Mercury climbs as Europe braces for summer scorcher

This looks like an obvious propaganda opportunity for the usual ambulance-chasing climate alarm suspects. If warm weather blows in from the Sahara desert it must be your fault…type of thing. But for many Brits at least it will make a change from some recent cool and miserable June weather, while the French recall problems arising from a hot summer sixteen years ago.

Temperatures were climbing on Sunday as Europe braced for a blistering heatwave with the mercury set to hit 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) as summer kicks in on the back of a wave of hot air from North Africa, reports Phys.org.

Europeans are set to bake in what forecasters are warning will likely be record-breaking temperatures for June with the mercury set to peak mid-week.

Rare snowfall blankets parts of Australia for first time in years

Queensland, Australia

Sub-tropical snow – some folk may have to manage without electricity from their solar panels until it goes 😎

Icy conditions are sweeping across eastern Australia, bringing snow to areas as far north as sub-tropical Queensland in what is believed to be the heaviest snowfall in years, reports the Evening Standard.

Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology described the weather as “rare” adding that Queensland had not experienced significant snowfall since 2015.

June marks the beginning of winter in Australia but the extreme weather is highly unusual, especially so early on in some areas of Tasmania, Victoria, Queensland and New South Wales.

Many took to social media to express their amazement at finding snow in their hometowns as well as sharing photos of Kangaroos and Tasmanian devils playing in the cold conditions.

The Blue Mountains west of Sydney woke on Tuesday to a blanket of snow, while there have been falls in Queensland’s Granite Belt region, west of Brisbane, although snow was not expected to settle.

Travellers are also being warned to expect delays on roads, rail, waterways and in the skies amid a day of wild weather and icy winds.

Full report here.

Climatologist: Why so many tornadoes this year? Not what some may think

Kansas tornado [image credit: Wikipedia]

Politicians keen to promote climate alarm run the risk of embarrassing themselves when pronouncing on random weather events.

H/T Climate Change Dispatch

With destructive tornadoes comes climate alarmism, so it’s useful to know why so-called global warming would produce fewer – not more – cyclonic events, says Dr Roy Spencer.

Progressive politicians like Al Gore, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D.-N.Y., don’t hesitate to blame any kind of severe weather – even if it is decreasing over time – on global warming.

With the devastating Dayton, Ohio, tornadoes fresh on our minds, it is useful to examine exactly why (modest) global warming has produced fewer – not more – of such events.

The simple answer is that tornado formation requires unusually cool air.

Denver weather: City sees biggest late May snow in 44 years

Credit: ezilon.com

Unusually cold local weather for this time of year, not conforming to supposed warming trends claimed to be due to too many SUVs, power stations etc. Records may fall.

As of 8 a.m. on Tuesday, Denver had officially received 3.4 inches of snow, says CBS4 News.

That’s the most snow measured this late in the season since May 29, 1975 when 5.6 inches hit the city.

In addition to the snow, Denver tied the record low temperature for May 21 when the official thermometer for the city dropped to 31 degrees Tuesday morning. It was previously 31 degrees on this date in 2001 when 1 inch of snow fell.

In terms of high temperatures on Tuesday, they will struggle to reach into the lower 40s again making it the second day in a row with temperatures staying 30 to 35 degrees below normal for the third week in May.

The record “coldest maximum” for May 21 is 40 degrees set 128 years ago in 1891. It’s possible that record could also be challenged.

Full report here.

Proposal to spend 25% of EU budget on climate change

Does the EU really have that much money to burn, on the basis of pressure from some school children? However much is spent will make no difference worth mentioning to the Earth’s climate any time soon, if at all.

Eight European countries have called for an ambitious strategy to tackle climate change – and to spend a quarter of the entire EU budget on fighting it, reports BBC News.

The joint statement says the EU should have net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 “at the latest”.

It was signed by France, Belgium, Denmark, Luxemburg, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden.

Summer extremes of 2018 linked to stalled giant waves in jet stream

Omega blocking highs can remain in place for several days or even weeks [image credit: UK Met Office]

Atmospheric blocking is a well-known weather phenomenon. The report below says ‘In recent years, the scientists observed a clear increase of these patterns’. But scientists have also reported a 20 year decline in solar magnetic fields and solar wind micro-turbulence levels. Coincidence, or possibly not?

