by Hundreds of people have died across Asia in recent weeks as the region grapples with blistering temperatures. And a new study determined an initial factor in how it happened.
Last month, many areas in India saw temperatures well above triple digits. The country’s meteorological service says yes heat waves uncommon between March and June, with May being the “peak month” for the extreme weather event. In Bagdora, India, last month, temperature hit almost 115 degrees Fahrenheit as the India Meteorological Department issued a red alert warning, meaning that extreme heat was expected to continue for more than two days and there was a very high probability of heat-related illnesses.
Elsewhere in the country, it was so hot that schools were cancelled, an issue people in the Philippines were also facing. Officials in Thailand also asked people to stay indoors when possible to avoid the heat, as dozens of people had already died from heat-related illnesses. According to the Associated Press, the April heat killed at least 28 people in Bangladesh, five in India and three in Gaza.
And according to the World Weather Attribution organization, it all boils down to two words – climate change.
“The heat wave exacerbated the precarious conditions faced by internally displaced people, migrants and those in refugee camps and conflict zones across West Asia,” said a new study from the organization. “… The extreme heat has forced the closure of thousands of schools in South and Southeast Asia.”
Researchers said that although the type of heat that existed during this time is not “very rare,” it is only being increased by climate change, which is driving climate change. global warming mainly burning fossil fuels.
West Asia is expected to receive the extreme heat event once a decade, and in the Philippines, that probability is even less, about once every 20 years when El Niño is not in play. In South Asia in general, extreme heat is not common.
“A very warm April like this one is a rarer event, with a 3% probability of occurring in a given year – or once every 30 years,” researchers said, adding that observations and data models show that change human-caused climate. it creates “a strong increase in probability and intensity.”
“In the Philippines, the change in probability is so great that the event would be impossible without human-caused climate change,” they said. “In West Asia, climate change increased the probability of the event by about 5.”
Average April temperatures in South Asia, which the group studied twice in the past two years since other extreme events, are “now about 45 times more likely and 0.85 degrees Celsius warmer,” they found.
“It seems like a broken record – yes! But the heat is still under-reported, under-recorded and extremely deadly,” said Friederike Otto, who is part of the World Weather Attribution study, on the social media. “The world is not prepared for today’s climate change, let alone the future.”
Extreme heat is “becoming the silent killer,” Ko Barrett, deputy secretary-general of the World Meteorological Organization, said in April.
“Heat-related mortality Under-reporting is widespread so the true scale of premature deaths and economic costs – in terms of reduced labor productivity, agricultural losses, and stress on the power grid – are not accurately reflected in the statistics,” she said.
The report from the World Weather Attribution came a day before another report from the WMO found that this April was the warmest on record and the 11th month in a row record temperature around the world.
The average surface air temperature last month was 15.03 degrees Celsius, about 59 degrees Fahrenheit, more than 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer than pre-industrial times. Scientists have warned that if the planet continues to warm at that 1.5 threshold, it could have a significant impact on weather events leading to global issues of food and water availability, migration and infrastructure.
“It was accompanied by record high temperatures high impact weather events — including intense heat in many parts of Asia,” the WMO said. countries, affecting millions of students.”
It will take years from this ongoing breach of 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels for the planet to officially mean that humans have failed to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement and sent the world into a more catastrophic climate era. However, 11 months of record heat – and possibly longer – show “early signs of being dangerously close to exceeding the long-term limit,” says the United Nations.
“Every fraction of a degree of warming is important. With each additional increase in global warming, extreme changes and risks become greater,” says the international agency. “… We need to lower the global emissions curve – and the production and consumption of coal, oil and gas – starting now. There are a wide range of solutions.”
Arshad R. Zargar contributed to this report.
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