the wave that bumped it are natural, and polar vortex breakdowns happen naturally, there is likely an element of climate change at work, but it is not a sure thing that science agrees on, Cohen, Gensini and Francis said. Warming in the Arctic, with shrinking sea ice, is goosing the atmospheric wave in two places, giving it more energy when it strikes the polar vortex, making it more likely to disrupt the vortex, Cohen said. “There is evidence that climate change can weaken the polar vortex, which allows more chances for frigid Arctic air to ooze into the Lower 48,” said University of Georgia meteorology professor Marshall Shepherd. Pattern has been observed for decadesThere were strong polar vortex disruptions and cold outbreaks like this in the 1980s, Cohen said. “I think it’s historic and generational,” Cohen said. “I don’t think it’s unprecedented. This Arctic outbreak has to be thought of in context. The globe is much warmer than it used to be.” It also feels colder because just before the outbreak, much of the United States was experiencing a milder-than-normal winter, with the ground not even frozen on Christmas Day in Chicago, Gensini said. The globe as a whole is about the same temperature as the average was from 1979 to 2000 for this time of year, according to the University of Maine’s Climate Reanalyzer. That’s still warmer than the 20th-century average, and scientists don’t think that this month has much of a chance to be colder than the 20th century average for the globe, something that hasn’t happened since the early 1980s. One reason is that it will soon warm back up to normal when the polar vortex returns to its regular home, Cohen said. As for people thinking this cold outbreak disproves global warming, scientists say that’s definitely not so. Even with climate change, “we’ll still have winter,” said North Carolina state climatologist Kathie Dello. “What we’re seeing here is we’re pretty unprepared for almost every type of extreme weather. It’s pretty sad.” 
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Sixty-six million years ago, a huge celestial object struck off the coast of what is now Mexico, triggering a catastrophic “impact winter” that eventually wiped out three-quarters of life on Earth, including the dinosaurs. A pair of astronomers at Harvard say they have now resolved long-standing mysteries surrounding the nature and origin of the “Chicxulub impactor.”  Their analysis suggests it was a comet that originated in a region of icy debris on the edge of the solar system, that Jupiter was responsible for it crashing into our planet, and that we can expect similar impacts every 250 million to 750 million years. The duo’s paper, published in the journal Scientific Reports this week, pushes back against an older theory that claims the object was a fragment of an asteroid that came from our solar system’s Main Belt. “Jupiter is so important because it’s the most massive planet in our solar system,” lead author Amir Siraj told AFP. Jupiter ends up acting as a kind of “pinball machine” that “kicks these incoming long-period comets into orbits that bring them very close to the sun.” So-called “long-period comets” come from the Oort cloud, thought to be a giant spherical shell surrounding the solar system like a bubble that is made of icy pieces of debris the size of mountains or larger.  The long-period comets take about 200 years to orbit the sun and are also called sungrazers because of how close they pass. Because they come from the deep freeze of the outer solar system, comets are icier than asteroids, and are known for the stunning gas and dust trails that they produce as they melt. But, said Siraj, the evaporative impact of the sun’s heat on sungrazers is nothing compared to the massive tidal forces they experience when one side faces our star. “As a result, these comets experience such a large tidal force that the most massive of them would shatter into about a thousand fragments, each of those fragments large enough to produce a Chicxulub-size impactor, or dinosaur-killing event on Earth.” Siraj and co-author Avi Loeb, a professor of science, developed a statistical model that showed the probability that long-period comets would hit Earth that is consistent with the age of Chicxulub and other known impactors. The previous theory about the object being an asteroid produces an expected rate of such events that was off by a factor of about 10 compared to what has been observed, Loeb told AFP. ‘A beautiful sight’  Another line of evidence in favor of the comet origin is the composition of Chicxulub — only about a tenth of all asteroids from the Main Belt, which lies between Mars and Jupiter, are made up of carbonaceous chondrite, while most comets have it. Evidence suggests the Chicxulub crater and other similar craters, such as the Vredefort crater in South Africa that was struck about two billion years ago, and the million-year-old Zhamanshin crater in Kazakhstan, all had carbonaceous chondrite. The hypothesis can be tested by further studying these craters, ones on the moon, or even by sending out space probes to take samples from comets. “It must have been a beautiful sight to see this rock approaching 66 million years ago, that was larger than the length of Manhattan Island,” said Loeb, “though ideally, we’d like to learn to track such objects and devise ways to deflect them, if necessary.” Loeb added he was excited by the prospect of the Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile becoming operational next year. The telescope might be able to see tidal disruption of long-period comets “and will be extremely important in making forecasts for definitely the next 100 years, to know if anything bad could happen to us,” he said. Though Siraj and Loeb calculated Chicxulub-like impactors would occur once every few hundreds of millions of years, “it’s a statistical thing,” said Loeb. “You say ‘on average; It’s every so often,’ but you never know when the next one will come.”  “The best way to find out is to search the sky,” he concluded. 
