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UN: Freak Weather a Warning to Step Up Climate Defences

             

Houses inundated in York, England after torrential rain caused rivers to burst banks. Damages are set to run into the billions of pounds (Flickr/ Alh1)

CLICK HERE - The United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNISDR) - Facing the new abnormal

After severe flooding and shock tornadoes, now is time get serious about precautionary steps to counter climate impacts says UN disaster chief

climatechangenews.com - by Alex Pashley - December 30, 2015

Governments have been told to face a “new abnormal” of extreme weather after a wave of natural disasters wrought death and economic damage around the world in recent days.

Heavy flooding in Britain and South America, and devastating tornadoes in the US has laid bare the lack of official preventative measures, Margareta Wahlstrom, head of the UN’s disaster risk reduction agency said on Tuesday.

They highlighted how climate change-linked events were becoming harder to predict as the planet overheats, she said.

Implementing an UN-backed framework to protect people against climate impacts agreed by 187 states earlier this year was “critical”, the official at the Geneva-based agency said.

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El Niño Strengthens Amid Warning Millions Could Face Hunger and Disease

             

Sea surface temperatures in October -- orange-red colors are above normal.

cnn.com - by Brandon Miller and Nick Thompson - December 30, 2015

If you're wondering why your white Christmas didn't arrive as scheduled this year, meteorologists have a two-word answer: El Niño.

This year's El Niño weather event -- characterized by warming waters in the eastern Pacific Ocean -- is already one of the three strongest ever recorded. NASA says El Niño conditions are still strengthening, and it could even rival the intensity of the record 1997 event that wreaked worldwide weather havoc.

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Relief Effort Underway for Flood-Ravaged Chennai in India

             

People walk through a flooded street in Chennai, India, Thursday, Dec. 3, 2015. The heaviest rainfall in more than 100 years has devastated swathes of the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, with thousands forced to leave their submerged homes, schools and offices. ( AP Photo) Associated Press

CLICK HERE - #ChennaiRains Resource Center

cnn.com - by Archith Seshadri - December 7, 2015

Chennai, a city of 4.6 million people on India's southeast coast, is reeling from some of the heaviest and deadliest rains in decades. . . .

"The value of Wi-Fi access cannot be underestimated," said Sharanya Manivanan of Chennai. "Phone lines were down for days, but those with Internet access were able to make things happen.”

Tech workers created a crowdsourcing site called www.chennairains.org so people can find sources of food and shelter using their smartphones or computers.

Drinking water is a megaproblem . . .

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

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U.N. Study: Natural Disasters Caused 600,000 Deaths Over 20 Years

CLICK HERE - STUDY - The Human Cost of Weather Related Disasters

Extreme weather caused nearly $2 trillion in economic losses

time.com - by Melissa Chan - November 23, 2015

Natural disasters have killed more than 600,000 people and left behind trillions of dollars in damages in the last two decades, the United Nations said Monday.

Hundreds of floods, storms, heat waves and droughts have left about 606,000 people dead and 4.1 billion injured or homeless around the world since 1995, according to a U.N. report.

The extreme weather-related calamities also caused nearly $2 trillion in economic losses.

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Satellites Expose Just How Bad Indonesia’s Fires Are

An image taken by German satellite TET-1, superimposed over one taken by NASA's MODIS, show just how many fires in Indonesia there were on September 24, 2015. DLR

Image: An image taken by German satellite TET-1, superimposed over one taken by NASA's MODIS, show just how many fires in Indonesia there were on September 24, 2015. DLR   

wired.com - November 9th, 2015 - Chelsea Leu

Indonesia has been aflame for a couple months now. That happens every fall—the country’s fire season is severe—but this time around, things are the worst they’ve been in almost two decades. This year’s crazy-strong El Niño has desiccated the region’s peat beds, while palm oil plantations exacerbate the problem by cutting down trees and draining the normally soggy land.

All that dry stuff adds up to create a big, flaming environmental catastrophe.

(VIEW COMPLETE ARTICLE)

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New Report Finds Human-Caused Climate Change Increased the Severity of Many Extreme Events in 2014

The report, "Explaining Extreme Events of 2014 From a Climate Perspective," can be viewed online. (Credit: Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society)

CLICK HERE - REPORT - Explaining Extreme Events of 2014 from a Climate Perspective

noaanews.noaa.gov - November 5, 2015

Human activities, such as greenhouse gas emissions and land use, influenced specific extreme weather and climate events in 2014, including tropical cyclones in the central Pacific, heavy rainfall in Europe, drought in East Africa, and stifling heat waves in Australia, Asia, and South America, according to a new report released today. The report, “Explaining Extreme Events of 2014 from a Climate Perspective” published by the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, addresses the natural and human causes of individual extreme events from around the world in 2014, including Antarctica. NOAA scientists served as three of the five lead editors on the report.

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East Africa on Alert for El Niño Deluge

Thomson Reuters Foundation - trust.org - by SciDev.Net - Gilbert Nakweya - October 29, 2015

Floods, disease and crop losses expected in coming months

Kenya has built camps for displaced people and is ready for cholera

East African farmers may face drought after the rains

[NAIROBI] East African countries near the equator are bracing for high El Niño-related rainfall that meteorologists warn may cause floods, crop losses and disease in the coming months.   The region is set to experience much more rain than usual during the October-December wet season, and possibly until early next year, forecasts say — although the rains may be less heavy than those experienced during the powerful 1997-98 El Niño ocean warming event.   The World Meteorological Organization (WMO), Kenya Meteorological Department, Tanzania Meteorological Agency and Uganda National Meteorological Authority have issued warnings about the risks associated with higher rainfall.   The Famine Early Warning Systems Network says flooding along rivers and lakes, such as Lake Victoria, and flash floods in lowland areas of Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia and Tanzania are likely to force people from their homes, lead to crop and livestock losses, and make it difficult for people to access food and work.

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Deadly Heat Is Forecast in Persian Gulf by 2100

          

Pilgrims in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, in September. A new study predicts heat and humidity levels “intolerable to humans.”  
Credit Ahmad Masood/Reuters

CLICK HERE - STUDY - Future temperature in southwest Asia projected to exceed a threshold for human adaptability

nytimes.com - by JOHN SCHWARTZ - October 26, 2015

By the end of this century, areas of the Persian Gulf could be hit by waves of heat and humidity so severe that simply being outside for several hours could threaten human life, according to a study published Monday. Because of humanity’s contribution to climate change, the authors wrote, some population centers in the Middle East “are likely to experience temperature levels that are intolerable to humans.” . . .

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Puerto Vallarta Spared by Hurricane Patricia

Hurricane Patricia was forecasted to bring catastrophic damage to Mexico’s coast and put the popular tourist destination of Puerto Vallarta on high alert.

Friday afternoon forecasters said that Hurricane Patricia was the strongest hurricane ever recorded packing winds of over 200 MPH, many referring to the storm as a Category 6 storm on a scale 1-5.

For two days Hurricane Patricia was expected to bring 3-5 meter storm surges, 10 inches of rain, and hurricane force winds to Puerto Vallarta when it made landfall between Manzanillo and Puerto Vallarta late Friday afternoon.

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