This year to be among three hottest on record: 'extraordinary weather' - U.N.

Nov. 6, 2017

BONN, Germany (Reuters) - This year will be among the three hottest on record in a new sign of man-made climate change that is aggravating “extraordinary weather” such as hurricanes, droughts and floods, the United Nations said on Monday.

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“2017 is set to be in top three hottest years,” the U.N.’s World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said, projecting average surface temperatures would be slightly less sweltering than a record 2016 and roughly level with 2015, the previous warmest.

And 2017 would be the hottest on record without a natural El Nino event that releases heat from the Pacific Ocean about once every five years, it said. El Nino boosted global temperatures in both 2015 and 2016.

“We have witnessed extraordinary weather,” WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas said in a statement of 2017, pointing to severe hurricanes in the Atlantic and Caribbean, temperatures above 50 degrees Celsius (122°F) in Pakistan, Iran and Oman, monsoon floods in Asia and drought in East Africa.

“Many of these events – and detailed scientific studies will determine exactly how many – bear the tell-tale sign of climate change caused by increased greenhouse gas concentrations from human activities,” he said.

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While it said there was no clear evidence whether climate change made hurricanes more frequent, when storms do take place warmer temperatures aggravate downpours, and higher sea levels can worsen storm surges, it said.

Among other extremes, monsoon floods killed 1,200 people in India, Bangladesh and Nepal, the WMO said. Severe wildfires, stoked by heat and drought, killed 64 people in Portugal, at least 41 in California and 11 in Chile.

A few places had record cold against the overall warming trend, such as -25.4C (-13.7°F) in Bariloche, Argentina, in July.

The warming air in the Arctic is causing a weakening of the winds around the Arctic, causing more frequent episodes of southward intrusion of Arctic air into Canada & the U.S. I would guess the same thing is happening in the southern hemisphere, involving the Antarctic, which would affect Bariloche.