 
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The European Space Agency (ESA) said Tuesday it is recruiting new astronauts for the first time since 2008 and encouraging women and people with disabilities to apply.The announcement Tuesday came in a virtual news briefing that included ESA Director General Jan Worner and current agency astronauts. Worner said while ESA still has astronauts from the last selection process, it needs new astronauts to “secure a continuity” and ensure a smooth transfer of knowledge from one class to another.Worner said the agency is looking to add up to 26 permanent and reserve astronauts. And it is strongly encouraging women to apply, as well as people with disabilities to its roster to boost diversity among crews. The agency has launched a “parastronaut” program designed to examine what is needed to get disabled astronauts onto the International Space Station.ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti said if technology can allow other humans to work and thrive in space, it can do so for the disabled as well. “When it comes to space travel, we are all disabled. You know, we all have a disability because we were just not meant to be up there. So, what brings us from being, you know, disabled, to go to space to being able to go to space is technology.”Requirements for an astronaut job at ESA include a master’s degree in natural sciences, engineering, mathematics or computer science and three years of post-graduate experience. But the agency says it is looking for “all-arounders,” not specialists.The application process begins March 31 with all details available on the ESA website. The period will run until May 28 of this year with the outcome expected to be announced in October 2022. 
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The World Health Organization and other aid agencies are moving quickly to try to gain control over a new outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus in Guinea. Guinea is one of three countries that was affected by the 2014 West African outbreak, the largest in history.The outbreak in Guinea was detected February 14, just one week after a new outbreak of Ebola was identified in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.  The two outbreaks are unrelated, but the World Health Organization says both face similar challenges and both can benefit from new treatments and recent experiences. The WHO reports seven family members who attended a burial ceremony in the town of Goueke, Guinea were infected with the virus and three have since died.  WHO spokeswoman Margaret Harris says 115 contacts have been identified and the majority have been traced. “We are confident with the experience and expertise built during the previous outbreak that the health team in Guinea are on the move to quickly trace the cause of the virus and curb further infections. But it certainly will be a big job. And WHO is supporting the Guinean authorities to set up testing, contact tracing, treatment structures and to bring the overall response to full speed,” said Harris.Harris says WHO offices in surrounding countries have been contacted and preparedness plans are being put in place. The 2014 West African Ebola outbreak began in Guinea and quickly spread to neighboring Sierra Leone and Liberia. By the time the epidemic ended in 2016, 28,000 people had been infected with the disease and more than 11,000 had died. Harris says many lessons have been learned from previous outbreaks to keep the virus from spreading. She says it is important to have a strategic response plan, get it into action early and to coordinate all aspects of the operation. “What is critical is decentralizing the operations to the lowest levels, making sure your operations are with the community now and that the community owns the operations — that your work is community centered and that you work with the community. A one size fits all approach to community engagement is not effective,” she said.Turning to the other Ebola outbreak, the World Health Organization has confirmed four cases, including two deaths in the city of Butembo in DRC’s North Kivu province. The WHO reports nearly 300 contacts have been identified and tracing is underway.  
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For the first time, wild camels have been sold on Australia’s leading online livestock auction. Australia has the world’s largest herd of feral camels that were introduced in the 1840s. Auctioneers in Australia weren’t sure if the group of 93 Arabian camels would sell online, but they all sold for as much as $230 each.  Most were bought to keep prickly weeds under control on farms, and there was interest from domestic meat traders. The animals had been rounded up, or mustered, by helicopter on a remote property in Queensland.  Scott Taylor is a selling agent who helped arrange the auction. He says it took two days for all the wild camels to be caught. “They came in, I think it was probably about 60 kilometers back to the yards. They were mustered in over a two-day period. Yeah, they just came straight in out of the bush and into the yards, and it is surprising how quickly they settled down once they get into captivity, for being a feral animal,” Taylor saidAlmost 100 animals were sold on AuctionsPlus, an online service that normally trades in cattle, sheep and goats.   It is estimated there are at least 300,000 feral camels in central Australia. They can often compete with livestock for scarce supplies of water. Thousands been killed by farmers. They have been declared agricultural pests by state authorities, including Western Australia. Wild herds are also considered to be a health and safety risk to isolated indigenous communities.  The animals were imported from South Asia and elsewhere in the mid-19th century. They were used in colonial Australia as transport, but when they were superseded by motor vehicles, many were released into the wild or escaped. They have, like other invasive species, adapted to Australia’s harsh conditions. Australia has had a long and disastrous record of importing animals that have become uncontrollable feral pests, including cats, foxes, pigs and cane toads.  
