Respond to prefers-color-scheme dark in app web views

Follow section front redirects in Spectrum

Enable NLP source in PCS for load testing

Switch off the News Alerts Survey Widget when we have enough responses

Poll to determine if new LUF updates are available

Allows the winning A/B test variant to be turned on without Spectrum deployment

Show infinite scrolling sections in Assembler MultiView

Show option for NLP article summaries in Action Bar

A general feature flag for Recipe Features that aren't yet released

Feature flag for media team features that aren't yet released

Use new Orca video player for preroll plugin in Spectrum

Show the snow tracker (instead of the heat tracker) on Spectrum

The Post endorses April McClain Delaney and Tom Royals for Maryland’s 6th District

On Press Freedom Day, little to celebrate for Hong Kong’s journalists

Young Georgians want to be part of Europe. Their government is in the way.

The new cure-all for vacation excess: the IV drip 

What’s the best bus to New York? We tested 5 for comfort and value.

Adaptive equipment is making national parks more inclusive

Trump Media auditor charged by SEC with ‘massive fraud’

Google’s empire is massive. A judge will soon rule if it’s a monopoly.

Five tech products we actually like

Confident of victory over Ukraine, Russia exhibits Western war trophies

Two women are seeking Mexico’s presidency. But the race is about a man.

Hamas in Cairo for hostage talks as Israel briefs aid agencies on Rafah

In photos: At least 39 dead as historic flooding hits southern Brazil

Sea level rise brings new era of dangerous flooding

Michael Cohen keeps broadcasting despite being a witness

The New York Times, alone in its outrage over access to Biden

The ‘Access Hollywood’ video cemented Trump’s air of invincibility

Stephen A. Smith would like even more of your attention

Strangers help Sesame Street puppeteer after heirloom necklace was stolen

Teen grabs wheel when driver passes out and school bus veers into traffic

Cat climbed into Amazon return box, found alive 630 miles away

In a pinch, the Nationals finally find some offense

Is Pastis as good as our food critic thought? He sent spies to find out.

The Capitals, a team in transition, know what they want this offseason

Ask Amy: My boyfriend just confessed he’s almost $20,000 in debt

Miss Manners: Is it inappropriate to reach out to old girlfriends?

Carolyn Hax: Longtime friend won’t forgive being last-minute canceled for a guy

Biden confronts campus protests; Trump hedges on accepting election results

Kristi Noem just won’t stop talking about killing her dog

Noem’s dog-killing isn’t popular, though Trump supporters are divided

Reporting on Earth’s changing climate and the search for solutions

See more coverage in your recommendations

Climate & environment

The Climate Coach newsletter

Climate alerts

At least five people are dead after a powerful storm system of more than 20 tornadoes swept through the central United States on Wednesday with high winds that spread wildfires and knocked down power lines, leaving hundreds of thousands of customers without electricity.

Most of the fatalities occurred in vehicle crashes. One person driving a truck in Iowa died when the vehicle was hit by a strong gust of wind, rolling it over and into a ditch, according to a <a href="http://accidentreports.iowa.gov/index.php?pgname=minimal_ar&caseno=2021030217" target=_blank>state patrol crash report</a>. Three people in Kansas died in car crashes, while a man in Minnesota died when a 40-foot tree fell on him, according to officials.

Unprecedented Midwest wind storm caps 2021’s siege of extreme weather

The National Weather Service confirmed that at least 21 tornadoes touched down in Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska and Wisconsin. At least 13 of those touched down in Iowa, officials said Thursday.

The unusual weather appeared to be fueled by record-breaking warm temperatures coupled with a jet stream that meteorologist Jeff Masters said took on a “very unusually contorted pattern.” It also came just days after devastating tornadoes in nine states left dozens dead.

The National Weather Service reported a tornado near Rochester in southeastern Minnesota, the state’s first on record in December. Several tornadoes reported in western and central Iowa also were December firsts for those parts of the state. And a record was set Wednesday for the most hurricane-force winds of 75 mph or higher in a single day since 2004, according to the Weather Service.

In all, more than 36 million people in an area between New Mexico and Michigan were under high-wind warnings, as gusts of up to 100 mph sent roofs flying and toppled tractor-trailers on highways from Colorado to Iowa.

“I’ve been a meteorologist for 40 years, and I’ve seen things that have floored me and boggled my mind,” said Masters, an extreme-weather expert at Yale Climate Connections and a founder of Weather Underground. “But I would have never thought I would see extremity of the weather I saw last night. The winds were unbelievable.”

Christian Murdock

More than 340,000 customers were without power in Wisconsin and Michigan as of Thursday afternoon, according to <a href="http://poweroutage.us/" target=_blank>PowerOutage.us</a>, which tracks outages. About 37,000 were without power in Iowa, nearly<b> </b>29,000 in Kansas and thousands in Illinois, Colorado, Nebraska, Missouri and Minnesota. MidAmerican Energy, which serves parts of Iowa, <a href="https://twitter.com/MidAm_EnergyCo/status/1471325928215171074?s=20" target=_blank>said</a> that “because of the extensive damage,” restoring power could take as many as three days.

A lack of electricity in winter in those states normally risks leaving people without heat in freezing conditions, but cities across the Midwest reported record highs Wednesday. Parts of Iowa reached temperatures as high as 74, with the Chicago region nearing 70 the week before Christmas.

High winds in Kansas kicked up dust storms that caused low visibility, prompting the Kansas Department of Transportation to <a href="https://www.facebook.com/SCKansasKDOT" target=_blank>shut down</a> major highways in the western part of the state.

