
So Philip says there’s an urgent need to limit global warming and make sure that a once-in-a-thousand-year heat wave remains extremely rare. There has been warming in the equatorial Pacific Ocean, particularly in the eastern portion. The Climate Prediction Center issued an El Nio Watch, indicating that El Nio conditions are likely to emerge. The researchers found that if average global temperatures rise to about 3.5 degrees Fahrenheit above pre-industrial times, an event like this would occur roughly every five to 10 years in that future world. Climate Outlook What’s Next for the Pacific Northwest El Nio-Southern Oscillation (ENSO): El Nio Watch. “Yet it would have been virtually impossible without human-induced climate change,” Philip says.Īnd if global warming continues, such extreme heat waves could grow more common. The researchers estimate that this year’s heat wave in the Pacific Northwest was about a one-in-a-thousand-year event, so it was extremely unlikely.

She’s part of the World Weather Attribution Initiative, a group that analyzes extreme weather events. “Many people do not realize that heat waves are actually one of the deadliest natural hazards,” says Sjoukje Philip of the Royal Dutch Meteorological Institute. Learn all about the climate of Washington State. Hundreds of people died across the Pacific Northwest and British Columbia. But in 2021, they reached more than 110 degrees. High temperatures in Portland are usually in the seventies that time of year. Less than two weeks after record-breaking temperatures forced California into a state of emergency, a severe heatwave has swept over northwestern US and Canada, shattering records across the region.

In June 2021, a record-breaking heat wave scorched the Pacific Northwest. The Northwest Climate Conference annually brings together more than 300 researchers and practitioners from around the region to discuss scientific results. Media analysis Media reaction: Pacific north-west ‘heat dome’ and the role of climate change.
