“We are seeing an uptick of extreme weather events to the tune of about a tripling since the 1980s.”
In fact, some climate scientists think a new term for the most extreme weather may be needed because the usual way of characterizing the events fails to capture how they keep getting more dramatic.
Cars sit abandoned on the flooded Major Deegan Expressway in the Bronx, N.Y., following a night of heavy wind and rain from the remnants of Hurricane Ida, Sept. 2, 2021. “One of the issues with ‘extreme’ is that once you’ve used that word, it’s kind of hard to talk about what it looks like when you have bigger extremes,” Barlow told Yahoo News. Johan Rockström, head of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, told the New York Times on Tuesday that recent weather events are increasingly “super-extremes.”
The fact that “extreme weather” can refer to both a bad hurricane and an utterly devastating one might cause people to underestimate the increasing severity of these events. “One aspect of that, that I’m not sure people always get, is that they look at the last six months or nine months and say these extreme heat waves, even in Canada, the fire season season, the flooding even in Central Park, and think, this is the new normal. And it’s not; this is just a way station,” Barlow said.
Adapting to the constantly worsening weather is especially difficult, because areas are often being hit with uncharacteristically extreme weather. Just as southern cities are suddenly having to contend with snow, usually cool areas are seeing abnormal heat waves.
Malaysia Latest News, Malaysia Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Severe natural disasters expose Asia's lack of insurance protectionExtreme weather exposed the enormity of Asia's underinsurance against natural disasters due to climate change, compared to the rest of the world.
Read more »
Measuring climate change: It's not just heat, it's humidityScientists say measuring climate change by temperature alone doesn't accurately reflect how bad global warming really is getting.
Read more »
Extreme heat driven by climate change is 'new normal' for oceans, study findsThe heat extremes, driven by climate change, put critical marine ecosystems like coral reefs, seagrass meadows and kelp forests at risk of collapse.
Read more »
This CRISPR startup thinks that mammoths can save the Arctic. Is it right?Colossal says that its plans to create a mammoth-elephant hybrid could ultimately help conservation and climate change.
Read more »
Honduras players forced off due to 'extreme climate conditions' in World Cup qualifier against USTwo players for the Honduras national team were forced off at halftime in Wednesday's 3-0 World Cup qualifying defeat to the US due to 'extreme climate conditions,' the federation said.
Read more »