A recent study has revealed that climate change played a significant role in intensifying Typhoon Gaemi, which resulted in the loss of dozens of lives across the Philippines and China earlier this year.
World Weather Attribution (WWA), a network of scientists renowned for their peer-reviewed methods in assessing the impact of climate change on extreme weather events, conducted an in-depth analysis of the typhoon's effects on three severely impacted regions: the northern Philippines, the Taiwan region, and Hunan Province.
The findings indicated that man-made climate change increased Typhoon Gaemi's wind speeds by seven percent. Additionally, rainfall intensified by fourteen percent in Taiwan and nine percent in Hunan, exacerbating the disaster's severity in these areas.
While the study faced challenges in conclusively determining the influence of climate change on rainfall in the Philippines due to the region's complex monsoon patterns, it highlighted that the warm sea temperatures essential for forming and sustaining Typhoon Gaemi were virtually impossible without the current global warming of 1.2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
Furthermore, WWA's modeling suggests that this level of warming has already led to a 30 percent increase in the number of similarly strong storms annually, rising from approximately five to six or seven events each year.
Reference(s):
cgtn.com
