Sunny days and... more sun
A few months ago the British Meteorological Office (Met Office) advanced that 2016 would be the warmest year on record . According to this organization, the combination of climate change and the cyclical phenomenon in the Pacific known as El Niño could shoot thermometers above 1.4 ºC compared to the pre-industrial era.
The truth is that the forecast is being fulfilled globally. Experts agree that 2016 will most likely be the warmest year. “It will almost in all likelihood considering that l he first four months of the year have already been the warmest of the historical series”, explains Adrián Cordero, meteorologist of La Sexta Noticias.
Shade and fan, essential in the Retreat
For his part, the former spokesman for the Meteorology Statal Agency (AEMET), Ángel Rivera, also believes that “if the current global trend continues”, 2016 could be the warmest year. Although, "the immediate appearance of the La Niña phenomenon, replacing that of El Niño, That trend could change.
In this sense, the also meteorologist and editor of the portal divulgeteo , José Miguel Viñas, explains that El Niño is going less. “We are heading to a neutral phase that remains to be seen if it will lead to a La Niña event. , which on a global scale would have a cooling effect”. However, he remarks that “regardless of whether we have Boys or Girls, global warming is a reality.
If we analyze the weather he has done so far this year, January and February were very hot and that changed from March. According to Rivera It is being a "quite erratic" year in terms of weather. This being the case, will we have a warmer summer than usual?
The game of chairs, but with hammocks and umbrellas
Viñas believes that "in the current climatic context, immersed in a warm phase at a global level, thinking of a hot or very hot summer falls within climatic normality." He is not surprised since “It is something that has become the norm in recent years” , he adds.
Taking the seasonal forecasts with all caution, Cordero points out that "what these forecasts tell us today is that it will be a more or less normal summer or slightly warmer than normal” . Although he clarifies: “that there are no indications that it will not be especially warm does not mean that it will not be hot, but that it will be normal heat this time of year ”.
Rivera explains that at a global level the records continue and in more local areas we are seeing the tremendous heat waves in India... "What will happen in the Iberian Peninsula and archipelagos (in summer)?", he wonders. "No one knows with acceptable certainty."
Too good weather, home solutions
For his part, Cordero stresses that "There are still no clear indications" that the summer will be warmer. From his point of view, “to the extent that it is expected to be a more or less normal summer, the foreseeable thing is that the most intense heat affects the most common areas” . According to the La Sexta meteorologist, “the heat will be stronger in the Guadalquivir, Guadiana and Tajo basins and, to a lesser extent, also in the Ebro valley”.
In this sense, "regarding the nights, it is common for the most suffocating occur on the Mediterranean coast, with minimums above 20ºC during most of the summer.
Viñas supports this explanation: “the highest temperatures will be reached, as happens every summer, by the center-south peninsular” . Thus, as this physicist and meteorologist recalls, "last summer the southeast was one of the areas hardest hit by the intense heat." Thinking about the possible entry on the scene of a more or less lasting heat wave, "if it also spreads through e In the north of the peninsula, that would be the most affected area, due to the lack of custom” he continues.
When our only concern is back and forth
He explains it graphically: "35 degrees maximum in Oviedo, for example, for 3 days in a row, have a significantly greater impact on the population than the same circumstance in Córdoba or Seville." For his part, Ribera also points to the "traditional" areas, such as the points where it will be hottest in summer: the basins of the great rivers of the southern half of the peninsula. But he warns: “it is pure climatological conjecture”.
Cordero explains that the trend in recent decades has been towards increasingly suffocating summers. However, in his opinion, the increase in temperatures in summer is "especially dramatic" to the extent that the heat "is usually a public health problem" at this time of year, so an increase in it "can be very harmful not only for the population, but for a multitude of species".
When the heat stops being good
And it is that climate change affects summers making them more extreme, "prolonging the dog days more days than strictly marks the calendar" , as Viñas explains. But there are also other consequences of climate change, such as the fact that suffer "summer heat in the middle of spring or autumn".
As if that were not enough, it also provokes “the favorable conditions so that heat waves more frequent and longer lasting” . As Viñas explains, “all these things have been taking place for years on our planet. The rate of change is being so great that, regardless of what the meteorological records indicate, people are perceiving the lengthening of the typically summer time and its excesses”.
Despite the indications, the difficulty of making reliable seasonal forecasts, together with the fact that the weather in 2016 is proving to be like a true Russian roulette, prevent us from knowing exactly if this year will be the suffocating summer in our country.
And not wanting to move at all