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Colombia is set to begin immunizations against COVID-19 after receiving its first shipment of vaccines on Monday. President Ivan Duque and his health minister accepted the first 50,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine and said frontline health care workers and the elderly will be the first to get their shots. Colombia has a contract to buy 10 million doses from Pfizer and it expects to soon receive 1.6 million doses from other laboratories. The government says it intends to vaccinate 35 million people this year, including hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan migrants and refugees. Colombia is one of the last countries in Latin America to start vaccinations, behind Ecuador, Panama and Chile. President Duque said his administration was hesitant to start immunizations until it had assurance of getting a steady supply of vaccine to battle the novel coronavirus.  The president also said the arrival of vaccines does not end the use of masks and social distancing. Colombia has more than 2,198,000 confirmed coronavirus cases and 57,786 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University Covid Resource Center.  
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College and university students are low on the list to receive COVID-19 vaccines, according to recent estimatesUnless students are classified as essential workers — such as medical, nursing, medtech or student teachers — or have a health condition — such as human immunodeficiency virus or cancer — they are not likely to receive the COVID-19 vaccine until at least April, Imani Bell, a senior at the University of Delaware. (Courtesy of Bell)“I hope that the rollout starts to pick up and that everyone has access,” said Bell. “It doesn’t make sense that we’ve been in this pandemic for a year and it’s still taking so long. It’s frustrating to me that there are [few] companies making the vaccine when it could go so much faster.” More Universities to Close After Thanksgiving Colleges tell students to stay on campus or go home, but not both While it would “be ideal,” Taylor said, to have campus-based vaccinations, vaccinating students near campuses would suffice.  “And I would hope that schools will do a good deal of advertising about where those locations are, make them convenient for students and also give a lot of information about the vaccine,” she said.  Taylor argues that vaccinating students before they leave campus and travel home would be a huge help to stopping the spread of the coronavirus by college students who routinely go between school and home into the community.  Colleges Closing Quickly as COVID-19 Cases Rise Thanksgiving will end the semester for more schools “We all, students included, still have to pay strict attention to wearing masks, physically distancing, avoiding crowds and washing hands, all of those public health measures that we have had in place throughout still need to be put in place,” she said.  There have been nearly 400,000 coronavirus cases on more than 1,900 college and university campuses since the start of the pandemic more than a year ago, according to the most recent tracking data from the New York Times. At least 90 students have died of coronavirus-related complications. Joshua Goodart, a 22-year-old student at University of New Haven in Connecticut, died from coronavirus on February 6, the Hartford Courant reported. While Goodart had asthma, he was not considered high-risk for COVID-19 complications.But some college students say they’re wary of coronavirus vaccinations. A study conducted at Eastern Connecticut State University of 592 graduate and undergraduate students showed that about half of students surveyed said they would get the vaccine, and half would not or remained uncertain. Institutions of higher education are debating whether to require students to be vaccinated before returning to school, raising legal questions. “Many colleges and universities can and do require that students be vaccinated against certain diseases,” such as human papillomavirus (HPV) and meningococcal disease, said Suzanne Rode, a counsel at Crowell & Moring, a law firm in San Francisco.  “The COVID-19 vaccines differ in that they have been authorized by the Food and Drug Administration under an Emergency Use Authorization, making the vaccines available sooner than they normally would due to the current public health emergency,” she explained. Other challenges for not getting the vaccine might include “valid medical, disability, and sincere religious reasons can serve as a basis for declining the vaccine,” said Rode. International students will be eligible for the vaccine as other students in their priority group, former Surgeon General Jerome Adams confirmed in December. Specific vaccination guidelines for those living, working and studying in the U.S. can be found on the government websites of the states where they reside. Some international students are deciding whether to receive the vaccine in the U.S. or in their home countries. Nogués plans to get his dose of the vaccine wherever it becomes available first. “From what I know, it is very likely that I will get it in the U.S. before I get it in Spain because the rollout in Spain has been slower than a lot of European countries,” Nogués said. Benjamin Ola. Akande, president of Champlain College in Vermont, says that college and university leaders have a duty to protect the health of international students on campus during this pandemic.“Coming to the college in the U.S. today is a life and death decision, and we need to recognize that,” said Akande, who came to study in the U.S. from Nigeria in 1979. “It’s a very conscious decision and therefore, there’s a responsibility on leaders of academies to ensure the safety and health care of students.” 
