Tag Archives: Extreme Weather

Hard to believe Montana will be getting 15 inches of snow while southern states will be in a heatwave

Extreme-Weather-map-June-2024

Important Takeaways:

  • US braces for extreme weather – from southern heat wave to winter storm warnings: Map reveals where dangerous conditions will hit
  • The US will be hit with severe hot and cold weather this week
  • Montana will see up to 15 inches of snow in higher regions
  • But the northeast and south are facing a massive heatwave
  • The US National Weather service has issued heat advisories for many states in the northeast and Mid-West, including Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York State, Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jersey, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Indiana and Iowa.
  • The weather agency warned that Texas and New Mexico in the south would face extreme heat as well.
  • Experts predict that Florida’s hurricane season will likely be unusually busy.
  • The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration estimates there is an 85 percent chance that the Atlantic hurricane season will be above average.
  • It is predicting between 17 and 25 named storms in the coming months including up to 13 hurricanes and four major hurricanes. An average season has 14 named storms.

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Anticipation of El Nino system; scientists warn of more extreme weather

Luke 21:25 “And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves

Important Takeaways:

  • Activists mark Earth Day as scientists warn of more extreme weather
  • Earth Day this year follows weeks of extreme weather with temperatures hitting a record 45.4 degrees Celsius (113.7 Fahrenheit) in Thailand and another punishing heatwave in India, where at least 13 people died of heatstroke at a ceremony last weekend.
  • Scientists warned this week that killer heatwaves were putting “unprecedented burdens” on India’s agriculture, economy and public health, and undermining the country’s long-term efforts to reduce poverty, inequality and illness.
  • Average global temperatures could hit record highs this year or in 2024, driven by climate change and the anticipated return of the “El Nino” weather phenomenon, climate scientists said on Thursday.

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Head of NOAA says buckle up, more extreme weather events expected

Luke 21:25 ““And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves

Important Takeaways:

  • The US leads the world in weather catastrophes
  • The United States is Earth’s punching bag for nasty weather.
  • “buckle up. More extreme events are expected,” said Rick Spinrad, head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
  • Hurricanes. Flash floods. Droughts. Wildfires. Blizzards. Ice storms. Nor’easters. Lake-effect snow. Heat waves. Severe thunderstorms. Hail. Lightning. Atmospheric rivers. Derechos. Dust storms. Monsoons. Bomb cyclones. And the dreaded polar vortex.
  • It starts with “where we are on the globe,” North Carolina state climatologist Kathie Dello said. “It’s truly a little bit … unlucky.”
  • “It really starts with kind of two things. Number one is the Gulf of Mexico. And number two is elevated terrain to the west
  • Look at Friday’s deadly weather, and watch out for the next week to see it in action: Dry air from the West goes up over the Rockies and crashes into warm, moist air from the Gulf of Mexico, and it’s all brought together along a stormy jet stream.
  • Look at Friday’s deadly weather, and watch out for the next week to see it in action: Dry air from the West goes up over the Rockies and crashes into warm, moist air from the Gulf of Mexico, and it’s all brought together along a stormy jet stream.

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Extreme Weather events are increasing and becoming more severe according to the experts

Extreme Weather

Luke 21:25 ““And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves

Important Takeaways:

  • Fact checks: Experts say extreme weather events are increasing in severity, not decreasing
  • Data shows climate events are wreaking more havoc
  • Randall Cerveny, a rapporteur on extreme records for the United Nations and World Meteorological Organization, told USA TODAY extreme weather events are increasing in severity.
  • The data shows increasing severe weather events of many kinds, said Alison Gillespie, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration spokesperson. NOAA data shows a steady increase in billion-dollar climate events since 1980.
  • Heat waves occur three times more often now than they did in the 1960s, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.
  • Data also show increase in droughts and wild fires
  • Since 2000, the western United States has experienced some of the driest conditions on record

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More record snow for Mountain communities of California

Luke 21:25 ““And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves

Important Takeaways:

