From the “weather is not climate” department, more chilling news from the southern hemisphere.
Guest post By Alexandre Aguiar
MetSul Weather Center via ICECAP
A brutal and historical cold snap has so far caused 80 deaths in South America, according to international news agencies. Temperatures have been much below normal for over a week in vast areas of the continent. In Chile, the Aysen region was affected early last week by the worst snowstorm in 30 years. The snow accumulation reached 5 feet in Balmaceda and the Army was called to rescue people trapped by the snow.
In Argentina, the snow in the region of Mendoza, famous for its winery, was described by local
meteorologists as the heaviest in a decade. The temperature in the morning of July 16th was the lowest in the city of Buenos Aires since 1991: -1.5C. The cold snap caused a record demand for energy and Argentina had to import electricity from Brazil. Many industries in Argentina were shut down due to gas shortage.
It snowed in nearly all the provinces of Argentina, an extremely rare event. It snowed even in the western part of the province of Buenos Aires and Southern Santa Fe, in cities at sea level.
The most famous beach of Argentina, Mar del Plata, was whitened by the snow in the morning of July 15th, a scene only seen in recent memory in 1991, 2004 and 2007. See below:
The snow was heavy even in Northern Argentina. In Santiago Del Estero, according to media reports, some areas experienced snow for the first time in living memory. In the province of Tucuman, some town saw snow for the first time since 1921 (Gaceta de Tucuman newspaper).
In Uruguay, there were widespread reports of sleet and even snow mixed with rain in towns in the Southern and Eastern part of the country, even in the capital Montevideo. At leas two deaths have been blamed in Uruguay on the low temperatures. Hospitals were packed with patients with respiratory illness.
In Paraguay, at least nine people died due to the cold weather in only 3 days. Cattle were very affected and one thousand animals died of hypothermia. In Bolivia, dozes of people died in consequence of the very low temperatures. In some areas of the nation the cold period was described as the worst in 15 years. It even snowed in the Chaco of Bolivia, one of warmest areas of South America, where the local population never saw snow before. Classes were suspended in Bolivia for three days to prevent more cold related deaths (El Nacional newspaper from Bolivia).
Southern Brazil was also very affected by the cold air eruption from the Southern Pole. Last week the temperature dropped to -7.8C in the city of Urupema, Santa Catarina. In Rio Grande do Sul, in the hills of the state, temperature felt to -4.9C in the city of Cambara. In the state of Paran�, the low was -6C. Only the nights were freezing, but the afternoons were very cold. In some days, temperature failed to reach 5C in many towns, the first time in a decade. Flurries observed in towns of Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina and Parana and sleet was also reported in Western Santa Catarina.
The most striking scenes came from the top of Morro da Igreja, a 1800 meters elevation in the state of Santa Catarina. The area recorded snow and freezing rain. As anyone can imagine, freezing rain is extremely rare in Southern Brazil. The event was witnessed and photographed by weather observers from MetSul Marcelo Albieri and Caio Souza.
On July 14th, in the afternoon hours, temperatures in the hills of Rio Grande do Sul state in Southern Brazil were lower than in Marambio, the main polar base of Argentina in Antarctica. In Central Brazil, in the tropics, the long streak of cold days was considered extremely rare. It was so cold that thousand of animals died in this region of Brazil known for its cattle, just South of the Amazon basin.
Maybe the most notable fact took place in North South America. The cold reached Amazon and temperatures felt to as low as 7C in towns in the Amazon Forest in the states of Acre and Rondonia. Temperature even felt in Roraima, where the state capital Boa Vista record 20C (normal lows are 25C) and the wind were blowing from the South.
Boa Vista is located at 2 degrees North of latitude, so the influence of the Antarctic cold blast crossed the Equator line and reached towns in the Northern Hemisphere. It would be the same of a cold snap from the Arctic crossing the entire North America continent, the Caribbean and reaching North Brazil in cities at 2 degrees South of latitude as Santarem, a bizarre situation.
PDF here.
