our meteorologist sayaka mori joins us for debt tails. sayaka?s, gene, last week in beijing the air was quite clean. however, the sky turned yellowish this week. this w the scene coming out of beijing on thursday. beijing residents woke up to heavy smog on thursday. it's a week after the at the government lifted air pollution control, put in place for apec forum to make sure of blue skies. authorities are calling for the pollutants hazardous. residents are advised to take protective measures and limit outdoor activities. now we need rain or wind to disperse the smog. and we're seeing windy conditions over the beijing area on friday. the conditions are improving there. however, instead the shanghai area and inland china will see conditions worsening as we go into the weekend. and some pollutant will move into the border of north korea and south korea on your saturday. so you may want to wear masks. now across japan, we're seeing some rainfall across kyushu and also some rain and snowfall over the hokkaido area, but in the middle, sunny weather and

meteorologist sayaka mori joins us for the details. sayaka? >> yes, the coldest air of the season is blanketing much of north america from canada all the way down to the south of the u.s. and we have a winter storm move through the eastern u.s. of heavy snow fell in a wide area, including hamburg, new york. lake-effect snow is turning western new york into a winter wonderland. cold air from canada swept over the great lakes monday, causing snow development into hamburg and buffalo early tuesday morning. a lake-effect snow warning is in place for the area through wednesday. as much as 15 centimeters of snow can be expected during that time. now the winter storm is still located over eastern part of canada, bringing widespread snowfall, up to 10 centimeter or even 20 centimeters likely for parts of ontario as well as quebec as we go into tuesday morning. and winds are going to be picking up. so you could feel much, much colder than your forecast temperatures. now, the system has pulled away from the eastern u.s., but because of cold air we have

meteorologist sayaka mori joins us with the details. >> thank you. people in hokkaido are experiencing winterlike weather conditions. we saw below freezing temperatures in the morning, and some areas like sapporo saw snow flurries. the reason is that we have a wintry pressure pattern. a high pressure system over the west and a low pressure system over the east. under such conditions cold air flows in from the north. but as the high pressure system moves towards the east, conditions will get back to normal, as we go into saturday over hokkaido. now this low is actually what was once severe tropical storm nuri and it's still developing. it could reach the bering sea late friday at the most intense system on record for the region. and that will provide extremely high waves, extremely strong winds, and also torrential rain before the western parts of the aleutian island, and also blizzard conditions for southern parts of alaska, as we go in to next week. now, across the americas, heavy rain is pounding coastal locations over the northeastern u.s. up into

meteorologist sayaka mori joins us for the details. >> it's the coldest air in decades for this time of year is blanketing the eastern parts of the u.s. because we have the jet stream meandering further down to the south allowing frigid air coming in straight from the arctic. so extremely cold conditions are happening over many parts of the u.s. and because of the cold, northwesterly winds, lake-effect snow is picking up over the south of the great lakes region. let's go ahead and show you the scene coming out of grand rapids. the streets of grand rapids, michigan, were paved in white on tuesday as lake-effect snow fell for the second day. the amount of snow easily broke the daily record. here, ten centimeters of snow fell over the course of nine hours. 38 centimeters has already piled up since the start of this month. the snow could continue through thursday night. now the heaviest know is falling especially in southwestern parts of new york state, in and around buffalo. some areas saw nearly 150 centimeters of snowfall in a span of 24 hours, and buffalo, you could be getting as muc

meteorologist sayaka mori joins us with the details. >> yes, gene.t's like a winter wonderland for many parts of the u.s. although we are one month ahead of the official start to winter. now, this was the scene coming out of new york on saturday. lots of snow there, and also this was the same in missouri on your sunday. and then up in the mountains in oklahoma, you can see a nice combination of snow and also a cactus. now, because we have a couple of winter storms affecting the eastern areas of the u.s. and canada, snow is affecting the eastern portions of the continent from minnesota towards the eastern end of canada up to 10 centimeters of snow is likely, and accompanied by very gusty conditions that could lower visibility. so driving is going to be quite hazardous. more of a concern is actually freezing rainfall. this is actually looks like rainfall, but because temperature itself is below average, or below freezing, so once it contacts the ground, it will create icy roads, making for very hazardous driving conditions. into the south, because cold