  • ‘Help Us!’ Record Snows in CA Create a Real Climate Crisis, Extreme Weather Kills 13 Across US
  • Another 5 feet of snow is possible in the Sierra Nevada Mountains this week, adding to the 46 feet of snow the area already received this season.
  • It’s a historic winter for the mountain communities of California with record snows showing no signs of letting up. Thousands were without power over the weekend, as blizzard conditions and near zero visibility caused accidents along I-80.
  • Many residents in San Bernardino County are still stranded under as much as 12 feet of snow.
  • In Big Bear, the roads in are still blocked, cutting off the community from supplies. Nina Clark a grocery store cashier in Big Bear said, “It feels like it is the end of the world or something.”
  • Store shelves are starting to empty and some gas stations are closed.
  • Almost half a million Americans from Kentucky to Michigan were in the dark Sunday after a massive front dumped heavy snow across much of the nation’s northern tier and slammed parts of the South with powerful thunderstorms, tornadoes, and wind gusts up to 70 miles per hour.
  • At least 13 people died, five in Kentucky alone.

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2021 was a year of extreme weather that cost the U.S. $145 billion in damages

Luke 21:25,26 “There will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth dismay among nations, in perplexity at the roaring of the sea and the waves, men fainting from fear and the expectation of the things which are coming upon the world; for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

Important Takeaways:

  • US experienced 20 extreme weather events in 2021 that cost $145 BILLION in damages: Hurricane Ida’s trail of destruction from Louisiana to New York racked up $75B in costs
  • These events cost $145 billion in damages and resulted in 688 deaths
  • The four tropical storms that rocket the nation had the biggest impact, costing Americans $78.5 billion – and $74 billion was just from damages during Hurricane Ida that left a trail of destruction from Louisiana to New York
  • While 2020 set the record for the most billion-dollar disasters, in 2021 ‘the extremes seemed a bit more profound than in 2020,’ Smith said.
  • The report states last year’s weather events one drought event, two flooding events, 11 severe storm events, four tropical cyclone events, one wildfire event and one winter storm event
  • Winter storms left behind the most damage… All of these disasters racked up a $24 billion bill in damages.
  • However, the deadliest events were the western drought and heat wave – combined these killed 229 people.

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At least 25 dead in Chinese province’s heaviest rains in 1,000 years

By Ryan Woo and Stella Qiu

BEIJING (Reuters) – At least 25 people have died in China’s flood-stricken central province of Henan, a dozen of them in a subway line in its capital that was drenched by what weather officials called the heaviest rains for 1,000 years.

About 100,000 people have been evacuated in Zhengzhou, the capital, where rail and road transport have been disrupted, while dams and reservoirs have swelled to warning levels while thousands of troops launched a rescue effort in the province.

City authorities said more than 500 people were pulled to safety from the flooded subway, as social media images showed train commuters immersed in chest-deep waters in the dark and one station reduced to a large brown pool.

“The water reached my chest,” a survivor wrote on social media. “I was really scared, but the most terrifying thing was not the water, but the diminishing air supply in the carriage.”

The rain halted bus services in the city of 12 million people about 650 km (400 miles) southwest of Beijing, said a resident surnamed Guo, who had to spend the night at his office.

“That’s why many people took the subway, and the tragedy happened,” Guo told Reuters.

At least 25 people have died in the torrential rains that have lashed the province since last weekend, with seven missing, officials told a news conference on Wednesday.

Media said the dead included four residents of the city of Gongyi, located on the banks of the Yellow River like Zhengzhou, following the widespread collapse of homes and structures because of the rains.

More rain is forecast across Henan for the next three days, and the People’s Liberation Army has sent more than 5,700 soldiers and personnel to help with search and rescue.

From Saturday to Tuesday, 617.1 mm (24.3 inches) of rain fell in Zhengzhou, almost the equivalent of its annual average of 640.8 mm (25.2 inches).

The three days of rain matched a level seen only “once in a thousand years”, meteorologists said.

