by The word of summer is ‘extreme’.
Extreme flooding. Extreme heat. extreme smoke.
Report after report, scientists have predicted a climate of extremes as the Earth warms as humans continue to spew fossil fuel pollution into the atmosphere.
And now it’s here – with a dizzying array of broken records and heartbreaking scenes.
The images — a smoky Central Park in sepia, kayaks floating through the streets of Montpelier, Vermont, and full refrigeration centers in Arizona — still shock even those who expect them.
“All of this is completely consistent with what greenhouse gas warming is doing and in line with the trends we expect,” Ben Zaitchik, a professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Johns Hopkins University, said of the extreme events. “Yet there’s something that feels surprising — emotionally surprising — when you see this happening with increasing frequency and severity.”
Researchers have not yet calculated how much climate change has changed the likelihood of the specific weather conditions causing disturbances this summer. But scientists see the fingerprints of climate change hissing across the landscape this summer, and it’s playing out like a car wreck you can’t look away from. The events have rocked communities in nearly every region of North America, claiming lives, damaging homes and stealing the simple joys of summer.
This is what stands out:
-
Earth had its warmest recorded days for average global temperatures earlier this month, which some scientists believe is a signal that El Niño is kicking in and raising temperatures on top of background warming from climate change.
-
Sea surface temperatures have been at record highs since mid-March. A prolonged marine heat wave is boiling water off the coast of Florida, raising ocean temperatures about 5-7 degrees Fahrenheit above normal, according to Brian McNoldy, a senior research fellow at the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric and Earth Science. The waters off the Florida Keys have recently reached record temperatures. Oceans have absorbed about 90% of the heat trapped by greenhouse gases.
-
More acreage was burned by wildfires in Canada this year than any other year on record. A record-breaking heat wave this spring prepared Northern Canada for the fires that have burned more than 37,000 square miles of land so far, according to the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Center. Scientists predict wildfires in North America will increase as temperatures rise and fire behavior becomes more likely. A buildup of fuels from firefighting and forest management practices also contributes to the problem.
-
Twice wildfires in Canada caused smoke in the U.S. An analysis by Stanford University found this was the worst year of exposure to wildfire smoke per capita in the U.S. since at least 2006, when data first became available. There will probably be more smoke this summer.
-
A heat wave in South Texas ravaged the state for more than two weeks without interruption in June and early this month. According to data from the National Weather Service, Del Rio had 18 consecutive days with temperatures above 100 F. Nighttime temperatures brought little relief. Climate change is shifting base temperatures, making heat waves more frequent and intense.
-
Heavy precipitation pounded the Northeast earlier this week, flooding communities like Montpelier and dropping as much as 10 inches (25 cm) of rain on Vermont towns in a two-day storm, according to data from the Weather Service. Nearly a fifth of the rainfall these areas expect in a normal year fell in two days. A warmer atmosphere can hold more moisture, making extreme rainfall events more likely.
-
California’s major snowpack meltdown has inundated more than 110,000 acres of premium California farmland, sinking tractors, electrical equipment and farms. A dozen atmospheric river storms produced a pack of snow about three times the size typical this winter in the southern Sierra mountains. Because a warmer atmosphere can absorb more water vapor, atmospheric rivers are expected to grow stronger as the world warms.
-
Phoenix officials said they feared unprotected residents as the city reported its 13th day above 110 F on Thursday as a prolonged heat wave cooked the desert southwest, according to weather service data. The weekend forecast calls for high temperatures of 118 F in Phoenix. Death Valley, California, would be 130 F.
In recent years, scientists have conducted attribution studies to determine how unlikely a weather event would have been in the cooler climate of the past.
Scientists have determined that a June 2021 heat wave in the Pacific Northwest would have been “virtually impossible” if not for the effects of climate change. A peer-reviewed study found that the event would have been at least 150 times less likely if global temperatures hadn’t been warmed so much by human activity.
The events of this year have yet to be analyzed so thoroughly. But scientists see the chain of events as part of a larger, unmistakable pattern of extremes that strengthens over time.
“The individual drivers of these events — of course we can’t say anything about them right now — but overall, these are consistent with what we would expect,” Deepti Singh, an assistant professor in the school of environment at Washington State University Vancouver, said. said of record-breaking temperatures. “It is not surprising that we are seeing these simultaneous widespread extreme heat events in multiple regions around the world.”
Temperature records are also set outside North America. The “Cerberus” heat wave gripped Europe Friday, with temperatures in Greece expected to approach 110 F. The European Space Agency warned that Europe’s all-time high – of 120 F – could be surpassed next week. Heat likely contributed to more than 61,000 deaths in Europe last summer, a recent study found. New daily rainfall records were set in Japan’s Kyushu region earlier this week, according to the World Meteorological Organization.
“It’s not just in remote places,” McNoldy said. “Records are being broken in so many parts of the world at the same time and that’s not just a hit. It’s not a day here, a day there – it’s extended.”
So far, the pace of climate change has exceeded the management capabilities of most communities.
“It gives me a lot of anxiety, the start of the summer season,” Singh said. “The fact that we are seeing so many fatalities and such extreme consequences means we are unprepared and unadapted to the conditions we are experiencing.”
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
