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One person died and tens of thousands lost power as the second "bomb cyclone" in a month brought snow and wind to the central U.S. Wednesday and Thursday.
Oprah Winfrey Donates $2 Million to Help Puerto Rico's Recovery From Hurricane Maria
Oprah Winfrey has donated $2 million to help Puerto Rico recover from the devastation wrought by Hurricane Maria in 2017, Reuters reported.
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At least 70 people have died in flooding caused by heavy rainfall in Iran since mid-March, as forecasts for more wet weather have prompted additional evacuations in the country's south, Al Jazeera reported Sunday.
The floods have caused hundreds of millions of dollars in damages to agriculture and water infrastructure across the country and forced thousands to flee their homes. Since March 19, around 1,900 cities and villages have been inundated, Iran's Mehr News Agency reported.
Fallen trees from 2018's Hurricane Michael are still a hazard in the Florida Panhandle, but that won't stop the 2019 hurricane season from starting June 1.
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A wildfire that broke out in Florida's Panhandle Saturday that should have been easy to contain was quicker to spread and harder to fight because of debris left over from Hurricane Michael.
The fire burned around 678 acres over the weekend and forced 20 homes to be evacuated in Bay County, AccuWeather reported. The fire burning near Allanton, Florida was 50 percent contained at only 15 acres Saturday evening when wind caused it to spread to 100 acres within an hour. Winds also pushed it south Sunday, and the Florida Fire Service described it as "stubborn."
Extreme weather events impacted close to 62 million people in 2018 and displaced more than two million as of September of that year. That's just one of the alarming findings in the UN World Meteorological Organization's (WMO) Statement on the State of the Global Climate in 2018.
"The physical signs and socio-economic impacts of climate change are accelerating as record greenhouse gas concentrations drive global temperatures towards increasingly dangerous levels," the WMO wrote in a press release announcing the report Thursday.
2018 saw record sea level rise and high land and ocean temperatures, the report found. Since the WMO first began producing the report 25 years ago, carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere have jumped from 357 parts per million (ppm) in 1994 to 405.5 ppm in 2017.
Speaking at the launch of the report, UN Secretary-General António Guterres used the findings to call for serious decision making from world leaders at the Climate Action Summit he is convening in New York on Sept. 23.
"Don't come with a speech, come with a plan," he said, according to a UN press release. "This is what science says is needed. It is what young people around the globe are rightfully demanding," he said. Two weeks ago, youth in more than 130 countries went on strike from school to protest inaction on climate change.
The report found that flooding was the climate-related disaster that impacted the largest number of people in 2018 —more than 35 million. Hurricanes Florence and Michael in the U.S. cost around $49 billion in damages and killed more than 100 people. Super typhoon Mangkhut killed at least 134 people and impacted 2.4 million, mostly in the Philippines.
WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas said that the extremes recorded for 2018 showed no sign of reversing.
"Extreme weather has continued in the early 2019, most recently with Tropical Cyclone Idai, which caused devastating floods and tragic loss of life in Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi. It may turn out to be one of the deadliest weather-related disasters to hit the southern hemisphere," Taalas said in the WMO press release. "Idai made landfall over the city of Beira: a rapidly growing, low-lying city on a coastline vulnerable to storm surges and already facing the consequences of sea level rise. Idai's victims personify why we need the global agenda on sustainable development, climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction."
The report was completed with assistance from UN agencies, national weather and hydrological services and scientists from around the world. Here are some of its other key findings.
1. Temperature: 2018 was the fourth warmest year on record, and the four warmest years on record all took place between 2015 and 2018. The average global temperature is now around one degree Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
2. Ocean Temperature: 2018 set new records for ocean heat in the top 700 meters (approximately 2,297 feet) and top 2,000 meters (approximately 6,562 feet).
3. Sea Level Rise: The global mean sea level hit a new record and was around 3.7 millimeters higher than in 2017.
4. Arctic Sea Ice: Arctic sea ice extent hit record lows for February and January of 2018. Its maximum extent in March of that year was the third lowest in the 1979 to 2018 satellite record.
5. Food Security: The report found that climate change could reverse progress made in fighting global malnutrition. In 2017, the number of people suffering from malnutrition rose to 821 million, and this was partly caused by droughts related to 2015-2016's El Niño.
6. Heat Waves and Wildfires: Between 2000 and 2016, around 125 million more people were exposed to heat waves, and the average heat wave grew 0.37 days longer compared to heat waves between 1986 and 2008. Heat waves and wildfires in the U.S., Japan and Europe in 2018 killed more than 1,600 people.
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At least 19 people have died and more than 100 have been injured in flash flooding in the south of Iran, the country's semi-official Tasnim News Agency said. The city of Shiraz in Fars province was the worst hit by the flooding, which occurred after a month's worth of rain fell in a few hours, CNN meteorologist Taylor Ward said.
Beloved nature broadcaster Sir David Attenborough will produce a new documentary for BBC One focused entirely on climate change, the network announced Friday.
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The record flooding in the Midwest that has now been blamed for four deaths could also have lasting consequences for the region's many farmers.
'The Trend Is Unmistakable': New Analysis Shows Heat Records Broken Twice as Often as Cold Ones
By Jessica Corbett
A new analysis revealed Tuesday that over the past two decades heat records across the U.S. have been broken twice as often as cold ones—underscoring experts' warnings about the increasingly dangerous consequences of failing to dramatically curb planet-warming emissions.
An early-season wildfire near Lyons, Oregon burned 60 acres and forced dozens of homes to evacuate Tuesday evening, the Oregon Department of Forestry (ODF) said, as KTVZ reported.
The initial cause of the fire was not yet known, but it has been driven by the strong wind and jumped the North Santiam River, The Salem Statesman Journal reported. As of Tuesday night, it threatened around 35 homes and 30 buildings, and was 20 percent contained.