Could the recent red flood warnings around the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole be attributed to the decade breaking temperature records seen across the United Kingdom?
The BCP area has been on high alert with the weather warnings in recent months, with flood warnings becoming a regular occurrence, including today, with low level flood warnings in the area of Lower Avon from Ringwood to Christchurch.
As it currently stands the residents of around 2.4 million UK properties are at risk from fluvial (river) and coastal flooding each year, while a further 2.8 million are susceptible to surface water flooding.
The UK isn’t the only part of the world being effected by climate change. Thousands of people have been displaced due to the rapidly expanding bush fires in Australia, which are being attributed to a long drought, strong winds and their own record-breaking heat waves, seeing the hottest day in history, at 41.9 degrees Celsius.
Australian wildfire, taken last year.
The rainfall isn’t the only issue with the weather seen in the UK this decade, with the UK witnessing the highest UK temperature for the months of February, July, and December, last year.
This decade a number of high UK temperature records were broken, along with one low-temperature record.
A few of these broken records include:
- 2018 resulted in the coldest day in March on record with a maximum of -4.7°C recorded in South Wales.
- the highest winter and summer temperatures in 2019.
- 2014 had the warmest mean annual temperature since 1910.
Dr Mark McCarthy, head of the National Climate Information Centre, said: “It is notable how many of these extreme records have been set in the most recent decade and how many more of them are reflecting high- rather than low-temperature extremes: a consequence of our warming climate.”
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