Texas, Feb 19: Millions of people are without power in the US state of Texas, where it has been snowing this week. A southern state that usually experiences temperatures no lower than 5°C during winter, the entirety of Texas is frozen over. The winter storm has caused power outages and bursting water pipes, attacking a region of the world that is unprepared for this kind of damage.
A winter storm is a weather event where the precipitation is mainly snow, sleet, or freezing rain.
The current winter storm is projected to travel further east towards the Atlantic coast states of Virginia and North Carolina, which are still dealing with the effects of the last storm.
Many water pipes froze over and even burst, causing homes to be flooded. In many regions the state advised residents to boil their water. Some people without water have even started using melted snow in lieu of water.
A majority of the roads in the central region of Texas are completely covered in snow, blocking them until the snow melts. Since the southern regions of North America get little to no snow each year, they are usually not prepared with large amounts of salt and snow plows like the north is.
Salt melts ice and snow by lowering its freezing point. Salt is put on the roads before they freeze or before it snows. Then, as snow falls, the salt mixes with it and lowers its freezing point. The brine solution that is formed by salt and melted snow prevents subsequent ice formation.
Winter storms in regions such as almost-tropical Texas are caused by the polar vortex, a large storm that swirls in its territory of the Arctic north. However, every few years or so, due to a sudden heating of the region, this vortex may shift south to North America, Europe, or Asia. This phenomenon isn’t anything to worry about, as it has happened many times in the United States alone in the last decade.