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The deaths of two Colorado men caught in avalanches and a third in Montana over the frigid Presidents Day weekend show how backcountry skiers and others in the Rocky Mountain wilderness risk triggering weak layers of snow that have created the most hazardous conditions in a decade, forecasters say. At least 25 people have been killed in avalanches in the United States this year — more than the 23 who died last winter. Typically, 27 people die in avalanches in the U.S. annually. Avalanche forecasters say they have rarely seen the danger as high as it is now — and it will grow as more snow moves into the Rockies, adding weight and stress on a weak, granular base layer of snow that’s susceptible to breaking apart and triggering especially wide slides on steep slopes. The main culprit is that ground layer of snow that dropped in October. A dry November weakened it, which is anywhere from several inches (centimeters) to several feet (meters) thick, and despite more snow falling, it’s stayed the consistency of granular sugar, said Dave Zinn, an avalanche forecaster for the Gallatin National Forest Avalanche Center in southwestern Montana. “That layer consists of large, sugary crystals that don’t bond together well. It’s impossible to make a snowball from it. And when it becomes weighted down, it becomes fragile and breaks,” bringing down the heavier layers on top of it, Zinn said. “It’s the weakest link in the chain. When you pile on more snow, there’s always one spot that’s going to break,” said Ethan Greene, director of the Colorado Avalanche Information Center.  This aerial photo provided by Gallatin National Forest Avalanche Center shows a ground team approaching the area of an avalanche in the Gallatin National Forest, Mont., Feb. 14, 2021.On Sunday, backcountry skier Craig Kitto, 45, of Bozeman, Montana, was fatally injured when the forest slope he and a companion were climbing cracked without warning, collapsed and swept him downhill into a tree. The other person wasn’t hurt. Similar conditions may have led to the death of 57-year-old David Heide, a backcountry skier whose body was found in an avalanche debris field Sunday in central Colorado’s Clear Creek County. In neighboring Grand County, an avalanche carried a snowmobiler onto a frozen lake Sunday, and his body was found buried in snow. A coroner is investigating. On February 6, Utah saw its deadliest avalanche in about 30 years when four backcountry skiers in their 20s died. Another four dug themselves out of the 1,000-foot (300-meter) slide east of Salt Lake City. Several factors are at play in the rash of deaths: The snowpack, which can be affected by windstorms shifting and piling snow atop weak layers; weather conditions that can change rapidly in the high altitudes of the Rockies; and the availability of public lands in the U.S. West, where people often take advantage of easily accessible national forest. In contrast, ski areas have long ensured their slopes are groomed, potential avalanches in their areas are triggered, and nearby backcountry areas are closed before the first customers hit the lift lines. It’s not uncommon for skiers at Colorado’s Loveland Ski Area to hear an occasional howitzer targeting danger-prone areas on wind-blown peaks approaching 13,000 feet (3,950 meters) along the Continental Divide. “The ski patrols do lots of work to mitigate hazards,” Zinn said. “But in the backcountry, we have to be our own avalanche experts.” Avalanche centers in Colorado, Montana and Utah, as well as the U.S. Forest Service National Avalanche Center, issue daily advisories on conditions and risk levels, as well as safety and training resources.  The Colorado Avalanche Information Center issued a special advisory Monday, warning that “large, wide and long-running natural and human-triggered avalanches are likely.” Are people getting the message? “That’s a hard one to answer,” Greene acknowledged Monday. “Yesterday was tragic, a horrible thing. We don’t know how many got the messages and pursued some other type of recreation. We don’t know how many made it out safely.” Taking precautionsForecasters emphasize standard precautions before heading into the backcountry: * Have rescue gear: A beacon, a probe to check snow conditions, a shovel. Know how to use them. * Check daily forecasts. * Keep an eye out for recent avalanche activity. * Take a guided tour. * Don’t go it alone if possible. Make sure only one person in your party is in exposed terrain at any given time. “The bottom line is that partner rescue is the only way we have positive outcomes in the backcountry,” Zinn said. Record cold temperatures in much of the Rockies “reduce your margin for error,” Zinn added. “If you have an accident, minor injuries become serious ones, and serious ones become deadly with the compounding factor of hypothermia.” Greene said that while there’s adventure in the wildest parts of public lands, “having the freedom to go where you want comes the responsibility of taking care of yourself.”  
