Scientific Reasoning for the Weird Summer Weather
It was a weird summer for weather – one that has scientists scratching their heads and wondering exactly what might be going on. Cataclysmic occurrences have taken place all over the world, including devastating flooding in Western Europe, a lingering heatwave in parts of Scandinavia, massive smoke plumes surfacing from Siberia and historically hot temperatures in the American West that have triggered massive wildfires.
Dr. Omar Baddour, head of the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) Climate Monitoring and Policy Division acknowledges that the historic heatwave episodes in the Western United States and Canada are clearly linked to human-induced climate change via rapid attribution studies. He also notes that weather patterns over the entire northern Hemisphere have shown “unusual planetary wavy patterns” this summer.
“The connection of this large-scale disturbance of summer season with the warming of [the] Arctic and the heat accumulation in the ocean needs to be investigated,” he said.
While scientists strive to find a cause to the unusual weather patterns, residents of impacted areas are left to pick up the pieces.
Areas of Western Europe were hit with two months of rainfall in two days – when the soil was near saturation to begin with. Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Germany suffered the deluge.
Germany and Belgium suffered the greatest loss of human life from the tragedy. People were swept away by rising waters, trapped, houses collapsed, and landslides kicked off, showing the destructive power of rapidly swelling water. At least 100 people were reportedly killed and many more remain missing.
“It is a catastrophe. There are dead, missing and many are still in danger,” said Malu Dreyer, President of the German state of Rheinland Pfalz, an area worst hit by the widespread flash flooding.
Warnings were numerous throughout the impacted countries, attempting to save lives from the impending threat.
“This situation was due to a near-stationary low-pressure weather system which has established over Germany. This unstable, baroclinic system usually moves slowly over a confined region, and it is associated with strong convergence and upward motion leading to heavy rainfall,” according to the WMO.
London was paralysed by flash flooding on July 12 due to flash flooding after “around 70mm of rainfall fell in a short space of time over a highly populated urban area.”
Record breaking heat waves plagued Finland and other areas of Northern Europe as well as the United States and Canada, which created a new set of problems.
“The megadrought conditions, very dry fuels and heatwaves are fuelling the occurrence of extreme wildfires this year in western USA, as well as western and central Canada,” per WMO.
Scientists are turning to climate change as the culprit for such weather extremes. WMO noted that the record-breaking heatwave in parts of the U.S. and Canada would have been nearly impossible if not for the influence of human-caused climate change, citing a rapid attribution analysis by an “international team of leading climate scientists.”
“Climate change, caused by greenhouse gas emissions, made the heatwave at least 150 times more likely to happen,” according to the article.
The findings came with a warning: evidence of human-induced global warming has (and likely will) lead to an increase in the intensity, frequency and amount of heavy precipitation occurrences on a global scale.
Germany and Belgium suffered the greatest loss of human life from the tragedy. People were swept away by rising waters, trapped, houses collapsed, and landslides kicked off, showing the destructive power of rapidly swelling water. At least 100 people were reportedly killed and many more remain missing.
“It is a catastrophe. There are dead, missing and many are still in danger,” said Malu Dreyer, President of the German state of Rheinland Pfalz, an area worst hit by the widespread flash flooding.
Warnings were numerous throughout the impacted countries, attempting to save lives from the impending threat.
“This situation was due to a near-stationary low-pressure weather system which has established over Germany. This unstable, baroclinic system usually moves slowly over a confined region, and it is associated with strong convergence and upward motion leading to heavy rainfall,” according to the WMO.
London was paralysed by flash flooding on July 12 due to flash flooding after “around 70mm of rainfall fell in a short space of time over a highly populated urban area.”
Record breaking heat waves plagued Finland and other areas of Northern Europe as well as the United States and Canada, which created a new set of problems.
“The megadrought conditions, very dry fuels and heatwaves are fuelling the occurrence of extreme wildfires this year in western USA, as well as western and central Canada,” per WMO.
Scientists are turning to climate change as the culprit for such weather extremes. WMO noted that the record-breaking heatwave in parts of the U.S. and Canada would have been nearly impossible if not for the influence of human-caused climate change, citing a rapid attribution analysis by an “international team of leading climate scientists.”
“Climate change, caused by greenhouse gas emissions, made the heatwave at least 150 times more likely to happen,” according to the article.
The findings came with a warning: evidence of human-induced global warming has (and likely will) lead to an increase in the intensity, frequency and amount of heavy precipitation occurrences on a global scale.