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Dying or resting?
Jim D says:
July 20, 2010 at 9:36 pm
Do you know that your adored prophet is a member of the board of directors of Google?
Paul Vaughan says: July 21, 2010 at 3:13 am
“See May 1989.”
Yes, I stand corrected, June had the 3rd highest positive anomaly in the historical record, following May 1989 and July 1979. Also, interesting is that the 4th highest positive anomaly was June 1989, and three of the top 15 highest positive anomalies occurred in 1999, Dec, Oct and May. Could be happenstance, or a 10 year cycle.
Paul Vaughan says: July 21, 2010 at 6:09 am
“I belong to a discussion group where this stuff has been thrown around”
Really good stuff in there, it will take a weekend for me to dig through and absorb. Thank you.
OT but very important: Pachauri’s TATA accused of fraud in Chile:
Frez Arturo Nahum and Sunday, two of the five former executives of the multinational Tata accused in the Civil Registry, only a firm must meet monthly for one year and 30 hours of community service. This was decided yesterday, the Seventh Court of Guarantee, to grant the request for conditional stay of proceedings requested by the prosecutor Alejandra Godoy. This means that if the former managers comply with these measures will be dismissed from the case.
Another benefit from this alternative outlet was the key witness in the case, Flavio Venturini, who presented various backgrounds regarding the alleged fraud that the multinational concrete plans with former service director Guillermo Arenas. In total, 14 defendants who received the suspension.
The court also sentenced in court shortened to 541 days in prison and a fine of 1 UTM to the Civil Registry former aides Victor Araya, Luz Hernandez and Paula Espinosa, for the crime of fraud to the Treasury, following the diversion of monies to the U . Santiago.
Today will continue the hearing, which discussed the preparation of the trial of Arenas, former rector of the Usach Ubaldo Zúñiga and general manager of Tata, Henry Manzano.
Source http://diario.latercera.com/2010/07/21/01/contenido/9_33073_9.shtml
——–Ken Hall………the winter Olympics were on the WEST COAST of Canada ! Vancouver is on the Pacific not the Atlantic. Cheers.
Green-go Americans in CONUS tend to have a mental block about everything outside “The Land of the Round Doorknob” (aka to military personnel as “The World”). But it does seem strange in this day and age of worrying about everything and everybody, that we’re not hearing more about our neighbors in the Southern Hemisphere. (sarc on) I can’t believe the MSM are sitting on this news for some reason related to AGW (sarc off). Thanks for the update!
Jimbo says:
July 21, 2010 at 5:07 am
100s in Russia because of a heatwave???? How about the 25,000 exess weather deaths in tiny UK???????????
To be fair, the population of russia is only twice that of the UK. The UK is very densely populated.
Some of the UK’s population is very dense indeed.
While snow is pounding the southern hemisphere, record-breaking heat waves hit the northern hemisphere, floods kill over 1,000 people, and droughts reduce farmland to wasteland as crops become unharvestable. The EXACT SAME THING happened last northern winter, but in reverse – the US got hit with a wallop of snow in all 50 states, while Canada basked in temperatures 4C above normal on average nationwide. Heavy snow hit southern France, Spain, Italy, Eastern Europe, and Moscow, while parts of England were colder than Moscow. An abnormal weather pattern affected the flow of the Gulf Stream and diverted winds out of the Arctic over the landmasses of North America, Europe and Asia, while the warm oceans, holding much more accumulated heat content than the atmosphere, poured their heat toward the Arctic, disrupting the ice refreeze. Next, a switch took place and windstorms started hitting Europe, but most of the colder temperatures withdrew toward the Arctic and the melt season started late. The winter storms killed close to 1,000 people in the northern hemisphere, while droughts and floods hit Africa, more flooding and dead fish turned up in Brazil, and record-breaking thunderstorms, hailstorms and a tornado hit Australia. Now, the extra heat is pouring back into the Northern Hemisphere, and it keeps accumulating.