 
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Much of the United States was in the icy grip of an “unprecedented” winter storm on Monday as frigid Arctic air sent temperatures plunging, forcing hundreds of flight cancellations, making driving hazardous and leaving millions without power in Texas.Texas Governor Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for the southern state, and the National Weather Service (NWS) said more than 150 million Americans were under winter weather advisories.”I urge all Texans to remain vigilant against the extremely harsh weather,” Abbott said in a statement.The NWS described conditions as an “unprecedented and expansive area of hazardous winter weather” from coast-to-coast.More than 2.7 million people were without power in Texas, according to PowerOutage.us, and temperatures in the major metropolis of Houston dipped to 16 degrees Fahrenheit (minus nine Celsius).President Joe Biden issued an emergency declaration for Texas on Sunday providing federal assistance to supplement state relief efforts.Texas is not used to such brutal winter weather and the storm caused havoc in parts of the state, including a 100-car pileup on Interstate 35 near Fort Worth last week that left at least six people dead.Austin-Bergstrom International Airport said that all flights had been canceled on Monday due to the “historic weather” and Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport also shut down.The NWS said Arctic air was driving a “polar plunge” that is expected to bring record-low temperatures.Much of the United States has been shivering under chilly temperatures for days, with about half of all Americans now under some sort of winter weather warning.Temperatures have dropped across the country, with only parts of the southeast and southwest dodging it.The cold snap has led to heavy snowfalls and ice storms that have caused a spike in electricity demand and power outages.A truck drives past a highway sign on Feb. 15, 2021, in Houston. A frigid blast of weather across the U.S. plunged Texas into an unusually icy emergency Monday that knocked out power to more than 2 million people.’Polar plunge’ Besides Texas, weather-related emergencies have also been declared in Alabama, Oregon, Oklahoma, Kansas, Kentucky and Mississippi.More than 300,000 customers are without power in Oregon.”Over 150 million Americans are currently under winter storm warnings, ice storm warnings, winter storm watches, or winter weather advisories as impactful winter weather continues from coast to coast,” the NWS said.”This impressive onslaught of wicked wintry weather across much of the Lower 48 (states) is due to the combination of strong Arctic high pressure supplying sub-freezing temperatures and an active storm track escorting waves of precipitation.”The NWS said record low temperatures were expected in much of the country.”Hundreds of daily low maximum and minimum temperatures have been/will be broken during this prolonged ‘polar plunge,’ with some February and even all-time low temperature records in jeopardy,” it said.In a large area known as the southern Plains that spans parts of Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas, temperatures are expected to fall well below typical readings for the time of year.”Temperature anomalies are likely to be 25 to 45 degrees (Fahrenheit) below normal for much of the central and southern Plains,” the NWS said.It said six to 12 inches of snow was forecast from the Ohio Valley and eastern Great Lakes to northern New England.Florida will remain the warmest spot in the continental United States, with highs above normal and temperatures generally around 80 degrees Fahrenheit (27 Celsius).
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Crowds of seals lie on the sand, some wriggling towards the water, on the northern French coast where they are staging a comeback. Drone images show around 250 wild grey seals, adults and cubs, frolicking at low tide near the town of Marck. Seals started to disappear from the Cote d’Opale in the 1970s, under pressure from fishermen who saw them as rivals for their catch. Seals, which have no natural predators in the English Channel, have been a protected species in France since the 1980s and as a result they have begun to return to the coast. Rescued grey seal cubs wait for fish during their quarantine at LPA animal refuge in Calais, France, Feb. 13, 2021.”At low tide, they settle here to get fat, to rest and to prepare for their upcoming hunt at sea,” seal enthusiast Jerome Gressier told Reuters. According to a 2018 report of the Hauts-de-France region’s Eco-Phoques project, at least 1,100 seals now live in the area. In the region’s Baie de Somme, harbor seal numbers grew by 14.4% between 1990 and 2017, while grey seals rose by 20%, the study found. Gressier uses a long-focus lens to identify injured seals. “It allows us to see if there are any animals who are caught in nets,” he said. “It hurts them enormously if they are caught by the neck.” Injured seals are treated at a nearby animal rescue center in Calais. Center manager Christel Gressier says many of the animals they deal with are seals, some abandoned by their mothers. “At around three weeks, the mother will quickly teach it to hunt, but if the seal is not able to manage, or do it quickly enough, she leaves and she goes about her business,” she said. “It is at this moment that we can intervene for seals that would not have been able to adapt quickly enough.” 
 
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