So, the problem is that it's about to be winter.
October 7, 2023: Frogs are trying to mate in the UK. The heat confuses them.
Scientists are alarmed.
"New data shows last month was the hottest September – the fourth consecutive month of such unprecedented heat – putting 2023 firmly on track to be the hottest year in recorded history.
September beat the previous monthly record set in 2020 by a staggering 0.5 degrees Celsius, according to data released Wednesday by the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service. There has never been a month so abnormally hot since Copernicus’ records began in 1940."
— Scientist calls record global heat in September ‘gobsmackingly bananas’, Laura Paddison, CNN, October 5, 2023
"While the most brutal heat will soon come to an end across the north-central US, summerlike heat is only beginning to build for the Northeast. Temperatures 10 to 15 degrees above normal October levels will be common through Thursday across the Great Lakes and Northeast.
It won’t last for long. The coldest air of the season will arrive late this week and usher in conditions that haven’t been felt since early May across the northern US."
— Temperatures are about to come crashing down with a dramatic fall pattern change, Mary Gilbert, CNN Meteorologist, October 4, 2023
"Right now, thanks to our recklessness, the sun is overheating our planet. And by right now, I don’t mean in this century. I mean, in this month. The global temperature readings for September should have been the top story on every newscast in the world, because they were bonkers. June, July, and August were historically hot — we saw the hottest days recorded on the planet in 125,000 years. September wasn’t quite as hot, of course, because it’s fall. But in relative terms September was even more outrageous. It was, the scientists tell us, the most anomalous month we’ve ever seen, with temperatures so far beyond historical norms that the charts don’t even seem to make sense."
— The Rays of the Sun: They cut both ways, hard. Bill McKibben. October 7, 2023.
Just as sudden temperature extremes aren't good for frogs, nor are they good for machines. A year ago, heat damaged an airport runway that had to be repaired on an emergency basis.
London Luton Airport "suspended flights on Monday after high temperatures damaged a runway. Temperatures soared up to 37 degrees Celsius (about 99 degrees Fahrenheit) in some parts of the country. ... An 'essential runway repair' was required 'after high surface temperatures caused a small section to lift,' the airport said...the Royal Air Force (RAF) paused all flights to and from Brize Norton, its biggest air base, in Oxfordshire after a report from Sky News suggested that the runway had 'melted.' The UK Ministry of Defence tweeted a statement on flights..."
— High temperatures caused section of UK airport’s runway ‘to lift’ Vasco Cotovio and Alex Hardie, CNN, July 18, 2022
Climate change causes atmospheric changes in the jet stream and polar vortex. This can cause sudden cold snaps, too.
"Look no further than the heavily populated US Northeast this weekend to see a real-time example of the long-term warming trend being interrupted by tremendous, record-setting cold. ... The wind chill is expected to plunge to dangerous levels of minus 30 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 34 Celsius) for millions on Saturday. ... Temperatures in the city of Mohe in northern China plummeted to minus 53 degrees Celsius (minus 63.4 degrees Fahrenheit), the lowest temperature the country has ever recorded. ... Our weather is intimately connected with the jet stream, a wavy river of fast-moving air high in the atmosphere, around the level at which airplanes fly. ... There is also another factor to consider: The polar vortex. This is a belt of strong winds encircling blisteringly cold Arctic air, which sits extremely high in the stratosphere – above the level of the jet stream – around the North Pole. ... The polar vortex is like a spinning top, Cohen said. In its normal state, it rotates very fast, keeping the cold air close to the center, like an ice skater spinning quickly on the spot, arms neatly across their chest. But every now and then it gets disrupted. It’s as if the ice skater hits a crack in the ice and flies off course, arms flailing. The polar vortex wobbles, becoming stretched and distorted, spilling out cold air and influencing the path of the jet stream. ... The theory centers on the Arctic, which is warming up to four times faster than the rest of the world as a result of heat-trapping pollution from burning fossil fuels. Some scientists argue that this warming is triggering changes to the jet stream and polar vortex, causing more frequent winter extremes. This idea gained traction following the publication of a 2012 study, co-authored by Jennifer Francis, a senior scientist at the Woodwell Climate Research Center in Massachusetts. ... One of the most prominent papers, co-authored by Cohen in 2021, said it found clear links between Arctic warming and disruptions to the polar vortex. Cohen’s argument is that particularly rapid heating in an area of the Arctic, north of western Russia, combined with increased snowfall in Siberia, amplifies the waviness of the jet stream and pushes energy upwards. This knocks the polar vortex off course, causing very cold air to spill out."
— Extreme cold snaps: Why temperatures still plummet to dangerous levels even as the planet warms, Laura Paddison, Krystina Shveda and Jhasua Razo, CNN, February 3, 2023
James Dinneen writes for the New Scientist ("The jet stream may be starting to shift in response to climate change," 6 Sept 2024):
"Sections of the planet’s jet streams have begun shifting towards the poles over the past several decades. It is most likely that this is a response to global warming due to our greenhouse gas emissions, and could exacerbate heat and drought in regions that depend on the high-altitude winds to steer storms their way."
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