Page 28 - ARUBA TODAY

A28 SCIENCE
Monday 30 July 2018

Science Says record heat, fires worsened by climate change

By SETH BORENSTEIN and derike Otto, a member of
FRANK JORDANS the team and deputy di-
Associated Press rector of the Environmental
Heat waves are setting all- Change Institute at the Uni-
time temperature records versity of Oxford.
across the globe, again. Erich Fischer, an expert on
Europe suffered its deadli- weather extremes at the
est fire in more than a cen- Swiss Federal Institute of
tury, and one of nearly 90 Technology in Zurich who
large fires in the U.S. West wasn't part of the analysis
burned dozens of homes said the authors used well-
and forced the evacuation established methods to
of at least 37,000 people make their conclusions.
near Redding, California. Georgia Tech climate sci-
Flood-inducing downpours entist Kim Cobb said the link
have pounded the U.S. East between climate change
this week. and fires isn't as strong as it
It's all part of summer — but is with heat waves, but it is
it's all being made worse becoming clearer.
by human-caused climate A devastating fire in Greece
change, scientists say. — with at least 83 fatalities
"Weirdness abounds," said — is the deadliest fire in Eu-
Rutgers University climate rope since 1900, according
scientist Jennifer Francis. to the International Disaster
Japan hit 106 degrees on Database run by the Cen-
Monday, its hottest tem- tre for the Research on the
perature ever. Records fell Epidemiology of Disasters in
in parts of Massachusetts, Brussels, Belgium.
Maine, Wyoming, Colo- In the United States on Fri-
rado, Oregon, New Mex- day there were 89 active
ico and Texas. And then An historic schoolhouse burns as the Carr Fire tears through Shasta, Calif., Thursday, July 26, 2018. large fires, consuming near-
Fueled by high temperatures, wind and low humidity, the blaze destroyed multiple homes and at
there's crazy heat in Eu- least one historic building. ly 900,000 acres, according
rope, where normally chill Associated Press the National Interagency
Norway, Sweden and Fin- Fire Center. So far this year,
land all saw temperatures of the planet, and has in- The same jet stream pat- used observations, statistics fires have burned 4.15 mil-
they have never seen be- creased the odds of re- tern caused the 2003 Euro- and computer simulations lion acres, which is nearly
fore on any date, pushing cord-setting wet events at pean heat wave, the 2010 to calculate if global warm- 14 percent higher than
past 90 degrees. So far this around half of the planet." Russian heat wave and ing increases the chances average over the past 10
month, at least 118 of these Climate change is making fires, the 2011 Texas and of the events. years.
all-time heat records have the world warmer because Oklahoma drought and A study by European scien- The first major science study
been set or tied across the of the build-up of heat- the 2016 Canadian wild- tists Friday found that the to connect greenhouse
globe, according to the trapping gases from the fires, Pennsylvania State ongoing European heat gases to stronger and lon-
National Oceanic and At- burning of fossil fuels like University climate scientist wave is twice as likely be- ger heat waves was in
mospheric Administration. coal and oil and other hu- Michael Mann said, point- cause of human-caused 2004. It was titled "More in-
The explanations should man activities. And experts ing to past studies by him global warming, though tense, more frequent and
sound as familiar as the say the jet stream — which and others. those conclusions have longer lasting heat waves
crash of broken records. dictates weather in the He said in an email that not yet been confirmed in the 21st century." Study
"We now have very strong Northern Hemisphere — is these extremes are "be- by outside scientists. The author Gerald Meehl of
evidence that global again behaving strangely. coming more common be- World Weather Attribution the National Center for At-
warming has already put "An unusually sharply kinked cause of human-caused team said they compared mospheric Research said
a thumb on the scales, up- jet stream has been stuck in climate change and in par- three-day heat measure- Friday that now it "reads
ping the odds of extremes place for weeks now," said ticular, the amplified warm- ments and forecasts for like a prediction of what
like severe heat and heavy Jeff Masters, director of the ing in the Arctic." the Netherlands, Denmark has been happening and
rainfall," Stanford Univer- private Weather Under- Climate scientists have and Ireland with historical will continue to happen as
sity climate scientist Noah ground. He says that allows long said they can't directly records going back to the long as average tempera-
Diffenbaugh said. "We the heat to stay in place link single weather events, early 1900s. tures continue to rise with
find that global warming over three areas where the like a heat wave, to human "The world is becoming ever-increasing emissions
has increased the odds of kinks are: Europe, Japan caused climate change warmer and so heatwaves of greenhouse gases from
record-setting hot events and the western United without extensive study. In like this are becoming burning fossil fuels. It's no
over more than 80 percent States. the past decade they have more common," said Frie- mystery."q