Is this already climate change?

Permanent high in March - Expert with details about current weather

Created: 03/22/2022, 22:49

By: Matthew Bieber

Lots of sun in March: Here the view from the paradise in Possenhofen (Starnberg district) onto the bathing jetty.

© Ulrich Wagner/imago

The weather is going crazy!

No rain is in sight.

Is this the weather or is it climate change?

That's what the expert says on World Meteorology Day (March 23).

Munich - The weather extremes are increasing, that's no longer a secret - on World Weather Day on March 23, we're talking to an expert about it: Dominik Jung, meteorologist from

, and his colleagues are particularly surprised by the abrupt change from February's storms to March's all-time high.

"Like someone flipped the switch.

Since the storms, we have had high after high.”

March 2022 sunny and also the driest

And March should remain sunny and warm: "April is expected to be above-average humidity, but that doesn't have to be the case, because the forecast change is being pushed back more and more," says Jung.

Everything indicates that March will be the sunniest since weather records began - and also the driest.

World Meteorology Day

World Meteorological Day is March 23rd.

World Weather Day commemorates the entry into force of the convention establishing the WMO (World Meteorological Organization) in 1950.

The WMO was founded as the successor organization to the IMO (International Meteorological Organization) of 1873.

According to its own statements, the German Weather Service (DWD) has represented the Federal Republic of Germany as a member of this international organization since 1954.

Weather or climate?

For the meteorologist, that's a consequence of climate change, although he doesn't like the word.

“As long as the earth has existed, there has been climate change.

I call it global warming, which has never been measured before.” It is clear that only the whole of humanity can change this.

Young doesn't believe in it.

"It doesn't help if we separate the garbage in Europe, but China or India blow out the carbon dioxide."

weather from one extreme to the other

Regardless of the climate, the weather is currently in turmoil: colorful crocus meadows as in the photo in the Old Botanical Garden, but recently there was still a lot of snow in Istanbul at the Sultan Ahmed Mosque.

The explanation is logical: "The low-pressure areas have to go somewhere if they can't get through Germany," the weather expert puts it.

Greece also recently suffered from the onset of winter with snow and constant rain.

Spring in Munich: A crocus meadow blooms in the Old Botanical Garden.

© Jens Hartmann/tz

The glacier melt in the Antarctic is probably alarming, where minus 12.2 degrees were measured on March 18 at the Concordia research station.

Cold for us, for the deepest south of the world an "extraordinary and unprecedented heat", as the World Weather Organization (WMO) describes it.

Even if the experts disagree on the effects (the forecasts range from a sea rise of between 50 centimeters and three meters) - "despite all the disagreement, the rise in temperatures is striking," says Jung.

The storms also seem to be getting more devastating - "the Ukraine war has pushed aside the catastrophes around Sydney in Australia's east," says Jung, "but flooding and heavy rain have never been so bad."

Rescue workers in a lifeboat in Camden, a south-west suburb of Sydney.

© Dean Lewins/dpa

The weather in Spain is also going crazy: "In Madrid, but also on the eastern Mediterranean coast in Barcelona and especially in Valencia, it's raining all the time," says Jung.

"And this will continue for the next seven to ten days with up to 200 liters per square meter!"

Just a few days ago, Spain was also affected by a phenomenon that we know well: Saharan dust.

The photo from the Navacerrada ski area around 30 kilometers north of Madrid shows that our weather is increasingly built on sand.

Sahara dust in Spain: A ski slope in the Navacerrada ski area is covered with dust after the storm "Celia".

© Rafael Bastante/dpa

 This is behind the Sahara dust cloud

Yellow-brownish streaks everywhere you look - this is what it looked like after Saharan dust was blown across western Europe.

The small grains of sand from Africa covered cars, windows and floors from Spain to Bavaria.

At the TH Rosenheim, the sand has now been examined by Prof. Dr.

Michael Müller under the microscope under the microscope.

The astonishing thing came to light: the dust grains range in size from one micrometer to 200 nanometers.

A micrometer is equal to 0.000001 meter - i.e. one millionth of a meter.

A nanometer is one millionth of a millimeter.

For comparison: The smallest bacteria have a size of 300 nanometers.

According to the expert in nanotechnology, this fineness is "extraordinary and special", normal grains of sand are between five and 50 micrometers in size.