Post claims Climate Change not responsible for extreme weather events in New Zealand

By Aayushi Sharma

CLAIM

Climate change is a political game. Calling weather events climate change is part of the scam.

FACT

Misleading. Extreme weather events are witnessed due to climate change.

Claim Post: https://twitter.com/FitzieD/status/1627596709684727808?s=20

WHAT THE POST CLAIMS

A Twitter post in response to a news article by Nzherald claims that flooding and destruction caused by it is a weather event and not a part of climate crises. 

The post shared an image from 1938 stating that the same scenario had been observed even decades ago.  The post has a caption, “It was a weather event. The same happened in 1938 in Hawke’s Bay. Same amount of rain, flooding, and damage. Climate change is a political game. Calling weather events climate change is part of the scam. #climatescam”

WHAT WE FOUND

Currently, New Zealand is grappling with two consecutive extreme weather events—massive flooding followed by a cyclone—that have claimed several lives and left hundreds of thousands of people without power for days on end. The high winds and waters of Cyclone Gabrielle have caused huge economic losses, washed away coastal roads on the north island, and left bridges and other infrastructure severely damaged. This happened only weeks after heavy rain caused widespread floods, and landslides that covered tarmac with slick mud, and left houses and streets under feet of water. These events have led to a national state of emergency for the third time in the history of New Zealand. The North Island of New Zealand experienced the devastating impacts of Cyclone Gabrielle.

New Zealand is situated in the South Pacific Ocean and is highly vulnerable to tropical cyclones that typically form in the north but could affect any part of the country in their path. Over the last few days, the northeast suffered the biggest hit as Cyclone Gabrielle whipped up winds and days of rain. La Niña, a weather event, also contributed to Gabrielle’s strength as it resulted in warmer air and sea temperatures.

The link between Extreme weather events and climate change

According to the World Meteorological Organisation, “The occurrence of extreme events is unprecedented in the observed record and will increase with increasing global warming, according to the Sixth Assessment report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Every bit of warming matters.” 

Climate change also has an impact on the water cycle – a warmer atmosphere holds more moisture. As such, the frequency and intensity of heavy rainfall events have increased since the 1950s and this is expected to continue. According to IPCC, Extreme daily precipitation events are projected to intensify by about 7% for each 1°C of global warming. There are numerous examples of a month or even many months’ worth of rainfall falling in a matter of hours or days, with devastating and deadly flooding – as seen in different parts of the world in the past few years. At the same time, increasing global warming is also projected to increase the land area affected by more frequent and severe droughts, a notorious slow-onset disaster.

The proportion of intense tropical cyclones (categories 4-5) is expected to increase at the global scale with increasing global warming, thus increasing the vulnerability of growing coastal populations. There is some evidence that climate change is affecting their tracks, especially in the western North Pacific. Compounded disasters when another accompanies a disaster are being witnessed more than often. According to the IPCC, the probability of compound flooding (storm surge, extreme rainfall, and/or river flow) has risen in some locations and will continue to increase due to both sea level rise and more intense precipitation. Concurrent heatwaves and droughts are likely to become more frequent, with the associated risk of wildfires.

Climate change is rapidly increasing the frequency of extreme weather events, and many other single events have been made worse over the years due to global warming. The record-breaking heatwave in parts of the world like Europe and the US at the end of June would have been virtually impossible without the influence of human-caused climate change, according to a rapid attribution analysis by an international team of leading climate scientists. Climate change, caused by greenhouse gas emissions, made the heatwave at least 150 times more likely to happen.

As the atmosphere gets warmer it holds more moisture which means it will rain more during storms, increasing the risk of floods. Thus, climate change is responsible for extreme weather events in New Zealand as well.