Marine heatwave over Pacific Ocean could lead to flooding in north-west | US weather
A marine heat wave known as the blob was particularly severe in the northwestern and central Pacific Ocean this year, according to climate scientists; This could lead to increased flooding in the U.S. Pacific Northwest and wintry weather, especially in eastern North America, in the coming months.
In August, temperatures in the North Pacific were 2.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels. Berkeley WorldA non-profit organization that researches global warming.
This sudden increase could lead to more storms and impact marine species, according to Zeke Hausfather, a research scientist at Berkeley Earth.
“I wonder if this will be a permanent feature?” Nick Bond, a climate scientist at Washington state and the University of Washington, coined the term “blob” for this phenomenon.
Bond added: “A storm could come in and cool the ocean a little bit. You could have a sunny summer and it’s going to get a little bit warmer than usual, so there are those kinds of fluctuations. But boy, what’s out there in the central North Pacific? That’s not going away anytime soon.”
Bond said he started calling such heat waves blobs because “they’re not static. They’re a little amorphous. They move and evolve over time as the weather changes.”
Such heat waves have become more severe and frequent over the past decade.
“There was an appreciation that there could be these events that occur in the ocean that are important, especially from an ecosystem perspective, but also from a weather perspective,” Bond said. “It’s important to monitor them, predict them more effectively and be aware that the climate is changing.”
According to the report, from 2014 to 2016, a drop in ocean temperatures occurred off the west coast of the United States that was 3 degrees above normal. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
“There were massive harmful algal blooms of unprecedented scope and intensity on the west coast of the United States, shutting down commercial shellfish fisheries,” Bond said.
Warmer ocean temperatures could lead marine species to migrate or die, Hausfather said.
“The impacts on a variety of marine species and phytoplankton, which make up most of the food web, are quite significant,” Hausfather said.
Recently some news organizations have suggested that the block is Chicago’s “coldest, snowiestWinter in years.
While Bond said the droplet may have played a role in inland weather patterns so far, he said it would likely only be a “secondary player.”
“If the air coming off the ocean is warmer than normal in western Washington state, we will experience less snow, all else being equal. This effect doesn’t extend that far inland,” Bond said. “For it to affect snowfall in Chicago, it would have to cause a disruption in the weather pattern… That doesn’t mean there isn’t an impact, but there are other factors that affect snowfall in the midwestern United States.”
Bond said scientists don’t yet have enough data to say for sure what effect such droplets will have, and the effect could be confused with developments such as disruption of the polar vortex.
In short, Bond said: “We are limited by the number of blobs we have.”
