Frigid air from the North Pole: What's this polar vortex?

How Arctic winds are making your winter miserable.

A bitter Arctic blast spanning the central and eastern US has propelled the phrase "polar vortex" from the pages of dense scientific papers to headline status as frigid temperatures and strong winds close schools and businesses and prompt forecasters

Move over, haboob. See you next summer, heat dome. The weather phenomenon hogging all the attention now is.

A frigid weather system called the polar vortex gripped much of the Midwest on Monday as temperatures dropped to near-record, subzero lows, canceling school classes, grounding thousands of airline flights and prompting authorities to urge residents to

(CNN) — Americans in two dozen states from the Midwest to the Southeast and Northeast are shivering this week courtesy of a distorted polar vortex. The rush of cold air it's sending southward is the biggest visitor from the North Pole since Santa Claus.