PermeateFree said:
Last month was the hottest September ever recorded on Earth, according to data released by Europe’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.
The global average temperature exceeded the previous record, which was set in 2019, by 0.09 degrees Fahrenheit (0.05 degrees Celsius), and was 1.13 degrees Fahrenheit (0.63 degrees Celsius) warmer than the average September based on data spanning 1979 to 2010, reports Veronica Penney for the New York Times.
NOAA’s predictions suggest, with 99.9 percent certainty, that 2020 is going to be one of the five hottest years ever recorded, reports Emma Newburger for CNBC. If this prediction comes true, 2020 will maintain the veracity of a sobering factoid for another year: each of the last five years has been one of the five hottest years ever recorded globally, per Climate Central.
“We have been saying this for decades–more and more greenhouse gases will lead to more and more warming,” Ed Hawkins, a climate scientist from Reading University, tells BBC News.
Hawkins adds that 2020’s extremes, from blistering heat to hurricanes and torrential downpours, have emerged with just one degree Celsius of warming (1.8 degrees Fahrenheit) above long-term global averages. If current greenhouse gas emission trends continue, the world is on pace for three degrees Celsius (5.4 degrees Fahrenheit) of warming, Hawkins tells BBC News.
“One degree of heating is dangerous for some people, as we’ve seen,” Hawkins says. “Two degrees is more dangerous still, and three degrees even more dangerous. We really don’t want to find out what that’ll be like.”
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/we-just-lived-through-hottest-september-ever-recorded-180976020/
California’s First-Ever Gigafire Blazes Through the State, Scorching More Than One Million Acres
California reached another devastating milestone this year: four million acres in total have been burned so far this fire season, more than doubling the state’s previous record from 2018’s Mendocini Complex Fire.
Earlier this week, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) announced that the August Complex Fire had been upgraded from a megafire—a fire burning hundreds of thousands of acres—to a gigafire after it blazed through more than a million acres of land.
Australia’s bushfire earlier this year reached gigafire status, but California’s is the first gigafire in the United States for ten years. More than 1.03 million acres of land have been engulfed in the August Complex Fire’s flames, making the fire itself larger than the state of Rhode Island, report Oliver Milman and Vivian Ho for The Guardian. According to Cal Fire’s live updates, 65 percent of the fire has been contained as of Thursday night.
California reached another devastating milestone this year: four million acres in total have been burned so far this fire season, more than doubling the state’s previous record from 2018’s Mendocini Complex Fire, reports Harmeet Kaur for CNN.
Although wildfires are a natural occurrence out West, rising temperatures due to climate change have made conditions hotter and drier—two variables that fuel wildfires. Drier land makes it easier for fires to catch and spread, and hotter temperatures prolong the fire season.
Californians are already feeling just how much wildfires have intensified in recent years. Of the states 20 largest wildfires in history, 17 have occurred since 2000; four of the top five occurred during this fire season alone, reports Gizmodo. So far, at least 31 people have died in California’s widespread fires, and millions more face health risks from the thick smoke and air pollution. Nearly 8,000 homes and other structures have been destroyed.
“This is an unprecedented year, and the thing is, there’s no vaccine for wildfires,” Mike Flannigan, a fire scientist, tells the Associated Press. “We’re going to have to learn to live with wildfires and the associate smoke.”
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/californias-first-ever-gigafire-blazes-through-state-scorching-more-one-million-acres-180976034/