Experts point out that there is something different this year from the latest reports of unusual weather.
08/04/2021 16:00
Clarín.com
World
Updated 08/04/2021 16:00
As the world endures another summer of extreme weather, experts have identified
a difference
: 2021 is hitting harder and in places that have previously been spared the effects of global warming.
Rich countries
like the United States, Canada, Germany and Belgium joined poorer and more vulnerable countries in the growing list of extreme weather events that scientists say may have some connection to man-made climate change.
"It is not just a problem of poor countries, now it is very obviously a problem of rich countries," said Debby Guha-Sapir, founder of the international disaster database at the Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters at the Catholic University of Louvain, Belgium. "They (the rich)
are taking a hit
."
A person suffers from heat stroke in Canada.
Photo: AP
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Shocking images of forest fires due to high temperatures, which devastate southern Europe
China has suffered deadly floods, but hundreds of people have also died in parts of Germany and Belgium
unaccustomed
to flooding.
Canada and the Pacific Northwest of the United States suffered what climate scientist Zeke Hausfather described as "terrifying" heat, which far exceeded 100 degrees Fahrenheit and 45 Celsius.
Temperature records were broken and there were
fires out of the ordinary.
Now southern Europe is experiencing unprecedented heat and a wave of fires.
Hurricane season
And the peak season of hurricanes in the Atlantic and wildfires in the United States has
just started.
The system that later became Hurricane Elsa formed on July 1, breaking last year's record for the fifth
earliest
recorded named storm
in the Atlantic season.
Colorado State University has already increased its forecast for the number of
named storms
in the region, and the US National Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) will update its forecast this Wednesday.
When it comes to fires, the western United States has
not been this dry since 1580,
based on moisture readings on the ground and tree-ring records.
That sets the stage for more serious fires once something sets them off, said UCLA fire and weather expert Park Williams.
The western United States was not so dry since 1580. Photo: AFP
What happens to America's fire and hurricane seasons determines year-end statistics for total damage from weather disasters, said Ernst Rauch, chief climate and geography scientist for big insurer Munich Re. year, he pointed out, the greatest economic losses have been registered in
the richest countries.
But when poor countries are affected, they
are less prepared
and their populations cannot use the air conditioning or leave, so the damage is greater, said Hausfather, climate director at the Breakthrough Institute.
Although hundreds of people died in the Northwest Pacific coast heat wave, he noted,
the number would have been much higher
in poor areas.
Madagascar, an island nation in East Africa, is immersed in a succession of droughts that according to the United Nations push
400,000 people towards famine.
Although it is too early to say if the summer of 2021 will break records for climate disasters again, "we certainly started to see climate change
driving extreme events
in new territories where they had not been seen before," Hausfather said.
A charred vehicle in Athens.
Photo: AFP
The number of disasters associated with climate, weather and water
is so far slightly higher
than the average for recent years, said disaster researcher Guha-Sapir.
The database of his group, which he said has not yet counted some incidents, includes
208 catastrophes around the world
until July, around 11% more than the average of the last decade, but a little less than the year last.
From Siberia to Oregon
Last year's heat record
was set in Siberia,
where few people live, but this year it was set in Portland, Oregon, and British Columbia, which receive much more Western media attention, Hausfather said.
The heat record this year was recorded in Portland, Oregon.
Photo: AFP
What happens is "in part an increase in the statistics of these extreme phenomena, but also the constant rhythm, the accumulation year by year (...)
a cumulative price is charged
in all of us who read these headlines," said the Georgia climate scientist Kim Cobb.
"This pattern of recent summers in the Northern Hemisphere has been quite harsh," said University of Exeter climate scientist Peter Stott.
We had warned
While the temperature rise
is "being exactly as we said 20 years ago
... what we're seeing in terms of heat waves and flooding is more extreme than we predicted back in the day," Stott said.
Germany flooded.
Photo: AP
Climate scientists say there is little doubt that climate change from
burning coal, oil and natural gas
drives extreme events.
In addition to dramatic floods and fires, heat waves are a major
risk in preparing for the future
, Guha-Sapir said.
" It
will be a very important issue in Western countries, because most susceptible to sudden peaks of heat are the elderly. And the demographic profile of people in Europe is very old ,
'' he said." The heat waves
are to be a real problem
for years to come. ''
By Seth Borenstein and Frank Jordans
ap
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