Strong warming in the Stratospheric over the poles could lead to prolong cold for much of the month of February for portions of the CONUS. When you have such strong warming in the Stratosphere, it “disrupts” the polar vortex…aka weakening it, splits it into daughter vortices or completely moves to another location entirely.
Currently, we are under going this same SSW event that was forecasted to happen weeks ago and this is what is helping the cold to be push into the lower 48 in about 4-5 days.
Here, we still see strong warming in the stratosphere continuing even once we get into the month of February and this helps increase confidence in prolonged cold over the central and eastern portions of the United States. Once we get the southern stream to get a little active, its game on!