“A rapidly growing wildfire prompting mandatory evacuations in northern Colorado is threatening to merge with the state’s largest wildfire in history, fire officials said…
“Incident Commander Noel Livingston said Thursday afternoon the fire’s growth is “really unheard of for a fire in this part of the world, in timber.””
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/10/22/us/colorado-evacuations-west-coast-fires/index.html
“On April 20, 2020, the weather station at McCarran International Airport [Las Vegas] measured 0.2 inches of rain. At the time, nobody realized that this meager rainfall would be the only measurable rain the city would see in at least half a year.
“…we were already deep into unprecedented territory. Back in September, Las Vegas had gone 151 days without rain, breaking the previous record that was set back in 1959.”
https://news3lv.com/news/local/las-vegas-has-gone-six-months-without-rain
“More than 6,500 people are still in temporary shelters after back-to-back hurricanes hit Louisiana, according to the state…
“The Department of Children and Family Services said about 6,430 people are in shelters because of Hurricane Laura’s strike on southwestern Louisiana, and more than 120 people are still out of their homes because of Hurricane Delta.”
https://www.insurancejournal.com/news/southcentral/2020/10/21/587461.htm
“Intensifying hurricanes are helping invasive species spread across the U.S.
“More than a hundred species—including Asian swamp eels and zebra mussels—hitched a ride on Hurricane Isaias’ floodwaters, scientists say.”
“Epsilon shatters records as it rapidly intensifies into major hurricane near Bermuda.
“It’s the fastest-intensifying and strongest late-season storm so far northeast in the Atlantic.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2020/10/21/hurricane-epsilon-bermuda-record/
“The most significant Arctic outbreak of the season is poised to envelop much of the western and central U.S., with frigid temperatures dropping below zero in spots early next week.
“Records will fall as the icy air mass settles south, the weather feeling more like January than October.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2020/10/22/arctic-blast-record-cold-west/
“A record-breaking snowstorm has hit the upper Midwest with some areas getting more than 10 inches of snow.
“In Minneapolis, 7.9 inches of snow fell yesterday making it the biggest snowstorm in recorded history there this early in the season.”
https://abcnews.go.com/US/record-snow-hits-upper-midwest-red-flag-warnings/story?id=73732357
“Met Office warns extreme weather in UK will get worse and more frequent:
“The UK will become hotter and wetter throughout the 21st century… with the likelihood of extreme weather events that put huge pressure on communities and infrastructure increasing, according to detailed new analysis by the Met Office.”
“Inside Crimea’s slow-burn water crisis:
“There’s reason to be concerned. Dried-up rivers, decreasing reservoirs and a bad harvest – this is what Crimea has been through in 2020 the driest year in the last 150, according to local officials. To combat the drought, the Crimean authorities have introduced a water supply timetable…”
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/odr/inside-crimeas-slow-burn-water-crisis/
“An oil slick has appeared in a bay near a ship repair plant on Russia’s Pacific coast, local media reported Thursday, marking at least the third oil spill to hit Russia this month.
“Aerial photographs showed a rainbow-colored area consistent with an oil spill on the water’s surface near the shipyard in the Far East city of Nakhodka.”
“A woman survived by hanging on to an electric power pole in Crete on Wednesday as rushing water swept away her car following torrential rains.
“The dramatic video was captured near the town of Kartero, in the region of Heraklion, as severe storms hit the northern part of the island.”
“Two years of drought have drained reservoirs in southern Morocco, threatening crops the region relies on and leading to nightly cuts in tap water for an area that is home to a million people.
“In a country that relies on farming for two jobs in five and 14 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP), the problems caused by increasingly erratic rainfall and the depletion of groundwater are growing every year.”
https://www.arabnews.com/node/1752426/business-economy
“Wajir County [Kenya] has set aside a Sh150 million emergency fund to help in the fight against drought in parts of the county.
“Some areas have already reported borehole breakdowns and also witnessed drying up of water pans and dams which are the main sources of water for pastoralist communities.”
https://allafrica.com/stories/202010220996.html
“Ethiopia struggles to suppress desert locust infestation:
Swarms of desert locusts have damaged 200,000 hectares of crops in a region already struggling with food insecurity…
“A single square-kilometre swarm can eat as much food in a day as 35,000 people.”
