It's nasty weather everywhere

THE 2014 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has warned that extreme climatic events are likely to be more frequent in the future. Any reasonably well-informed person must have noted the preponderance of extreme climatic events such as prolonged droughts, heavy rainfall, intense floods, hotter and longer heatwaves, and cold spells all over the world in recent years. Throughout human history, climatic fluctuations have been a fact of life. However, episodes of extreme weather occurred at any specific time only in a few countries. What has been unusual is the number of intense heat or cold spells and high or low rainfalls that have been observed concurrently in many parts of the world around the same time.

The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) monitors the global weather. It notes that in the first two months of 2014, we witnessed unusual extreme events at the same time in many parts of the world, resulting in disruptions to transport, food production and electricity generation and distribution. The following are some extreme weather events in the past 10 years.

INDIA