It’s summer in the Northern Hemisphere, and a global heat wave hits the Northern Hemisphere, affecting North America, Europe, Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and the Indian Subcontinent. No, this isn’t just a normal change in the seasons. Something about the seasons themselves is changing, and the precipitation patterns are changing more than the temperatures, which by themselves are changing as well. This is consistent with AGW projections, with one key difference: a lot of the expected effects are occuring much sooner than predicted.
Some people will focus on one thing, and one thing only: the fact that cold weather, snow storms and winter-like extreme weather is happening somewhere, someplace in the world, and forget that on average, things are still getting warmer and more extreme. When a cold wave and snow storms hit the southern US, fewer people believed in AGW as a result. When summer returned to the northern hemisphere, the same people who no longer believed in AGW turn to the southern hemisphere to look for any evidence at all of colder weather, and they find it. But the fact that extreme heat and extreme cold are occurring simultaneously is neither contradictory nor does it cancel out the effects of any climate trend. That would be like saying that because both floods are droughts are increasing or becoming more apparent, that there can be no change at all in precipitation. But it’s not just the precipitation itself that changes, it’s the precipitation patterns. Same with temperatures, except this time there is a trend, and one aspect of the trend is that everything is getting more erratic and severe, and this may prove global warming simply because we are shifting from an equllibrium to a steady increase, but while that increase occurs we can have both warming in some areas and cooling in others. Due to the non-linear nature of such a change, this does not contradict the greenhouse gas global warming theory. We’re not just getting the averages anymore. We’re getting the start of the extremes.
AstroH says:
“Some people will focus on one thing, and one thing only: the fact that cold weather, snow storms and winter-like extreme weather is happening somewhere, someplace in the world, and forget that on average, things are still getting warmer and more extreme.”
Exactly what ‘extreme’ weather is getting more extreme?
You pretend to give both sides of the argument, then pronounce your belief that CAGW is upon us.
No Sale.
AstroH says:
July 21, 2010 at 6:57 pm
“[…]This is consistent with AGW projections, […]”
I’m sure one of the 800 peer-reviewed studies Gavin Schmidt recommends projects exactly what you’re saying.
Same with temperatures, except this time there is a trend, and one aspect of the trend is that everything is getting more erratic and severe, and this may prove global warming simply because we are shifting from an equllibrium to a steady increase, but while that increase occurs we can have both warming in some areas and cooling in others. Due to the non-linear nature of such a change, this does not contradict the greenhouse gas global warming theory. We’re not just getting the averages anymore.
We’re getting the start of the extremes.
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Actually…we’re getting to the END of the extreme…madness…that is…the end of the black magic of a soon-to-be-washed-up, multi-billion-dollar industry and aberration of science.
And the Earth is 4.6 BILLION years old last time I checked.
You have no clue or idea (nor do any of us in our little drop in the bucket of history) of what “extreme” is.
It is entertaining, though, to hear the chicken littleing continue unabated.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
AstroH:
Lmao!
Not a shred of evidence, just pure, unadulterated emotional appeal!
List your facts!
My point in bringing up the heat wave was to show that for every cold-weather event dutifully reported here, it is not hard to find an equally significant warm event that is not. It is weather, and that is what weather does. The world is a big place. I am not saying any of this is climate change on either side. Anyway, it generated the right sort of debate in my view.
I’m glad all of you other troll repellers responded before I had to open up a can of Occam’s Razor whoop-ass on this deluded (AstroH) fool.
And troll-fool Jimmy D just chooses to remain clueless. The MSM gladly reports “warm-weather events”; but, for some stange reason you have to go to an internet blog to find out about “cold-weather events”. And the blog is the problem for you? How?
JimD:
If you want coverage of heatwaves, please check the ordinary news. As WUWT is off of the ordinary news path, I would expect that the cold weather be covered here. Indeed, the coverage of the heat waves is thick enough that expecting WUWT to cover it is a parody of sorts. I mean really, you came here for news about the heat wave? Do you really think anyone else did? I don’t mean this in a rude way, but please be serious.
