Environment

Altering jet stream 'may drive weather shift'

New research suggests that the main system that helps determine the weather over Northern Europe and North America may be changing. The study shows that the so-called jet stream has increasingly taken a longer, meandering path. This has resulted in weather remaining the same for more prolonged periods.

The meandering jet stream has accounted for the recent stormy weather over the UK and the bitter winter weather in the US Mid-West remaining longer than it otherwise would have. We can expect more of the same and we can expect it to happen more frequently. The jet stream, as its name suggests, is a high-speed air current in the atmosphere that brings with it the weather. It is fuelled partly by the temperature differential between the Arctic and the mid-latitudes.