Extreme weather events
Extreme weather or extreme climate events includes unexpected,
unusual, severe, or unseasonal weather
Many extreme events have increased in the recent decades.
new and stronger evidence confirms that some of these increases are related
to human activities.
Extreme weather has significant impacts on human society as well as natural
ecosystems.
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Examples of
extreme events
The most commonly considered
examples of extreme weather events
include:
heat waves,
cold snaps,
droughts,
extratropical or tropical cyclones,
storm surges, and tornadoes
ice or hailstorms.
heavy rainfall or snowfall,
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Extreme events examples:
Heatwaves
this phenomenon that involves high temperatures lasting for several days, has
become increasingly frequent and intense in the majority of the Earth's regions
since 1950, according to the IPCC's report.
➢ Cold snaps
Involves several days of low temperatures, has become less frequent, according to
the IPCC.
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Extreme events examples:
Tropical cyclones
According to the IPCC-The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change-, these have
become more frequent over the last four decades. Furthermore, they are proving
more destructive as they result in higher category hurricanes. All of this could well
be related with an increase of the surface temperature of the sea.
Droughts
The lack of rain in certain areas of the world, such as the Horn of Africa, is
increasingly pronounced, thereby prolonging this phenomenon and forcing
thousands of people to emigrate and become climate refugees. In addition, water
scarcity can also result in violent clashes.
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weather-events
Extreme events examples:
Torrential rains
At the same time as there may be less general rainfall due to climate change, the
rain which does fall might become more intense, resulting in typhoons capable of
causing extremely destructive flooding and swollen watercourses.
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THE CONSEQUENCES OF EXTREME WEATHER EVENTS
Extreme weather events have serious consequences with respect to
both human and animal life. Some of these are reviewed below:
Wild fires:
Heatwaves, which seriously dry out the ground, often trigger
virulent wildfires that affect entire communities, destroying homes
and damaging health due to smoke inhalation. Furthermore, the
impact on ecosystems is such that some of them never recover.
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weather-events
THE CONSEQUENCES OF EXTREME
WEATHER EVENTS
Flooding
Foold is defined as “an overflow of a large amount of water beyond its normal
limits, especially over what is normally dry land”. The IPCC highlights the high
probability that monsoon rainfalls will increase in the medium and long term,
especially in South and South-east Asia, causing terrible floods. This will have
especially serious consequences for coastal cities.
Famines : An extreme scarcity of food
Those sectors that depend on a certain degree of climate stability, such as
agriculture, are seeing their production and performance levels undermined,
thereby generating food insecurity in certain areas. The EU-European Union-
points out that these phenomena, in turn, could well cause a deterioration in water
quality.
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