In fact, if you think that the heat wave is such an important metric, please explain to me why the area I live in in Ohio is ~20F lower than the high temp set in 1934. And while you are thinking about that, what does the 2nd coldest July on record mean last year? What about NY not hitting 90 in July last year? Again, it is either important or not, but if it is not, neither is NY hitting 100 this year. Pick one.
Jim D says:
July 21, 2010 at 8:01 pm
My point in bringing up the heat wave was to show that for every cold-weather event dutifully reported here, it is not hard to find an equally significant warm event that is not.
============================================
Uh huh.
And my point for bringing up the cold wave is that for every “cold weather event” that is reported here, is equally NOT reported on every network of the mainstream media.
Yet any “significant warm event”, in the MSM, gets front freakin’ page every time.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Jim D says:
July 21, 2010 at 8:01 pm
I am not saying any of this is climate change on either side. Anyway, it generated the right sort of debate in my view.
==========================
Ha. You can’t stay in no man’s land forever, so your point here just muddies the water because the point is not valid.
And no, it has not sparked any debate. Just given a greater reason to attack the weak argument.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
I say weather is weather and climate is climate. You can be objective about weather events without compromising your beliefs on climate, but I noticed some hint of a spillover here, which is what I was drawing attention to. An article about one cold snap or heatwave is a weather article, not climate until you start looking at frequencies of multiple events. If their next cold snap comes next year, that’s starting to get interesting from the climate point of view, but if they have a once-per-decade event after ten years, not so interesting in terms of climate. You could be reporting those somewhere every week.
Some good humor there AstroH. It looks like it can be fun being a nonalarmist playing the role of alarmist [sitting back watching folks take the bait].
My daddy said In 1970’s – 80’s climate experts said we are heading into an ice age. Then Al Gore, who brought us the internet??said human are killing the planet with their breathING ?? Co2. which has changed ice age into global warming. we LOOK AT THE CO2 READING IN ICE CORE SAMPLES recordeds CO2 WAS HIGHER 400 YRS AGO. 2000 YRS AGO.ECT. IT’S NOT CO2 THE PROBLEM IT’S YOU AL A PROBLEM TO “TAX” CO2,US ?? HOW BOUT WE STOP TAXING AND SURPRESSING TRUTH AND TECHNOLOGY. IPCC, BEEN EXPOSED AS PAID OFF HALF WITTS.AT COPENHAGEN. SUMMIT, SAME WITH OBAMA, BROWN. MERKAL, ECT, ECT, ANY ONE THAT BELIEVES IN GORE BOOK NEVER LOOK AT THE RESEARCH AND NOR SOUGHT OUT THE PIER REVIEWS, TEST DID YOU? i just learn in my 3rd grade earth class IN MAY always double, tripple check. DON’T BELIEVE WHAT ONE SAYS WITH OUT DOCUMENTED IN YOUR HAND NOT SOME BOOK,written by al the far left handed leopard kon extermanator and marks ist fecal like obama IF AL GORE BOOK IS TRUE ‘hey i’m harry potter’ and i just saved the world.” TEREIS NO CO2 KILLING THE EARTH IT’S MADE UP. SO EVERY ONE CAN RELAX WE DON’T NEED TAXES ANY MORE. oil will always be around for everyone there it grows more every day like trees that grow fruit. why \can’t scientist find this out, mrs rose said there more to it how. why. this my book report to the third grade class.. thank you becky colette thomas
The problem is actually not enough pollution. Sulphur dioxide until recently was being pumped into the atmosphere by all the coal fired power stations then some fool started complaining about acid rain damaging crops ( we all know how good acid is for cleaning things). Now what sulphur dioxide does is creates more clouds which prevent the nights from getting to cold and stops the days from getting too hot. Thats why the cold clear nights in the south and the hot days in the North. Burn more coal I say !
In Spanish there is no different word for Climate and Weather, just “Clima”.
I would love to hear an explanation about the differences of climate and weather in Spanish…