Cold air is moving west of the Urals and east of them:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060123/ap_on_re_eu/frozen_europe

Siberia remains locked in record cold, Moscow (according to the article above) is recording its coldest temperatures in almost 40 years, and Eastern Europe is beginning to feel the bite, too. Of course, a lot of the article is discussing the politics of natural gas, and as a follower of oil markets I can't help but wonder if this brutal cold isn't playing a small part in the oil run we've seen lately (along with Iran, and Nigeria).

Politics and oil (and oil politics) aside, some credit needs to be given where it's due: accunever's Jim Andrews saw this cold spreading into Europe a week ago:

http://wwwa.accuweather.com/news-column....date=2006-01-14

Unfortunately, he said nothing about it spreading east into North America, but the skiing weatherman has been tracking declining temps in western Canada. Though if the core of the cold is remaining locked over Siberia, it's hard to see the cold getting much further to the east for the time being. Nonetheless, it sounds like the only place really escaping below normal temps right now in the northern hemisphere is westernmost Europe and... us.

Update: some more bloggers at accuweather suggesting changes in North American weather patterns:

a) http://wwwa.accuweather.com/news-column....date=2006-01-20 - cold mass shifting east into Canadian prairies and forcing a substantial cooldown in Ontario and Quebec next week;

b) another poster on shifting weather patterns and fluctuations in the jet stream: http://wwwa.accuweather.com/news-column....webcaster=sobel

c) one guy looking at a millibar model and speculating (but nothing more) that this could result in a change in weather patterns: http://wwwa.accuweather.com/news-column....date=2006-01-23

Just some stuff to think about.

All that colds on us siberia & europe....I'm going to be an Indian giver & ask for it back! See you read a lot of Accuhype or Accunever there Roger...so do a lot of us.We need hope,hype,speculation..whatever. The Gov't F-cast for feb is now calling for above normal temps while the privy's are hinting & have been hinting at a return to cold at the start of the month. I just cked the long range models & It looks interesting for the time period leading up to the weekend of the 4th of feb. No snow..I don't go...too long of a drive for me! Another day in the low 70's down here...Nieghbors went surfing...My girl called me to play hookie from work & my palm trees & plants were just singing in the wind....it cannot last, after all, this is NORTH carolina.

Actually I don't read much of accuweather, last night I was browsing the blogs in a fit of boredom. Some of it was kind of interesting to read though, and unlike Weather RX, I grasped a lot of what they were saying.