“Such extreme weather events will likely become more frequent in the future,” said Johnny Chan, a professor of atmospheric science at City University of Hong Kong.

“What is needed is for governments to develop strategies to adapt to such changes,” he added, referring to authorities at city, province and national levels.

‘FLOOD PREVENTION DIFFICULT’

Many train services have been suspended across Henan, a major logistics hub with a population of about 100 million. Highways have also been closed and flights delayed or cancelled.

By Wednesday, media said food and water supplies had run out for hundreds of passengers stranded on a train that had stopped just beyond the city limits of Zhengzhou two days earlier.

Roads were severely flooded in a dozen cities of the province.

“Flood prevention efforts have become very difficult,” President Xi Jinping said in a statement broadcast by state television.

Dozens of reservoirs and dams breached danger levels.

Local authorities said the rainfall had caused a 20-metre breach in the Yihetan dam in the city of Luoyang west of Zhengzhou, and that the dam “could collapse at any time”.

In Zhengzhou itself, where about 100,000 people have been evacuated, the Guojiazui reservoir had been breached but there was no dam failure yet.

A raft of Chinese companies, insurers and a state-backed bank said they had offered donations and emergency aid to local governments in Henan amounting to 1.935 billion yuan ($299 million).

SCHOOLS, HOSPITALS CUT OFF

Taiwan’s Foxconn, which operates a plant in Zhengzhou assembling iPhones for Apple, said there was no direct impact on the facility.

China’s largest automaker, SAIC Motor, warned of short-term impact on logistics at its plant in the city, while Japan’s Nissan said production at its factory had been suspended.

Schools and hospitals were marooned, and people caught in the floods flocked to shelter in libraries, cinemas and even museums.

“We’ve up to 200 people of all ages seeking temporary shelter,” said a staffer surnamed Wang at the Zhengzhou Science and Technology Museum.

“We’ve provided them with instant noodles and hot water. They spent the night in a huge meeting room.”

After the First Affiliated Hospital of Zhengzhou, the city’s largest with more than 7,000 beds, lost all power, officials raced to find transport for about 600 critically ill patients.

The neighboring province of Hebei issued a storm alert for some cities, including Shijiazhuang, its capital, warning of moderate to heavy rain from Wednesday.

(Reporting by Sameer Manekar in Bengaluru, Josh Horwitz and Jing Wang in Shanghai, and Stella Qiu, Roxanne Liu, Cheng Leng, Yilei Sun, Judy Hua and Ryan Woo in Beijing; Additional reporting by Ben Blanchard in Taipei, Beijing Newsroom and Kanupriya Kapoor in Singapore; Editing by Kenneth Maxwell and Clarence Fernandez)

‘Wither away and die:’ U.S. Pacific Northwest heat wave bakes wheat, fruit crops

By Julie Ingwersen

CHICAGO (Reuters) – An unprecedented heat wave and ongoing drought in the U.S. Pacific Northwest is damaging white wheat coveted by Asian buyers and forcing fruit farm workers to harvest in the middle of the night to salvage crops and avoid deadly heat.

The extreme weather is another blow to farmers who have struggled with labor shortages and higher transportation costs during the pandemic and may further fuel global food inflation.

Cordell Kress, who farms in southeastern Idaho, expects his winter white wheat to produce about half as many bushels per acre as it does in a normal year when he begins to harvest next week, and he has already destroyed some of his withered canola and safflower oilseed crops.

The Pacific Northwest is the only part of the United States that grows soft white wheat used to make sponge cakes and noodles, and farmers were hoping to capitalize on high grain prices. Other countries including Australia and Canada grow white wheat, but the U.S. variety is especially prized by Asian buyers.

“The general mood among farmers in my area is as dire as I’ve ever seen it,” Kress said. “Something about a drought like this just wears on you. You see your blood, sweat and tears just slowly wither away and die.”

U.S. exports of white wheat in the marketing year that ended May 31 reached a 40-year high of 265 million bushels, driven by unprecedented demand from China.