“Namibia has so far sprayed about 10,532 hectares of land as part of efforts to control the African migratory locusts which have broken out in parts of the country, agricultural official said Thursday…
“Namibia is looking to sign a Memorandum of Understanding with neighboring countries experiencing a similar disaster…”
https://africa.cgtn.com/2020/10/22/namibia-sprays-over-10000-hectares-of-land-to-contain-locusts/
“Storms, torrential rains and swollen rivers claimed 22 lives in the first three weeks of the 2020-2021 rainy season, according to Mozambican government spokesperson and Deputy Justice Minister, Filimao Suaze.
“Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, at the end of the weekly meeting of the Council of Ministers (Cabinet), Suaze said that, in addition to the deaths, at least a further 12 people were injured in the storms between 1 and 19 October.”
https://allafrica.com/stories/202010210861.html
“Hyderabad [India] is stinking following the massive floods.
“The stench emanating from waterlogged homes is nauseating and people cleaning them are having a tough time as they simply cannot work continuously. For the last two days, volunteers and family members cleaning the homes state that the smell is unbearable.”
“Prime Minister Hun Sen said on Wednesday that flash floods in Cambodia have so far claimed 34 lives and forced the evacuations of tens of thousands of people.
““To date, 34 people were killed, including 18 in Banteay Meanchey province,” he said while distributing relief kits to about 10,000 flood-hit families in Northwestern Banteay Meanchey province.”
https://www.khmertimeskh.com/50775728/flood-death-toll-in-cambodia-rises-to-34/
“The Korean Peninsula has been hit by five typhoons during the 2020 storm season, three of which battered North Korea in rapid succession in late August and early September…
“…for North Korea to take direct hits from three major typhoons within a span of just three weeks is historically very rare and places extreme pressure on the country’s adaptive responses.”
https://thediplomat.com/2020/10/typhoons-and-human-insecurity-in-north-korea/
“Intense rains have caused a landslide at a coal mine on Sumatra island in Indonesia that has killed 11 miners.
“The slide occurred on Wednesday in a mine tunnel about 65ft deep at Tanjung Lalang village in Muara Enim district of South Sumatra province, according to National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman Raditya Jati.”
“Forested areas greater than the size of the Netherlands have been burned in Indonesia in the past five years, with 30% of the fires occurring on pulpwood and palm oil concessions, environmental group Greenpeace said on Thursday.
“Greenpeace said analysis of official data showed 4.4 million hectares (10.8 million acres) of land burned over 2015 to 2019, with 1.3 million hectares of that lying in the concession areas.”
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/nearly-third-indonesia-forest-fires-031044539.html
“Dangerous thunderstorms are set to cause large hail and flash flooding, destroy crops and drive deadly spiders into homes across large swathes of eastern Australia over the next week.
“Triggered by a low pressure system forming over the southern centre of the country and a trough across eastern Australia, the hazardous weather will escalate when the two systems combine on Friday…”
“Extreme fire risk has increased in Masterton [New Zealand] due to climate change, an environment ministry report shows. Masterton has gained an extra week of warm days each year due to climate change from 1972 to 2019…
“New Zealand’s average annual temperature rose by 1.13 degrees Celsius from 1909 to 2019.”
https://times-age.co.nz/fire-risk-in-region-rising/
“A jaguar badly burned in the fires that ravaged Brazil’s Pantanal wetlands this year has been returned to the wild after more than a month of intensive treatment for his burns.
“Members of the veterinary team that treated the jaguar’s scorched paws with ozone and laser therapies released him Tuesday at the same spot where he was rescued, along a river in the Encontro das Aguas nature reserve in central-western Brazil.”
“For the first time since records began, the main nursery of Arctic sea ice in Siberia has yet to start freezing in late October.
“The delayed annual freeze in the Laptev Sea has been caused by freakishly protracted warmth in northern Russia and the intrusion of Atlantic waters, say climate scientists who warn of possible knock-on effects across the polar region.”
“North Pole ice cap too thin for testing Russia’s giant icebreaker…
“Currently, the entire Northern Sea Route north of Siberia from the Kara Sea to the Bering Strait is open waters. The ice cap further north has never been reported weaker and thinner than this year.”
“The events of this year are yet another sign of how incremental increases in temperature can lead to exponentially worse natural disasters, experts say…
““It’s really been a shocking escalation,” said Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the University of California at Los Angeles.”
You can read the previous ‘Climate’ thread here and visit my Patreon page here. I’ll be back over the weekend with a ‘Socio-Economic’ thread.
