The city I live in (UK) flooded, is this due to Global Warming?

Question

Not Sheffield. Interesting to see if ppl said yes because it has flooded late 1800 and a couple of times early 1900 and about 1960. Then just wondered if the "Yes" ppl could put the previous floods down to global warming as well !!

Trevor, totally flawed post. You mention the city but you fail to include history. History has shown that the 1 in 13 billion chance is inaccurate. Also, you will be surprised which towns and villages have flooded over 100 years ago.

There's increasing evidence that "so called experts" advice only covers data from 2 years ago to the present.

Answer 1

No, global warming is a con to get more people to pay more taxes, thinking they are helping this idiotic government to sort things out, some hope, the real cause of flooding is down to the so called planning EXPERTS that have allowed thousands of acres of land to be concreted over, without making provision for taking the same amount of absorbent land out of the equasion, and the greedy water companies that rely on the rivers to remove the excess water instead of making facilities available to store it for the dry periods. What other businesses are allowed to charge for something they cannot deliver?

Answer 2

That is one of the many products of global warming that scientist claim will happen. Since this flood is current you cannot say whether it is caused by global warming or not. The only way to know is to look at a 10 20 or 30 years of floods across the globe and see if the amount of floods have increased with time while the earth has been warming to know if it fits a correlation of global warming or not. That's what kind of confuses me. B/c now pro AGWers will say that it is not caused by global warming b/c it is a localized event, but in the future if floods have increased then this flood you are referring to will be logged in with the rest of the floods as a cause of global warming. So another question what is the criteria for a flood caused by global warming. I don't really see how you can tell if it is or isn't a cause of global warming. You have so many other factors to consider like poor damning or poor levees built to keep water in tact. Building in a flood zone and things of that nature. So what a pro AGWer would say is no you cannot know if it is a cause of global warming. B/c this is a localized event and only if a trend develops can you know if it is a cause of Global Warming or not. Raise the question again?? What is the criteria for floods caused by global warming??

Answer 3

At the moment the UK is flood free so I guess you're referring to one of the many towns and cities that were flooded in June and July.

Whilst it's impossible to say that any particular event was the result of global warming it is a safe bet that the flooding witnessed earlier this year in the UK was exacerbated by GW.

One of the effects of a warmer planet is increased precipitation - the warmer temps lead to increased evapouration from the seas and oceans and ultimately to increased rainfall (or snowfall). This has been observed across the planet in recent decades.

The first spate of flooding to hit the UK (Sheffield, Hull etc) had a return period of 400 years, meaning it was the type of event that should occur once every 400 years. The second wave of flooding (Gloucester, Oxford etc) had a return period of 1000 years. The chance of both events occuring within the same year being 1 in 400,000. However, both events occured within the same month giving odds of 1 in 4.8 million.

Since 2000 there has been extensive flooding in Glasgow, Carlisle, York, London, Boscastle, Leeds - all over in fact. The odds of this happening normally? An amazing 1 in 13 billion.

In recent years there has been a 600% increase in the number of insurance claims due to flooding - this being despite many insurance companies reluctance to provide flood damage insurance. The Association of British Insurers commissioned research by the Met Office (Hadley Centre) which concluded that the incidence of flooding is likely to increase further and that the ABI should be prepared for a further 50% increase in payouts - i.e. a 9 fold increase in flood related claims.

Had there been no global warming there would almost certainly still have been extensive flooding but there wouldn't necessarily have been such prolonged and intense rainfall - some places haveing received 3 months worth of rain in just 24 hours.

What we witnessed this year was a fairly unusual event in that the Jet Stream was much further south than normal. This high altitude stream of fast moving air ordinarily runs between Scotland and Iceland during the summer months but this year it came in off the Atlantic, across Wales, central England and across the North Sea to Scandinavia.

Ariving from the Atlantic means that the air mass is moisture laden so, global warming or not, we would have expected significantly increased levels of precipitation. The effects of GW would have added further to moiswture content of the air mass.

You can blame the jet stream for the lack of a British summer this year, it effectively acted as a barrier and prevented the Azores High moving up from continental Europe. This weather system brings with it the typical summer weather, something that was in short supply this year. Hopefully 2008 will see a better summer.

Answer 4

Whether the UK experiences a dry or wet summer depends on the course of low pressure systems which track across the Atlantic. High up in the atmosphere is a ribbon of fast moving air – known as the jet stream. It is the jet stream that steers the weather systems which bring much of our rainfall. Since early June it was further south than it normally is in summer and this steered rainfall systems straight over the UK. Once these systems reached the UK, they ‘parked’ dumping rainfall over the same areas for hour after hour.

Associated with the displaced jet stream, there was a persistent low-pressure system to the west of the UK and a high pressure system over southern Europe.

At the same time Britain flooded, a July heat-wave claimed hundreds of lives in Southern Europe, with up to 500 dying in Hungary alone.

Changes to climate are really about changes to the average over a period of 30 years or so. One event is not evidence of climate change. But if such flooding becomes more frequent in future decades then would be a sign of climate change.
It’s also worth noting that there were a number of noteworthy extreme weather evens worldwide in 2007. The Asian cyclone season has been very intense two years running and there were droughts in Australia and China and southern USA, but bad flooding in regions of South & North America, across West, Central and East Africa and also Indonesia, China, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal. Oman and Iran had their first cyclone since 1945. The Arctic continued to warm, opening the Northwest Passage for the first time in centuries.

There was also NO El Nino or La Nino over the summer (both often associated with extreme weather events); a weak La Nina formed in Sept. which may influence weather into next year if it continues.

It is worth noting that if the jet stream had been further north we would have experienced another record breaking hot summer, which is what Southern Europe experienced.

I'll also point out the obvious which is that warmer air holds more moisture, it has to go somewhere.

Answer 5

That isn't clear--but possibly it is.

Here's the thing--global warming isbeginningto result in climate changes. We've always had floods, storms, droughts,etc., of course. But they are getting worse andmorefrequent due to global warming. So--it's likely that the flooding you sufferedis partly due to global warming,or at least was wors than it would have been otherwise.

but --whien you try to isolate a single event--like a flood, it is extremely hard tomap out the exact causes. Global warming and climate change don't work that way--they are broad, overall trends with many short-term and localized variations.

Answer 6

I even have by no potential heard of the possibility of paying trillions to surrender coastal flooding using international warming. the place is your source for this innovations? thank you. Edit: The Cap and commerce plan does not specify the spending of trillions of greenbacks to surrender coastal flooding.

Answer 7

No, You're just falling into the mass panic and hysteria that the media has created by jumping on the Global Warming Bandwagon.
There is actually no proof that Carbon Dioxide effects our climate in any way, they just tell you that it does.
"Going green" and "Saving the Earth" make people popular, it gets votes for politicians and gives them an excuse to raise taxes. A lot of celebrities jump on the bandwagon too, because it helps them sell records or gets people to go and see their films.
The main thing that effects our climate here on Earth is the Sun, it throws out massive solar rays and blasts out powerful solar winds and magnetic storms that effect our weather here on Earth.
The reason your city got flooded is because of the weather, these things happen and they are completely natural.

Answer 8

no just a lot of rain and houses built in stupid areas, you may notice old houses don't get flooded, because the people back then were wise enough not to build in flood prone areas

Answer 9

yes. but global warming will happen anyhow, not because of what the politicians think and try and drum in to you. theyve seen a gap to make some tax. bin tax for instance, thats the first of many!!

Answer 10

That would be one (albeit very simplistic) answer..... However, if it was Sheffield, that would have more to do with the way that the pressure system did what it does every twenty years or so and ended up missing the UK to the South....