Record breaking heatwaves and droughts in North America and Western Europe, torrential rainfalls and floods in South-East Europe and Japan – the summer of 2018 brought a series of extreme weather events that occurred almost simultaneously around the Northern Hemisphere in June and July, says IOP Publishing.

These extremes had something in common, a new study published today in Environmental Research Letters by an international team of climate researchers now finds.

The events were connected by a newly-identified pattern of the jet stream encircling the Earth. The jet stream formed a stalled wave pattern in the atmosphere, which made weather conditions more persistent and thus extreme in the affected regions.

The same pattern also occurred during European heat waves in 2015, 2006 and 2003, which rank among the most extreme heatwaves ever recorded. In recent years, the scientists observed a clear increase of these patterns.

The Noble Corruption Of Climate Science

H/T The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF)
Is IPCC-oriented climate science running out of road in terms of public credibility, when measured against reality?

This is a story of climate science, tracing from its enthusiastic beginnings as a small field – warning of a global threat – to its rich and increasingly desperate present, writes Larry Kummer @ Fabius Maximus.

It is a long story, with a climax at the end.

The climate change campaign hits a dead end

On 24 June 1988, James Hansen’s testimony to the Senate began the campaign to fight anthropogenic global warming. During the following 31 years we have heard increasingly dire forecasts of doom.

Researchers find unusual phenomenon in clouds triggers lightning flash

As the professor quoted below says: “Despite over 250 years of research, how lightning begins is still a mystery.” Tesla had a few ideas though (video).

In a first-of-its-kind observation, researchers from the University of New Hampshire Space Science Center have documented a unique event that occurs in clouds before a lightning flash happens, says Phys.org.

Their observation, called “fast negative breakdown,” documents a new possible way for lightning to form and is the opposite of the current scientific view of how air carries electricity in thunderstorms.

Large volcanic eruptions can alter hurricane strength and frequency

Intertropical Convergence Zone [image credit: University of New Mexico]

Another aspect of natural variability in weather and climate patterns emerges.

A new study led by Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory researcher Suzana Camargo and Université du Québec à Montréal’s Francesco Pausata provides deeper insight into how large volcanic eruptions affect hurricane activity, says Phys.org.

Previous studies could not clearly determine the effects of volcanic eruptions on hurricanes, because the few large volcanic eruptions in the last century coincided with El Niño-Southern Oscillation events, which also influence hurricane activity.

Climate Adversely Affecting Humans? The Facts Show Otherwise

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Joe Bastardi continues his pushback against the false prophets of climate hysteria.

PA Pundits - International

Joe Bastardi  ~  

This is the third part of a trilogy intended to get readers to examine more deeply the climate debate. I always tell people they should go look for themselves. I do not expect any person to blindly accept what they are told, and that applies to me also. I do ask that you look at these ideas to gain a greater vision of what’s going on.

The first part addressed perspective. I noted that the timescale we are looking at is only a snapshot of what is a multibillion-year “movie” that contains many scenes leading up to the total story.

The second part challenges the idea that extreme weather events are getting worse.

Which brings us to today’s subject matter: Climate is not impeding human progress. In fact, it’s been quite the opposite in the fossil-fuel era.

Here are some charts to make my point.

View original post 347 more words

Climate Crisis? Four Major Metrics That Say Otherwise

Credit: planetsave.com

Joe Bastardi argues that loud claims of a climate about to spin out of control are out of tune with various actual observations.

I have long advocated that climatologists take a course on long-range forecasting so they can better understand the inherent errors in trying to predict the weather or climate, says Joe Bastardi at Patriot Post.

In the debate over the fate of the planet, where one side is always pushing hysteria, the weather is plainly not cooperating with the missive.

Forecasters take climatology classes and are now being taught the one-sided climate narrative, but in general, climatologists do not have to learn how to forecast.

Polar vortex helping forecasters predict New Zealand weather

What is the dominant climate for Oceania, Australia, New Zealand, and Antarctica?

They refer to the ‘no-show El Niño event’ but allow that a weak version could still show up at some point this year, in theory at least.

Move over El Niño, and make room for SAM, says NZ’s Stuff website.

While attention over the summer focused on the much-promised but yet to arrive El Niño, SAM – or the Southern Annular Mode, to give it its proper name – has been working away quietly in the background determining our weather.

Forecasters are becoming increasingly enamoured with SAM for the valuable guidance it gives of likely weather conditions up to two weeks ahead.

