{"id":425587,"date":"2026-01-22T10:03:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T10:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/425587\/"},"modified":"2026-01-22T10:03:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T10:03:08","slug":"snow-buries-kamchatka-nasa-science","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/425587\/","title":{"rendered":"Snow Buries Kamchatka – NASA Science"},"content":{"rendered":"

It has been an eventful few months for the Northern Hemisphere atmosphere. An unusually early sudden stratospheric warming<\/a> episode in late November appears to have factored into a weakened and distorted polar vortex<\/a> at times in December, likely causing extra waviness in the polar jet stream<\/a>. This helped fuel extensive intrusions of frigid air into the mid-latitudes, contributing to cold snaps in North America<\/a>, Europe<\/a>, and Asia<\/a>, and priming the atmosphere for disruptive winter storms in January.<\/p>\n

Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula<\/a> has been among the areas hit hard by cold and snowy weather in December and January. More than 2 meters (7 feet) of snow fell in the first two weeks of January, following 3.7 meters in December, according to news reports<\/a>. Together, these totals make it one of the snowiest periods the peninsula has seen since the 1970s, according<\/a> to Kamchatka\u2019s Hydrometeorology Center. The onslaught brought Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, the regional capital, to a standstill, with reports of large snowdrifts burying cars and blocking access to buildings and infrastructure.<\/p>\n

This image, acquired by the MODIS<\/a> (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) instrument on NASA\u2019s Aqua<\/a> satellite, shows fresh snow blanketing the peninsula’s rugged terrain on January 17, 2026. Several circular, snow-covered volcanic peaks are visible across the peninsula, one of the most volcanically active area<\/a>s<\/a> in the world. Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, home to more than 160,000 people, sits along Avacha Bay\u2014a deep, sheltered bay formed by a combination of tectonic, volcanic, and glacial activity.<\/p>\n

NASA Earth Observatory image by Lauren Dauphin, using MODIS data from NASA\u00a0EOSDIS LANCE<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0GIBS\/Worldview.<\/a>\u00a0Story by Adam Voiland. <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\"A\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

AccuWeather (2026, January 20) Snow buries Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula, but don’t believe the AI videos<\/a>. Accessed January 21, 2026.<\/p>\n

Cohen, J. (2026, January 19) Arctic Oscillation and Polar Vortex Blog<\/a>. Accessed January 21, 2026.<\/p>\n

Manney,\u00a0G. L., et al. (2022)\u00a0What’s in a name? On the use and significance of the term \u201cpolar vortex<\/a>.\u201d\u00a0Geophysical Research Letters,\u00a049, e2021GL097617.<\/p>\n

The Moscow Times (2026, January 19) Kamchatka Struggles to Get Back on Its Feet a Week After Winter Storms Bury Peninsula<\/a>. Accessed January 21, 2026.<\/p>\n

NASA (2024, January 30) Sudden Stratospheric Warming Event<\/a>. Accessed January 21, 2026.<\/p>\n

Reuters (2026, January 21) Russia’s Far East Buried in Snow<\/a>. Accessed January 21, 2026.<\/p>\n

UPI (2026, January 20) Snow buries Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula<\/a>. Accessed January 21, 2026.<\/p>\n

The Watchers (2026, January 18) State of Emergency declared for Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky after extreme snow kills 2, Russia<\/a>. Accessed January 21, 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It has been an eventful few months for the Northern Hemisphere atmosphere. An unusually early sudden stratospheric warming…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":425588,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[49,48,143020,55376,66,11738,306],"class_list":{"0":"post-425587","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-earth-observatory","11":"tag-extreme-weather-events","12":"tag-science","13":"tag-snow","14":"tag-space"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425587","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=425587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/425587\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/425588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=425587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=425587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=425587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}