US blizzard kills 18, leaves hundreds of thousands without power
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US blizzard kills 18, leaves hundreds of thousands without power

Madison Franz

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US blizzard kills 18, leaves hundreds of thousands without power
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At least 18 die from exposure and car crashes as fierce storm brings rain and snow across much of the US.

A fierce winter storm has knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses across the United States and left at least 18 people dead due to exposure and car crashes on icy roads.

The “bomb cyclone” storm, one of the most powerful in decades, also forced the cancellation of more than 3,000 US flights on Saturday, stranding thousands of travellers who were making last-minute dashes for Christmas.

The storm, now in its third straight day, was nearly unprecedented in its scope, stretching from the Great Lakes near Canada to the Rio Grande along the border with Mexico. The plummeting temperatures brought the coldest Christmas Eve on record to some parts of the country, including in Washington, DC.

Power systems across the US were under strain due to rising demand for heat and storm-related damage to transmission lines.

According to tracking site Poweroutage.us, at least 300,000 homes and businesses were without power as of Saturday evening, a sharp drop from 1.8 million customers who were without power earlier in the day.

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But many electric companies continued to ask people to conserve energy by not running large appliances and turning off unneeded lights.

Across the country, officials attributed at least 18 deaths to the effects of the storm, including two people who died in their homes outside the city of Buffalo in New York state when emergency crews could not reach them amid historic blizzard conditions.

Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz said a third person had also died in Buffalo and that the blizzard may be “the worst storm in our community’s history”.

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It was taking ambulances over three hours to make one trip to hospital in areas where a vehicle could get through the snow, he said, adding that there were “hundreds of people still stuck in their vehicles”.

He added that the National Guard was being sent “right into the city of Buffalo for these life-threatening rescues”.

 

New York Governor Kathy Hochul meanwhile said almost every fire truck in Buffalo was stranded due to the snow. “No matter how many emergency vehicles we have, they cannot get through the conditions as we speak,” she said.

Other storm-related deaths include four people killed in the state of Ohio on Friday during a pileup involving some 50 vehicles. In Missouri, a driver was killed on Thursday after skidding into a creek, while in Kansas, three others died on Wednesday in separate crashes on icy roads.

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A utility worker was killed in Ohio on Friday while trying to restore power, while a woman in Vermont died in hospital on the same day when a tree broke in the high winds and fell on her. In Colorado, police found the dead body of a person who appeared to be homeless as subzero temperatures and snow descended on the region. In Michigan, a snowplough driver found an 82-year-old woman curled up in the snow outside of her assisted living community. She was pronounced dead later.

Three deaths were also reported in Kentucky, where Governor Andy Beshear on Saturday warned residents, “Stay home, stay safe, stay alive.”

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“I know it’s really hard because it’s Christmas Eve. But we’re having dozens and dozens of accidents,” he said in an online briefing. “It’s simply not safe.”

Along Interstate 71 in Kentucky, Terry Henderson and her husband, Rick, told The Associated Press news agency that they were stuck in a massive traffic jam caused by several accidents for 34 hours. The truck drivers weathered the wait in a rig outfitted with a diesel heater, a toilet and a refrigerator but nonetheless regretted trying to drive from Alabama to their home near Akron, Ohio, for Christmas.

“I wish we should have stayed,” said Terry Henderson, after they got moving again Saturday. “We should have sat.”

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The severe weather also forced the cancellations of some 3,411 flights within, into or out of the US on Saturday, according to the tracking site FlightAware. While in Mexico, refugees and migrants camped near the US border in unusually cold temperatures as they awaited a US Supreme Court decision on pandemic-era restrictions that prevent many from seeking asylum.

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The National Weather Service said its map of existing or impending meteorological hazards “depicts one of the greatest extents of winter weather warnings and advisories ever”.

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In hard-hit Buffalo, Latricia Stroud said she and her two daughters, 1 and 12, have been stranded without heat or power in their house since Friday afternoon, with the snow too deep to leave.

“I have to go over a snowbank to get out,” Stroud told AP. “There’s a warming center, I just need a ride to get there.”

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Violent Typhoon Mawar sets sights on Philippines, Taiwan and Japan after blow to Guam

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The powerhouse typhoon is the equivalent of a very strong Category 4 hurricane as it approaches the northernmost island of the Philippines before turning to the north, continuing its damaging path.

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Japan says scrambled fighter jets after Russian planes spotted

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The country’s defence ministry says Russian ‘intelligence-gathering’ aircraft spotted near its coasts along the Pacific Ocean and Sea of Japan.

Japan scrambled fighter jets after spotting Russian “intelligence-gathering” aircraft off its coasts along the Pacific Ocean and Sea of Japan on Thursday, the country’s defence ministry has said.

One Russian aircraft travelled from Japan’s north down along part of its west coast, while the other took a similar route along the opposite coast and returned the same way, the Joint Staff office run under the defence ministry said in a brief statement.

“In response, fighters of the Air Self-Defence Force’s Northern Air Force and other units were scrambled,” it added.

There was no further information on the incident, which comes days after Japan hosted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the summit of Group of Seven (G7) – a grouping of rich nations – in Hiroshima city.

Japan has joined Western allies in sanctioning Moscow over its February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, and has warned of the threat posed by Russia.

Its latest security document, which once called for enhanced ties and cooperation with Russia, now warns that Moscow’s military posturing in Asia and cooperation with China are “a strong security concern”.

Last May, Chinese and Russian military jets carried out joint flights near Japan immediately after a meeting of the United States-led Quad grouping in Tokyo. India and Australia are other members of Quad.

And more recently, Moscow has carried out military exercises, including test-firing missiles, in the Sea of Japan.

Russia considers Japan to be a “hostile” country – a designation it shares with all European Union countries, the US and its allies, including the United Kingdom and Australia.

Tokyo had complex relations with Moscow before the invasion of Ukraine in February, and the two sides have yet to sign a post-World War II peace treaty.

Attempts to do so have been hampered by a long-running dispute over islands controlled by Russia, which calls them the Kurils.

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France bans short-haul flights to cut carbon emissions

Madison Franz

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France has banned domestic short-haul flights where train alternatives exist, in a bid to cut carbon emissions.

The law came into force two years after lawmakers had voted to end routes where the same journey could be made by train in under two-and-a-half hours.

The ban all but rules out air travel between Paris and cities including Nantes, Lyon and Bordeaux, while connecting flights are unaffected.

Critics have described the latest measures as “symbolic bans”.

Laurent Donceel, interim head of industry group Airlines for Europe (A4E), told the AFP news agency that “banning these trips will only have minimal effects” on CO2 output.

He added that governments should instead support “real and significant solutions” to the issue.

Airlines around the world have been severely hit by the coronavirus pandemic, with website Flightradar24 reporting that the number of flights last year was down almost 42% from 2019.

The French government had faced calls to introduce even stricter rules.

France’s Citizens’ Convention on Climate, which was created by President Emmanuel Macron in 2019 and included 150 members of the public, had proposed scrapping plane journeys where train journeys of under four hours existed.

But this was reduced to two-and-a-half hours after objections from some regions, as well as the airline Air France-KLM.

French consumer group UFC-Que Choisir had earlier called on lawmakers to retain the four-hour limit.

“On average, the plane emits 77 times more CO2 per passenger than the train on these routes, even though the train is cheaper and the time lost is limited to 40 minutes,” it said.

It also called for “safeguards that [French national railway] SNCF will not seize the opportunity to artificially inflate its prices or degrade the quality of rail service”.

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