Dry, windy conditions also fueled wildfires in Kansas, forcing evacuations. The Weather Service <a href="https://twitter.com/NWSQuadCities/status/1471341455205486593?s=20" target=_blank>said</a> late Wednesday that a wildfire in Russell County, Kan., was still burning. Parts of Kansas, Missouri and Colorado had the worst air quality in the country Wednesday evening, with Brownell, Kan., recording a “very unhealthy”<a href="https://www.iqair.com/usa/kansas/brownell" target=_blank> air quality index</a> of 237, far higher than levels earlier in the week. And in Nebraska, west of the cold front igniting the storms, <a href="https://www.spc.noaa.gov/products/md/md2031.html" target=_blank>blizzard</a> conditions developed.

The sweeping storm system Wednesday came on the heels of the more vicious string of tornadoes that struck parts of the Midwest and South this past weekend,<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/12/15/tornado-damage-biden-live-updates/" target=_blank> leaving at least 88 people dead</a> and destroying thousands of homes and other structures.

Studying and determining the weather systems that triggered Wednesday’s devastating storms is likely to take months, but meteorologists told The Washington Post that a combination of factors, including unusually warm weather, were likely to blame.

A senior research scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Severe Storms Laboratory said he wouldn’t expect the recent stretch of devastating December weather to become the new normal in the United States — calling the spate of extreme storms “somewhat freakish.”

“We don’t put out tornado warnings very often in places where snow is still on the ground,” said the researcher, Harold Brooks. “It took a lot of stuff, and weeks of buildup, for this to happen.”

Part of what made Wednesday’s anomalous storms so devastating is that they were continuing to mature and strengthen as they were battering the middle part of the country, said Victor Gensini, a meteorology professor at Northern Illinois University who specializes in extreme weather and climate.

Amid a stretch of destruction across multiple states in the past week, Gensini said a significant argument could be made that global warming is helping enhance and increase the likelihood of damaging storms. He compared the possible effect of global warming on the climate to how steroids affected Major League Baseball decades ago.

“When you started looking at the number of home runs in baseball, you saw that steroids had an effect. And I think the same thing is happening here with the changing climate and these events,” Gensini said. “As more of these extremes are happening, you ask whether they would have been as intense or impressive without climate change? Those are things we don’t know right now, but we’re in a climate state where we allow these things to be more probable.”

Masters echoed Gensini, saying that when the research is done on Wednesday’s storms, “We’ll find that an event like last night would have been virtually impossible without human-caused global warming.”

The storms also wreaked havoc at airports. “For their safety,” Federal Aviation Administration employees were evacuated from an air traffic control tower at Kansas City International Airport, causing delays and diverting flights, the airport <a href="https://twitter.com/KCIAirport/status/1471269863599583236?s=20" target=_blank>said</a>. Runways reopened after FAA staffers returned to the tower and the airfield was checked for debris.

There were hundreds of delays and canceled flights at Denver International Airport on Wednesday, and several small planes that were parked were <a href="https://twitter.com/precisionapch/status/1471139570049851392?s=20" target=_blank>damaged</a> at Santa Fe Regional Airport in New Mexico. A Christmas tree was <a href="https://www.facebook.com/OldeTownArvadaCO/photos/a.10156032303982134/10158001446177134/?type=3" target=_blank>toppled</a> in the town square of a Denver suburb.

As millions of Americans’ lives have been upended by storms in the past week, meteorologists are warning many to take the weather seriously into account before Christmas.

“You’re talking about two historic weather events happening less than a week of each other,” Gensini said. “It’s becoming clear that these events certainly will go down as top-10 weather events of not just the entire year but also top-10 weather events for the entire decade. It’s been a very, very impressive stretch.”

<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/12/16/regeneron-omicron-diminished-potency-covid/" target=_blank>Regeneron says its coronavirus antibody cocktail loses potency against omicron</a>

<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/12/15/desantis-stop-woke-act-mlk-crt/">DeSantis invokes MLK as he proposes Stop Woke Act against critical race theory</a>

<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/12/15/nasa-touches-sun-spacecraft-parker/">NASA probe that ‘touched the sun’ for first time could help people better understand the solar system</a>

Arizona State University, BA in Journalism and BA in Business

Bryan Pietsch is a reporter on the International desk covering foreign affairs. He was previously based in Seoul, where he was the inaugural reporter in The Post's news hub there.

Bryan Pietsch

National Weather Association, Digital Seal of Approval

University of Virginia, BA in environmental science, 1998

University of Wisconsin, MS in atmospheric science, 2000

Jason Samenow is The Washington Post’s weather editor and Capital Weather Gang's chief meteorologist. He earned a master's degree in atmospheric science and spent 10 years as a climate change science analyst for the U.S. government. He holds the Digital Seal of Approval from the National Weather Association.

Jason Samenow

Forbes 30 Under 30, Media & Marketing Europe, 2020

Gracie Awards, Original Online News Programming, 2020

MHP 30 To Watch: Young Journalist Award, 2019

Georgetown University, Bachelor of Science in Foreign Service

Annabelle Timsit is a breaking news reporter for The Washington Post's London hub, covering news as it unfolds in the United States and around the world during the early morning hours in Washington.

Annabelle Timsit

Timothy Bella was a staff writer and editor for the General Assignment team, focusing on national news. His work has appeared in outlets such as Esquire, the Atlantic, New York magazine and the Undefeated.

Average Year-To-Date	1
Yearly Average	40
Record Most	67 (1980,2010)
Record Fewest	7 (1886,1905)
Last Year	38