Though it likely won't happen this year this is how mini-ice ages start

If you look at lake effect snow for Erie Pennsylvania which is 121 inches in December for example.
121 inches of snow is approximately 10 and 2/3 feet of snow by the way.

(I've seen 12 feet of snow in the little city of Mt. Shasta in 1992 but it is at 3500 feet up in the mountains too where a lot of snow in the 70s and 80s was pretty normal still.)

But, imagine for example, if the polar vortex just kept slipping down east of the Missiissippi River and dropping another 121 inches of snow each month for the next 6 months for example.

You might say, "No! That could never happen!" Well. This kind of thing happened all over North America at least as far south as Yosemite National Park, because Half Dome, all the domes and even Yosemite Valley and many alpine lakes in the High Sierras were formed by Glaciers at one point. So, saying it could NEVER happen just doesn't wash at all!

But, you could say, "Well. That never has happened from the 1800s or the 1900s or up to 2017.

Yes. You could say that. But, were you or anyone with a camera here before that in the 1700s and before?

So, to say this could never happen again even in the High Sierras of California let alone Erie, Pennsylvania or points east or south is to be unrealistic in the end.

What if you say, "Well. What about Global Warming?"

If you talk to enough PHds in weather science they are going to tell you global warming precedes all the ICE AGES usually.

Why?

Because as oceans heat up lands get colder so snow can stick better because land only freezes down about 1 to 3 feet at most and water heats up 30 to 50 feet deep if there is no ice or snow on top to reflect the heat back up into space.

So, Cloud cover caused by Global Warming actually cools the landed areas of earth more and creates the likelihood of short or long ice ages because the cloud cover (less sun hitting the ground) over the years cools the lands so snow sticks better year around.

Which is why Sea Elephants many people think were once Grizzly bears or elephants or something like that and Sea lions were likely wolves or larger predatory animals where they had no choice but to adapt to the seas because of all the ice on shore on the lands. This is what scientists now actually think  is where Sea Elephants and Sea Lions actually came from as well as smaller fur seals.