US storms: Inside bullseye of polar vortex

Weather records have been broken across North America, with Canada and all 50 US states experiencing freezing temperatures.

In Kentucky, an escaped prisoner turned himself in to get out of the cold while at least one polar bear at a zoo in Chicago had to be taken inside because of the plummeting temperatures.

ABC news correspondent Linzie Janis, in Buffalo in New York, told BBC News the area looked like a series of ghost towns with roads littered with overturned cars.