But farmers may not have as much to sell this year.

“The Washington wheat crop is in pretty rough shape right now,” said Clark Neely, a Washington State University agronomist. The U.S. Agriculture Department this week rated 68% of the state’s spring wheat and 36% of its winter wheat in poor or very poor condition. A year ago, just 2% of the state’s winter wheat and 6% of its spring wheat were rated poor to very poor.

On top of the expected yield losses, grain buyers worry about quality. Flour millers turn to Pacific Northwest soft white wheat for its low protein content, which is well-suited for pastries and crackers.

But the drought is shriveling wheat kernels and raising protein levels, making the some of the crop less valuable. “The protein is so high that you can’t use (it) for anything but cattle feed,” Kress said.

Low-protein “soft” wheats have lower gluten content than the “hard” wheats used for bread, producing a less-stretchy dough for delicate cakes and crackers.

The Washington State Agriculture Department said it was still too early to estimate lost revenue from crop damage.

The heat peaked in late June, in the thick of the harvest of cherries. Temperatures reached 118 degrees Fahrenheit (48 Celsius) on June 28 at The Dalles, Oregon, along the Washington border, near the heart of cherry country.

Scientists have said the suffocating heat that killed hundreds of people would have been “virtually impossible” without climate change and such events could become more common.

The National Weather Service posted weekend heat advisories for eastern Washington.

NIGHTTIME CHERRY HARVEST; SUN NETS FOR APPLES

On the hottest days last month, laborers who normally start picking cherries at 4 a.m. began at 1 a.m., armed with headlamps and roving spotlights to beat the daytime heat that threatened their safety and made the fruit too soft to harvest.

The region should still produce a roughly average-sized cherry harvest, but not the bumper crop initially expected, said B.J. Thurlby, president of the Northwest Cherry Growers, a grower-funded trade group representing top cherry producer Washington and other Western states.

“We think we probably lost about 20% of the crop,” Thurlby said, adding that growers simply had to abandon a portion of the heat-damaged cherries in their orchards.

The heat wave’s impact on Washington’s $2 billion apple crop – the state’s most valuable agricultural product – is uncertain, as harvest is at least six weeks away. Apple growers are used to sleepless nights as they respond to springtime frosts, but have little experience with sustained heat in June.

“We really don’t know what the effects are. We just have to ride it out,” said Todd Fryhover, president of the Washington Apple Commission.

Growers have been protecting their orchards with expansive nets that protect fruit against sunburn, and by spraying water vapor above the trees. Apples have stopped growing for the time being, Fryhover said, but it is possible the crop may make up for lost time if weather conditions normalize.

The state wine board in Oregon, known for its Pinot Noir, said the timing of the heat spike may have benefited grapes. Last year, late-summer wildfires and wind storms forced some West Coast vineyards to leave damaged grapes unharvested.

Washington’s wine grapes also seem fine so far, one vineyard manager said. “I think wine grapes are situated well to handle high heat in June,” said Sadie Drury, general manager of North Slope Management.

(Reporting by Julie Ingwersen in Chicago; Editing by Caroline Stauffer and Matthew Lewis)

Extreme weather to push property insurance higher -Hippo CEO

By Noor Zainab Hussain and Carolyn Cohn

(Reuters) – Extreme weather events and shortage of labor and materials for repairs will push property insurance rates higher in the next several years, the chief executive of U.S. home insurer Hippo said on Tuesday.

As homeowners stayed home during the pandemic, their properties suffered more damage due to issues such as bathroom leaks, and it was harder to get tradespeople in to mop up, Assaf Wand, chief executive officer and co-founder of Hippo said in an interview at the Reuters Future of Insurance USA conference.

“The severity of the claims increased quite significantly,” Wand said, pointing to higher rates charged by plumbers and to buy lumber.

Those prices were likely to normalize as the U.S. economy opens up following the vaccination roll-out, but hurricanes and wildfires are leading to increased damage as more people move to disaster-prone locations, he added.

