Parts of the US are experiencing a record-breaking wind chill factor that is so cold it’s literally off the National Weather Service’s official charts.
The northeast of the country has been struck by a powerful arctic blast, with the temperature at New Hampshire‘s Mount Washington plummeting to a new low of -46F (-43C).
But the wind chill temperature is how cold people actually feel while outside and depend on the strength and temperature of winds.
High winds of 96mph on Mt Washington have produced a wind chill factor of -108F (-78C) – comfortably below the lowest point on the National Weather Service’s (NWS) wind chill chart, which stands at -98F (-72C).
Image: The picture at Mount Washington’s weather station. Pic: National Weather Service Cleveland/@NWSCLE
‘Worst weather in the world’
NWS said Mt Washington, the highest peak in the northeastern US, was “living up to the reputation of having the worst weather in the world”.
New Hampshire is one of several states under wind chill warnings, alongside Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, Rhode Island, Vermont, and much of New York, where a “Code Blue” alert for sub-zero temperatures was issued.
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Thousands of properties have lost power and emergency shelters have been opened.
While the deep freeze is expected to be relatively brief, people are being warned the conditions are life-threatening, with schools closed in some cities due to risks of children suffering hypothermia and frostbite.
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One weather expert says the wind chills forecast could cause frostbite on exposed skin in just 10 minutes.
Meteorologist Donald Dumont at the National Weather Service in Gray, Maine, said: “It’s painful.”
One of the cities hit by the worst of the freeze is Boston, Massachusetts, where mayor Michelle Wu declared a state of emergency.
Record low temperatures are forecast there for Saturday, and in one of the state’s other cities, Worcester, where residents have already endured lows of 3F (-16C) heading into the weekend.
Boston’s record low is -2F (-19C), set back in 1886, and Worcester’s is -4F (-20C), which dates back to 1934.
‘Citizens have been let down’
The freezing conditions, which are sweeping in from eastern Canada, come as southern states recover from another winter storm that brought days of rain, sleet, and ice.
In Texas, thousands of residents were still without power on Friday night, even as conditions warm up. One of the state’s biggest cities, Austin, has seen 30% of customers without electricity at any given time since Monday.
Mayor Kirk Watson admitted the city “let its citizens down”.
“The situation is unacceptable to the community, and it’s unacceptable to me,” said the Democrat.
One resident, Edward Kim, has had no power or heat since Wednesday. The 43-year-old revealed he was using a generator to keep his home “on life support”.
Another local, Will Rison, said his elderly parents had also been without electricity for three days.
“You can only wrap yourself in so many blankets and wait it out,” he added.
While no deaths have been reported as a result of the outages, the weather has been blamed for at least a dozen deaths on roads across Texas, Arkansas, and Oklahoma this week.
A man has been charged after allegedly harassing Hollywood actress Jennifer Aniston for two years before crashing his car through the front gate of her home, prosecutors have said.
Jimmy Wayne Carwyle, of New Albany, Mississippi, is accused of having repeatedly sent the Friends star unwanted voicemail, email and social media messages since 2023.
The 48-year-old is then alleged to have crashed his grey Chrysler PT Cruiser through the front gate of Aniston’s home in the wealthy Bel Air neighbourhood of Los Angeles early on Monday afternoon.
Prosecutors said the collision caused major damage.
Police have said Aniston was at home at the time.
A security guard stopped Carwyle on her driveway before police arrived and arrested him.
There were no reports of anyone being injured.
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Carwyle has been charged with felony stalking and vandalism, prosecutors said on Thursday.
He also faces an aggravating circumstance of the threat of great bodily harm, Los Angeles County district attorney Nathan Hochman said.
Carwyle, who has been held in jail since his arrest on Monday, is set to appear in court on Thursday.
His bail has been set at $150,000 dollars (£112,742).
He is facing up to three years in prison if he is convicted as charged.
“My office is committed to aggressively prosecuting those who stalk and terrorise others, ensuring they are held accountable,” Mr Hochman said in a statement.
Aniston bought her mid-century mansion in Bel Air on a 3.4-acre site for about 21 million dollars (£15.78m) in 2012, according to reporting by Architectural Digest.
She became one of the biggest stars on television in her 10 years on NBC’s Friends.
Aniston won an Emmy Award for best lead actress in a comedy for the role, and she has been nominated for nine more.
