The weather in March 2026 was a record-breaking event, with powerful storms and bouts of polar air passing through the Central and Eastern U.S. and Hawaii experiencing flooding rains in a series of kona lows. These patterns illustrate how interconnected we are by larger patterns that move around our atmosphere. Much of the activity is linked to the jet streams, currents of fast-moving air in the mid-latitudes of both the Northern and Southern hemispheres. High pressure systems and low pressure systems, often linked to storms, ride around the globe on the jet stream. However, when they're blocked, they can linger over a region for days or weeks. This phenomenon can lead to persistent high-pressure system, which also led to high temperatures in the West and the Pacific Northwest.