30/6/2021 How Weird Is the Heat in Portland, Seattle and Vancouver? Off the Charts.

Vancouver? Off the Charts. - The New York Times

https://nyti.ms/3h5jkea

How Weird Is the Heat in Portland, Seattle and

Vancouver? Off the Charts.
By Aatish Bhatia, Henry Fountain and Kevin Quealy June 29, 2021

Temperature records
set in the last week

Hottest since at least 1979

2nd hottest
3rd
4th
5th
6th

Source: ECMWF/Copernicus via KNMI Climate Explorer · Shaded areas represent places where maximum temperatures in the
last week ranked compared with annual maximum temperatures from 1979 to 2020.

Heat waves and the “heat domes” that can cause them aren’t rare, but the
recent weather that’s been smothering the Pacific Northwest has little
precedent in at least four decades of record-keeping.

To understand the magnitude of the departure from historical norms, it

helps to visualize it. The map above, created by Geert Jan van Oldenborgh,
a climate scientist at the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute,
reflects temperatures since 1979. It shows the extent of the areas
experiencing extreme temperatures in the past week.

The heat has been not only widespread, but also intense, in some places
surpassing records by double digits.

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30/6/2021 How Weird Is the Heat in Portland, Seattle and Vancouver? Off the Charts. - The New York Times

In Vancouver, British Columbia, this past weekend’s temperatures were

far above norms for this time of year, and a village in British Columbia,
Lytton, reached nearly 116 degrees, the highest recorded temperature for
any place in Canada in its history. The record was broken again Monday as
Lytton reached 118 degrees.

In Seattle, there have been only two other days in the last 50 years with
temperatures in the triple digits: in 2009 and 1994.

Daily maximum temperatures in Portland, 1979-2021

Daily maximum temperatures in Seattle, 1979-2021

Daily maximum temperatures in Vancouver, 1979-2021

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Weather Station Data for Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, Vancouver
International Airport and Portland International Airport via Global Historical Climatology Network

The heat has resulted from a wide and deep mass of high-pressure air that,
because of a wavy jet stream, parked itself over much of the region. Also
known as a heat dome, such an enormous high-pressure zone acts like a lid
on a pot, trapping heat so that it accumulates. And with the West beset by
drought, there’s been plenty of heat to trap.

In Seattle, Portland and other areas west of the Cascades, hot air blowing
from the east was further warmed as it descended the mountains, raising
temperatures even more.

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Climate is naturally variable, so periods of high heat are to be expected.

But in this episode scientists see the fingerprints of climate change,
brought on by human-caused emissions of carbon dioxide and other
greenhouse gases.

Karin Bumbaco, Washington’s assistant state climatologist, said that any

definitive climate-change link could be demonstrated only by a type of
analysis called an attribution study. “But it’s a safe assumption, in my
view, to blame increasing greenhouse gases for at least some portion of
this event,” she said.

On a global average, the world has warmed about 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit
since 1900. “When you have that warmer baseline, when you do get these
extreme events it's just going to get that much warmer,” she said.

This heat wave is also unusual because it occurred earlier than most.
Those two previous triple-digits days in Seattle, for example, happened in
late July, about 30 days later.

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30/6/2021 How Weird Is the Heat in Portland, Seattle and Vancouver? Off the Charts. - The New York Times

This one occurred just a few days after the summer solstice, which may
have contributed to the extreme conditions. “The days are longer, and
we’re not getting that cool-off at night,” she said.

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Extreme temperatures are getting more common

Climate change is also making episodes of extreme heat more frequent,
longer and more intense, said Erica Fleishman, director of the Oregon
Climate Change Research Institute at Oregon State University.

In these two cities, days with temperatures that are well above historical
averages have increased, particularly starting in the 2010s:

Number of times daily mean temperatures were 20 degrees Fahrenheit above

normal
NOAA Weather Station Data via Global Historical Climatology Network. The temperature rise is in reference to 1950-90 averages.

“We can say extreme weather is happening more as climate changes, and
will continue to happen more,” she said. “This heat wave is extraordinary,
but this in a sense is not likely to be the last.”

Heat waves eventually end, and for the coastal cities what’s called a
“marine push,” when cooler air blows in from the Pacific, is already
moderating temperatures.

For inland areas, however, the high heat will remain. Eastern Washington
might exceed 118 degrees on Tuesday, Ms. Bumbaco said, which would set
a record for the state.

And temperatures are still expected to be quite high for the next two or
three weeks, she said — not 30 or 40 degrees higher than normal, but 10 to
15.

“That might actually have more implications for our agriculture and
potential wildfires,” she said. The heat wave won’t be as extreme, she said,
“but it’s going to last longer.”

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