She has appeared in several Hollywood films and currently stars in The Morning Show on Apple TV+.
Image: The defendants hugged each other after being acquitted of the charges. Pic: Commercial Appeal/USA Today Network/AP
The 29-year-old’s death and a video of the incident – in which he cried out for his mother – sparked outrage in the US including nationwide protests and led to police reform.
Civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who represents Nichols’ family, described the verdicts as a “devastating miscarriage of justice”. In a statement, he added: “The world watched as Tyre Nichols was beaten to death by those sworn to protect and serve.”
Memphis District Attorney Steve Mulroy said he was “surprised that there wasn’t a single guilty verdict on any of the counts” including second-degree murder. He said Mr Nichols’ family “were devastated… I think they were outraged”.
Image: Former police officers Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Justin Smith were accused of second-degree murder. Pic: Memphis Police Dept/AP
But despite the three defendants being acquitted of state charges during the trial in Memphis, they still face the prospect of years in prison after they were convicted of federal charges of witness tampering last year.
Two other former officers previously pleaded guilty in both state and federal court. Desmond Mills Jr. gave evidence as a prosecution witness, while Emmitt Martin was blamed for the majority of the violence.
Sentencing for all five officers is pending.
Image: Tyre Nichols’ death sparked street protests in January 2023 in Memphis and across the US. Pic: AP
Video evidence showed Mr Nichols was stopped in his car, yanked from his vehicle, pepper-sprayed and hit with a Taser. He broke free and ran away before the five police officers caught up with him again, and the beating took place.
Prosecutors argued that the officers used excessive, deadly force in trying to handcuff Mr Nichols and were criminally responsible for each others’ actions.
They also said the officers had a duty to intervene and stop the beating and tell medics that Mr Nichols had been hit repeatedly in the head, but they failed to do so.
The trial heard Mr Nichols suffered tears and bleeding in the brain and died from blunt force trauma.
The defence suggested Mr Nichols was on drugs, giving him the strength to fight off five strong officers, and was actively resisting arrest.
In December, the US Justice Department said a 17-month investigation showed the Memphis Police Department uses excessive force and discriminates against Black people.
The US central bank held interest rates as it said Trump tariffs have risked higher inflation and unemployment amid “so much” uncertainty.
The announcement is likely to anger President Donald Trump, who has made the taxes on imports one of his signature policies and had threatened to fire the Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell.
On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve, known as the Fed, held rates at 4.25%-4.5%. Unlike the UK, the US interest rate is a range to guide lenders rather than a single percentage.
It means borrowing costs have remained unchanged for Americans, something Mr Trump had wanted to reduce.
Interest rates have been raised by the Fed to bring down high inflation in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the supply chain crisis brought about by COVID-19 lockdowns.
Fears of inflation rising higher as tariffs make goods on US shelves costlier, and of job losses from reduced spending, led the Fed to remain cautious.
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The full effect of the tariffs is “highly uncertain”, Mr Powell said on Wednesday evening, as those announced so far have been “significantly larger” than anticipated.
Image: US Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell speaks during a news conference. Pic: Reuters
A 90-day pause was announced on the suite of taxes Mr Trump imposed on countries across the world, on top of the 10% base tariff, which has remained in place.
A trade war was kicked off between China as the countries escalated tariffs on each other to nearly 150%. Taxes on cars and some metals entering the US are still subject to a 25% tax.
If these tariffs remain, Mr Powell made the strongest statement yet that goods overall would become more expensive.
“If the large increases in tariffs that have been announced are sustained, they’re likely to generate a rise in inflation, a slowdown in economic growth and an increase in unemployment,” he said.
“The effects on inflation could be short-lived, reflecting a one-time shift in the price level. It is also possible that the inflationary effects could instead be more persistent,” he added.
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Trump’s tariffs: What you need to know
Uncertainty over the economic outlook also caused consumer and business sentiment to fall, “largely reflecting trade policy concerns”, Mr Powell said.
Despite Mr Trump appointing Mr Powell to the Fed chair position during his first term, the president has repeatedly spoken out against Mr Powell.
Markets rallied after Mr Trump ruled out ousting Mr Powell at the end of April.
It comes as the UK central bank, the Bank of England, is poised to cut interest rates on Thursday afternoon. The base rate is anticipated to drop to 4.25% before falling to 3.5% by the end of the year.