Weather

The island of Fiji is facing the worst tropical cyclone in its history – with a category-five cyclone set to sweep across the island on Saturday night.  Tropical Cyclone Winston will bring winds of 300km per hour and gusts of up to 360km per hour – with experts warning that the storm could completely devastate Fiji due to its unprecedented power. Thousands of residents have already left their homes and relocated to evacuation centers, with winds continuing to intensify as the storm inches closer to the island. All flights in and out of the country have been cancelled until further notice.

The historic blizzard that blanketed the East coast of the United States has killed at least thirty people. The fatalities were as a result of car accidents, carbon monoxide poisoning and heart attacks suffered while shovelling snow. The snow storm, which set a new single-day snowfall record in Washington DC and New York City, hit a dozen states from Friday into early Sunday and affected around 85 million residents. The heaviest snowfall was recorded in Glengary, West Virginia, which had 42in.

24 hours after it started, the Blizzard of 2016, aka Snowmageddon, aka Snowtorious B.I.G., is over.

Here we are on Sunday and some 85 million Americans did indeed get “slammed” under an epic blizzard which has now moved beyond the realm of the “potential” and now encapsulates an actual, GDP-sapping winter extravaganza.

The last time a "epic" blizzard was supposed to slam New York City almost exactly one year ago, it ended up being an even more epic dud. This time, however, winter storm Jonas was no false alarm as millions of Americans across the Eastern Aeaboard woke up this morning to as much as two feet of snow, flooding, no electricity, strong winds, or all of the above.

On Wednesday we noted with some amusement that the “historic” winter blizzard that’s set to slam the east coast had been upgraded to a “potentially epic winter blockbuster.”

The best thing about “potentially epic winter blockbusters” is that they pave the way for “potentially epic” weather scapegoating from the BES, who last year learned that the American public (not to mention the market) is apparently fine accepting double-adjusted GDP data.