“I expect to see rates increase over the next several years,” Wand said.

“Labor and materials keep on increasing…the severity of catastrophic events keeps on increasing.”

Insurers are taking increasing note of climate change, with many fearing the rapid changes could make some premiums unaffordable, especially for customers exposed to extreme weather events.

Insurers and banks are also facing stricter regulatory scrutiny over their response to global warming, with shareholders expecting better disclosures and transparency on climate-related risks.

One advantage of the pandemic, however, was that “the world has shifted three to five years forward on digitalization,” Wand added.

Hippo in March said it would go public through a $5 billion merger with a blank-check firm backed by Silicon Valley heavyweights Reid Hoffman and Mark Pincus, in a sign of rising interest in the fast-growing “insurtech” sector.

Founded in 2015, Palo Alto-based Hippo sells homeowners insurance online.

Home insurance products offered through Hippo are currently available in 32 U.S. states, covering more than 70% of the country’s population, and the company expects its products to be available to 95% of the population by the end of 2021.

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced the insurance sector to rely heavily on technology to reach customers, helping the “insurtech” sector, which uses artificial intelligence and big data.

Both insurance and technology need to do more on inclusion, Wand said.

“These two are industries that are just not diverse enough,” Wand said, adding that Hippo was hiring data scientists and customer agents from other sectors to help improve diversity.

“We are trying to push and nudge.”

Insurtech Tractable told Reuters earlier this month that it is keen to boost diversity in a typically male-dominated sector, adding that more than 20% of its software engineers are women, above the industry average.

(Reporting by Noor Zainab Hussain in Bengaluru and Carolyn Cohn in London; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

Rare deep freeze leaves more than 2 million Texas customers without power

(Reuters) – A rare deep freeze in Texas that raised demand for power forced the U.S. state’s electric grid operator on Monday to impose rotating blackouts that left more than 2 million customers without power.

The PowerOutage.us website – an ongoing project created to track power outages – said 2,629,684 customers were experiencing outages at 9:44 a.m. ET (1444 GMT).

President Joe Biden declared an emergency on Monday, unlocking federal assistance to Texas, where temperatures on Monday ranged from minus 8 to 21 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 22 to minus 6 Celsius).

Apart from Texas, much of the United States from the Pacific Northwest through the Great Plains and into the mid-Atlantic states was in the grip of bone-chilling weather over the three-day Presidents Day holiday weekend.

The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) sought to cut power use in response to a winter record of 69,150 MW on Sunday evening, more than 3,200 MW higher than the previous winter peak in January 2018.

About 10,500 MW of customer load was shed at the highest point, enough power to serve approximately two million homes, it said, adding that extreme weather caused many generating units across fuel types to trip offline and become unavailable.

As of early Monday, it said over 30,000 MW of generation had been forced off the system, and rotating outages would likely last throughout the morning and could be initiated until the weather emergency ended.

“Every grid operator and every electric company is fighting to restore power right now,” ERCOT President and CEO Bill Magness said in a statement.

The storms knocked out nearly half the state’s wind power generation capacity on Sunday. Wind generation ranks as the second-largest source of electricity in Texas, accounting for 23% of state power supplies, ERCOT estimates.

Of the 25,000-plus megawatts of wind power capacity normally available in Texas, 12,000 megawatts were out of service on Sunday morning, an ERCOT spokeswoman said.

A level three emergency notice was issued by the regulator, urging customers to limit power usage and prevent an uncontrolled systemwide outage.

The National Weather Service said an Arctic air mass had spread southwards, well beyond areas accustomed to freezing weather, with winter storm warnings posted for most of the Gulf Coast region, Oklahoma and Missouri.

The spot price of electricity on the Texas power grid spiked more than 10,000% on Monday. [NGA/]

(Reporting by Aishwarya Nair and Diptendu Lahiri in Bengaluru; Editing by Bernadette Baum, David Goodman and Howard Goller)