Where’s winter? Western Europe basks in record temperatures – but there’s a catch

Credit: planetsave.com

This report more or less answers its own question, possibly without noticing that the answer given virtually rules out the presence of any particular trace gases in the atmosphere as a likely cause. ‘Hottest on record’ does not go back all that far anyway.

As western Europe enjoys record highs for winter temperatures, southern parts of the continent are being hit with snow flurries, reports Phys.org.

What is going on with the weather, and how closely are the topsy-turvy temperatures linked to climate change?

Scientist finds an influence of solar activity on European rainfall

Credit: BBC

Interesting result here, although they do admit: ‘The exact mechanism by which the solar signal influences precipitation is still largely unclear and requires further research.’ But the observations have been made.

Source: The GWPF

A balanced level of precipitation provides the basis for a wide range of economic and social activities in Europe. Particularly agriculture, drinking water supply and inland waterway transport are directly affected.

However, the amount of rain fluctuates strongly from year to year. While it may pour torrentially in one year, rain may remain absent for weeks in another year. The population is used to this variability and knows how to deal with it.

The chance discovery by an agricultural scientist from Münster, Germany, now suggests that in certain months rain over Germany and other parts of Europe follows a pattern that up to now has remained undetected.

Seattle receives the most snow in 70 years

Two feet of snow in Seattle?

Yes it’s winter, but this is way beyond normal weather for this region as CBS News reports.

Some areas around Seattle received more than 10 inches of snow Saturday, the most in 70 years, the National Weather Service said, and more is on the way as two more storm systems close in on the area.

AAA: Cold weather can cut electric car range over 40 percent

One for the ‘worse than we thought’ file. Anyone running out of power in an EV in winter due to sudden cold weather range reduction has no in-car way to keep warm while waiting for rescue.

Cold temperatures can sap electric car batteries, temporarily reducing their range by more than 40 percent when interior heaters are used, a new study found.

The study of five electric vehicles by AAA also found that high temperatures can cut into battery range, but not nearly as much as the cold, reports TechXplore. The range returns to normal in more comfortable temperatures.

Underwater drones could transform hurricane forecasts

Image credit: sanibelrealestateguide.com

H/T The Atlantic.
Researchers found that all 11 hurricanes they investigated that went through the mid-Atlantic in summer experienced ahead-of-eye cooling. This indicator was not previously known.

The key to predicting storm intensity may lie below the surface, says Undark magazine.

In August 2011, with Hurricane Irene bearing down on the mid-Atlantic coast, Scott Glenn, an ocean engineering researcher at Rutgers University, made a bold decision.

While most other research teams moved their ships, personnel, and expensive hardware to safety ahead of the hurricane, Glenn left his data-collecting drone—a torpedo-shaped underwater “glider” about 6 feet long and worth about $150,000—directly in its path.

Extreme rainfall events are connected across the world

We’re told there are patterns which ‘appear to be created by Rossby waves – wiggles in fast-flowing currents of air high in the atmosphere, known as the jet streams.’

An analysis of satellite data has revealed global patterns of extreme rainfall, which could lead to better forecasts and more accurate climate models, reports Phys.org.

Extreme rainfall—defined as the top five percent of rainy days—often forms a pattern at the local level, for example tracking across Europe.

But new research, published today in Nature, reveals that there are also larger-scale global patterns to extreme rainfall events.

‘Gore Effect’ Trips Up Green Elites Talking Climate In Davos

Credit: foreca.com

Davos is a balmy -25C this morning – just right for sounding off about a theoretical future excess of warm weather. 😎

More than just a portmanteau, ‘Snowmageddon’ has forced the green elite to miss their own party in Davos Monday, putting their faux climate concern on hold, says Climate Change Dispatch.

Who would have thought it: Snow in Davos! It’s only Europe’s highest town.

Claim: Record snow ‘likely a consequence of global warming’

Alps weather: Heavy snow cuts off ski resorts
[image credit: BBC News]

‘Here we go again’ says Climate Depot. ‘Climate activists are once again claiming that *global warming* is causing record-breaking snow.’ Forgetting perhaps that it has to be cold to snow, otherwise moisture falls as rain. Also forgetting their earlier claims that Alpine snow would tend to disappear for exactly the reason that is now supposed to make it worse.  

UK Guardian By Kate Ravilious
Excerpt: Look at all that snow in the Alps; has global warming taken a break?

Alas, no, it turns out that the recent record-breaking dumps of snow across much of southern Germany, Switzerland and Austria are more likely a consequence of global warming.