Post-Thanksgiving and with winter break on the horizon, USC students are stressed about flight delays, cancellations and unsafe conditions due to the bomb cyclone that has hit the Midwest and Northeast.
A bomb cyclone is an intense wind storm, usually paired with rain or snow. A map from CNN shows the coasts of Maine and New Hampshire under a winter storm warning, with much of the Northeast under a winter weather advisory.
Victoria Petryshyn, associate professor of environmental studies at USC Dornsife, says that while bomb cyclones are natural weather events similar to hurricanes and fires, they are becoming increasingly common.
Petryshyn said that it is currently a bomb cyclone season, which typically occurs when air instability is combined with a mix of “cold plus hot meeting each other.” She says this is common in the Northeast because of “cold polar air that waves with the jet stream and then a warm surface ocean current, the Gulf Stream, that comes up to meet it,” a dynamic that typically occurs in the winter months of November through March.
“We’re seeing a lot more of them because of climate change,” said Petryshyn. “Bomb cyclones become more intense because this polar air mass that used to stay up there is now literally dropping down into the center of the country in places that don’t normally see it.”
The bomb cyclone effects are hitting airports across the Midwest and Northeast, frustrating passengers during the peak of the post-Thanksgiving travel period.
Catherine Cahill, a sophomore music industry student, said she experienced several delays when travelling back to Los Angeles on Saturday night after spending Thanksgiving break in Chicago.
“A process that should’ve taken about six hours ended up taking a lot longer than that,” Cahill said. She described seeing a car spin out because of the ice, forcing her to drive slowly and adding extra time to her commute to the airport.
After arriving at the airport, Cahill said she was faced with more travel delays.
“[The flight] kept getting pushed back every 30 minutes… It was a struggle because it was already late at night and I had nowhere else to go,” she said.
Cahill wasn’t the only one struggling. She said, “The whole airport was in a mood… everyone looked really tired and stressed.”
Anne Duensang, a freshman applied and computational mathematics student, ended up cancelling her flight due to numerous delays.
“It kept getting delayed 30 to 40 minutes every 20 minutes,” said Duensang, who was flying back to Los Angeles from Milwaukee after Thanksgiving break, when her parents became concerned about her potential late night at the airport. “The flight was originally supposed to leave at 6 p.m., and I don’t think it ended up leaving until 11-something,” Duensang said.
Duensang ultimately cancelled her flight and flew out of a Milwaukee airport instead of Chicago O’Hare.
The bomb cyclone is now moving to the east, bringing snow and ice to New York, among other states.
Students in the Northeast are now feeling the storm’s effects. Alex Goodale, a junior at Syracuse University, said there is “definitely more snow than usual.”
Last night, Goodale went to sleep not seeing much snow, but that changed when she woke up Tuesday.
“Everyone’s walking super slow, it’s a lot longer to get to class… In my 11 a.m., at least three people were late today,” Goodale said.
According to the National Weather Service, most of upstate New York experienced 2 to 6 inches of snow, with some parts receiving up to 8 inches. In Syracuse, snowfall began early Tuesday morning and is expected to continue through the evening.
“People are driving slower… every time a car goes by, it kind of splashes on the sidewalk, which is very annoying,” Goodale said.
As travel increases due to the holiday season, Petryshyn anticipates more delays at airports.
“The problem is it’s very hard to predict because [storms] intensify so rapidly,” Petryshyn said.