Warming may bring hurricanes to Mediterranean
Mon Jul 16, 2007 8:53AM EDT
By Ben Hirschler
LONDON (Reuters) - Global warming could trigger hurricanes, or
tropical cyclones, over the Mediterranean sea, threatening one of the
world's most densely populated coastal regions, according to European
scientists.
Hurricanes currently form out in the tropical Atlantic and rarely
reach Europe, but a new study shows a 3 degrees Celsius (5.4 degrees
Fahrenheit) rise in average temperatures could set them off in the
enclosed Mediterranean in future.
"This is the first study to detect this possibility," lead researcher
Miguel Angel Gaertner of the University of Castilla-La Mancha in
Toledo, Spain, told Reuters on Monday.
"Most models in our study show increasing storm intensity and if you
combine this with rising sea levels, as are projected, this could be
damaging for many coastal settlements."
As well as being home to millions, the Mediterranean coast is also a
major centre of tourism, which would be under threat.
Factors influencing hurricanes include warm sea surface temperatures
and atmospheric instability. In the past, they have been confined to a
limited number of regions, such as the north Atlantic and north
Pacific, where they are known as typhoons.
Recently, however, they have been forming in unusual places, which
Gaertner sees as a clear danger signal.
In 2004, Hurricane Catarina formed in the south Atlantic and hit land
in southern Brazil. A year later, Hurricane Vince formed next to the
Madeira Islands and became the first to make landfall in Spain.
In a paper published in the American Geophysical Union Journal,
Gaertner and colleagues from the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology
in Hamburg, Germany, used a range of regional climate models to assess
the chance of similar events in the Mediterranean.
They found rising temperatures pointed to increasing storm intensity
and, in the case of the most sensitive computer model, a likelihood of
strong hurricanes.
Gaertner said a large number of uncertainties remained and it was not
yet possible to say which parts of the Mediterranean would be hardest
hit. He also believes there is time to avoid the worst-case scenario
by working to limit global warming.
"This is a big threat but I think we have time to avoid it, if we cut
emissions of greenhouse gases," Gaertner said.
A United Nations climate panel, drawing on the work of 2,500
scientists, said this year that the "best estimate" was that
temperatures would rise 1.8-4.0 Celsius this century.
Most experts say emissions of greenhouse gases, mainly from burning
fossil fuels in power plants, factories and cars, are the principal
reason for rising temperatures.
--
There may come a time when the CO2 police will wander the earth telling
the poor and the dispossed how many dung chips they can put on their
cook fires. -- Captain Compassion.
Wherever I go it will be well with me, for it was well with me here, not
on account of the place, but of my judgments which I shall carry away
with me, for no one can deprive me of these; on the contrary, they alone
are my property, and cannot be taken away, and to possess them suffices
me wherever I am or whatever I do. -- EPICTETUS
Joseph R. Darancette
daranc@NOSPAMcharter.net
.
|
