Climate Change: Is extreme weather the new normal

February 28, 2019 7:07 PM | Skymet Weather Team

Number of extreme weather events have been on all time high, be it hurricane, droughts, floods, or occurrence of El Nino. Like year 2015, 2016, and 2017, 2018 too became the 4th consecutive hottest year on the earth.

Arctic blast in Canada led to bone chilling cold across the country, while severe heat wave in Melbourne left several dead. Hurricane Michael had flattened parts of the Florida Panhandle and southern Georgia, survivors of which took months to recover. Extreme drought in Cape Town had brought city to brim of collapse. Massive floods in Kerala left thousands homeless, while wildfires in California scorched 2.9 million acres.

The 20 warmest years on the earth have been recorded in the last 22 years. Average global surface temperatures have seen a rise over 1°C from pre-industrial era. In fact, the global temperatures have risen 20 times faster than the earth’s fastest natural climate change. Global sea levels have also seen 8-inch rise over the last century.  

Predictions say it would keep getting hotter and the world is heading towards for the ‘warmest decade on record’. Quite a possibility that we could break a critical threshold for climate change within the next five years.

Image Credits – theverge.com 

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