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Recent extreme rainfallStorms in the southeast Africa Scientists have discovered that earlier this year was more severe and destructive due to climate change.
Scientists who are partThe World Weather Attribution groupAccording to a study, climate change has made extreme rainfall more common during back-to-back seasons. Madagascar stormsAt the beginning of this year, Mozambique and Malawi were both in place.
Between January & MarchIn just six weeks, three tropical cyclones and 2 tropical storms struck southeast Africa. MadagascarAccording to the group’s estimates, Malawi and Mozambique were two of the most affected countries. More than a million people were affected by extreme flooding and severe rainfall, and there were some 230 deaths.
Most impacts were caused by flooding — all three countries had experienced floods in the weeks preceding Ana, leaving affected communities vulnerable to further rainfall, according to the report. It states that the vulnerability was likely to be increased by conflict in northern Mozambique or drought in southern Madagascar.
Tropical storm Ana and cyclone Batsirai were forecasted and tracked, but the existence of warnings does not guarantee that they will be received and acted upon, the study’s authors say. They note that warnings were not received in certain areas due to damage to electrical grids and communication infrastructure.
“Again we are seeing how the people with the least responsibility for climate change are bearing the brunt of the impacts,” said Dr Friederike Otto,One of the leaders The World Weather AttributionGroup, a collaboration of climate scientists and disaster specialists that analyzes the impact of climate change on extreme weather events. “Rich countries should honour their commitments and increase much-needed funding for adaptation, and for compensating the victims of extreme events driven by climate change with loss and damage payments.”
The combination of high vulneribility and climate change led to “devastating” losses and damages during the cyclone season in the region, she later Tweet.
In order to assess the role of climate change on the frequency and intensity of extreme rainfall during the storms, the scientists analysed weather observations and computer simulations to compare the climate as it is today — after about 1.2°C of global warming since pre-industrial times — with that of the past.
The analysis focused on rainfall patterns in Madagascar and the area surrounding Malawi and Mozambique. Both cases showed that extreme rainfall events like these are more common due to climate change.
This finding is consistent in scientific understanding of how Climate Change affects heavy rainfall — as the atmosphere becomes warmer it gathers more water, increasing the risk of extreme rain. Scientists warn that heavy rain will increase in frequency as more greenhouse gases and temperatures rise.
The analysis showed that climate change caused storms to be more intense and more destructive, but scientists couldn’t quantify the exact contribution due the lack of detailed historical records of rainfall. The group called for greater investment in weather stations in Africa to allow for more accurate analysis in the future.
Izidine pinto, a Mozambican climate researcher and author of the study said many weather stations had been destroyed in the country’s civil war that ended 1992. He added that although the government has stated an ambition to build weather stations throughout the country, funding is still needed.
“In many governments there is no funding for research,” he told a press conference Monday. “Research is very important in this case, for example for attribution, and if we had enough station data, enough time series, enough data we would be confident enough to say this is how much climate change has contributed to this particular event.”
He said that scientists can only conclude that climate change was responsible for the increase in heavy rainfall events in these three countries.
In 2009, developed nations pledged $100 billion annually to assist developing countries in adapting to global warming by 2020. The developed world has failed to fulfill that promise. John Kerry, US climate ambassador, stated last month that he believed rich countries would fulfill the pledge this year.
Vulnerable and developing countries have also called on rich countries to compensate them for the “loss and damage” caused by the climate crisis i.e. The effects of global warming on countries that are unable or unwilling to adapt. It was a hot topic in 2008. COP26 at GlasgowBut, in the end, little progress was made.
22 researchers conducted the World Weather Attribution Study published Monday, which included scientists based in France and Mozambique.
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