“Australia could experience its hottest day on record next week as a hot air mass building in Western Australia makes its way east…
“”We will potentially see the hottest day on record across all of Australia…
“”It is not out of the realms of possibility that we could break our highest ever recorded temperature of 50.7C at Oodnadatta, which is in South Australia.””
“The remote Kakadu town of Jabiru broke its December heat record four days in a row, as a heatwave continues to roll across the Top End.
“It is just one of several places breaking records in the Northern Territory as a wider heatwave grips most of Australia.”
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-12/record-breaking-heatwave-hits-hard-in-the-top-end/11794690
“South Australia is on track to have its driest year on record.”
“Thousands of baby grey-headed flying foxes have been abandoned by their mothers in the latest example of wildlife devastation caused by Australia’s severe drought and bushfires, which disrupted the bats’ ability to produce milk for their offspring.
“A threatened species, the grey-headed flying fox is one of the world’s largest bats…”
http://news.trust.org//item/20191212080852-d5br8/
“Brisbane has copped a badly needed drenching from a a wild storm that triggered flash flooding and left thousands of homes without power…
“East Brisbane recorded 135mm while the CBD weather station received 130.4mm.”
“Diwali is long gone and the peak crop burning season is over. But severe pollution is back in Delhi [India].
“With the national capital recording ‘severe’ category pollution again this week, experts have suggested that Delhi needs a less reactionary and more consistent and dynamic response system to battle the toxic winter smog.”
“The word we want is “biblical” – a number of KZN floods [South Africa] have surfaced this week, and the amount of rain that’s hit the province is scarcely believable…
“Part of the M4 highway has been closed off after Umhlanga.. Entire streets have been washed away…”
“Aid workers in Angola are appealing for help in the country’s south, where they say climate change is causing a crisis for up to 2.3 million people. Paolo Balladelli of the United Nations said that’s how many people were affected at the height of this year’s drought.
““Temperatures in 2019 were the highest in 45 years and drought is driving increasing hunger and malnutrition, especially in Cunene, Huíla, Bié and Namibe provinces,” Balladelli said.”
https://www.ooskanews.com/story/2019/12/angola-drought-affects-23-million-people_179024
“The government says Poland has one of the worst rates of water scarcity in Europe: witness the last two years of drought, which cut crop yields and even left some towns out of water.
“Other European countries also fared badly this summer, with farming hit in France, Belgium and Lithuania, according to the European Drought Observatory, part of the European Commission.”
http://news.trust.org/item/20191212085225-xemel
“The hottest day on record in the UK, on 25 July this year, caused the deaths of more than 200 additional people than usual, according to official figures…
“The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said more people died on 25 July than any other day in the three months from July to September this year as the thermometer hit a record-breaking 38.7C (102F).”
“Crescent, Iowa — Frogs, carp and bugs thrived all summer in murky floodwaters where Gene Walter should have planted corn and soybeans.
“Last year’s ruined crop spilled from metal storage bins that burst nine months ago when the Missouri River surged through two levees near his southwest Iowa farm.”
“Near-record high water levels on the Great Lakes could increase the threat of coastal erosion and lakeshore flooding this winter.
“The average water level for the lakes during November was within half a foot of record levels on Lake Superior as well as Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. Lake Erie and Lake Ontario were just over half a foot below their record level for this time of year.”
“”Alaska is built for the cold. Anchorage set a December record high on Monday, and schools were closed. Why?
“Fifty degrees turned roads into skating rinks,” Thoman said, referring to the 51-degree high temperature the NWS recorded in Anchorage on, Monday, Dec. 9, a mark that broke the old record of 48 that was set in 1992 and tied in 1999 and 2005.”
https://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/what-happens-when-americas-coldest-state-warms-up/643127
“This has become the new norm across the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta. Late winters and sudden thawing have turned roads into slush and made rivers and sloughs, which are necessary for travel, less safe because they take longer to freeze…
“There have been reports of little to no sea ice on the Bering Sea coast, which means less protection for coastal villages when winter storms pop up.”
“The Arctic is warming, and its sea ice is melting, prompting fevered dreams of ever-easier access, and a renewed jockeying among Arctic nations for status, profit and ownership…
“…covetous eyes gaze upon the Northwest Passage, more so as Arctic ice retreats; establishing authority over the Passage proffers the prospect of establishing control over access, and there is no consensus as to where that authority lies.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/dec/12/bering-strait-northwest-passage-arctic-ice-melts
“The results are bad news for efforts to tackle climate change now. The research implies today’s warming will lead to a more rapid decline in Arctic sea ice than most models suggest…
“The work also goes some way to explaining why the rapid loss of Arctic sea ice seen in recent years – 2012 saw summer ice diminish to its lowest extent ever – is at the more extreme end of what climate models expected.”
“Satellite sleuthing reveals that Greenland summers now are warm enough to create 27 percent more lakes than 20 years ago, and at higher elevations…
“…ponding of meltwater can “darken” the ice sheet’s surface and lead to further melting…”
“Minister of Rural Development and Local Government Kazim Hosein [Trinidad] says his team is on the ground and responding to flood victims throughout the county.
“Hosein said the Municipal Emergency Operations Centre of the ministry has been partially activated following reports of flooding, mainly in south Trinidad.”
Heavy rains in Bogota, Colombia turn the city into a temporary ‘Venice’. “The Fire Department of Bogotá, as well as the Police and the District Mobility Secretariat are attending the emergency.”
Pictures:
“In a day in which once again the temperature exceeded 35 °, at dawn today more than 33 thousand users do not have electricity service in the City of Buenos Aires [Argentina] and the Buenos Aires metropolitan area.
“In the early hours of yesterday, a time of low demand, the peak had reached 40,000 homes.”
“Soaring temperatures in November have seen a growing demand for at-home air conditioning units, as Kiwis look to stay cool in unseasonably sweltering weather.
“With NIWA recently revealing November 2019 to be New Zealand‘s hottest November on record (since records began in 1909), it is unsurprising that people are looking for effective ways to cool their homes.”
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