A stormy March provided good news for one European country that had been suffering its worst drought in recorded history.
Four named storms swept through the Iberian Peninsula, Bloomberg reported, tripling the usual rainfall for the first three weeks of the month, per the State Meteorological Agency, Agencia Estatal de Meteorología, or AEMET.
Seville, Córdoba, and Madrid, among other cities, received 10 times as much rain as they normally do. In Andalusia, the southern part of Spain, three people were killed by flooding, providing a reminder of the deadly and devastating October downpour that killed more than 200 people in Valencia.
AEMET meteorologist Rubén del Campo said the drought was likely over, but the country still didn’t have an excess of water.
Still, water reserves reached 66% of capacity, which was greater than the last 10 years’ average, according to the Ministry for the Ecological Transition and Demographic Challenge, per Bloomberg.
Rising global temperatures are causing extreme weather to happen more frequently and with greater intensity. This includes droughts and floods as well as heat waves. In Spain and the Mediterranean, the changing climate will lead to warmer and drier conditions, Bloomberg noted.
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“That kind of cycle is conducive to flash floods as hardened, scorched soil fails to absorb sudden downpours,” the outlet stated.
The drought had led to water restrictions for millions of Spaniards over the last few years, and those in Barcelona and elsewhere were still under orders to cut back on the vital resource. Fountains have been turned off, and gardens can only be watered on certain days and at certain times.
This is the result of humans burning dirty energy sources for fuel, which releases heat-trapping gases into the atmosphere. We can all help turn things around by using solar panels to produce clean energy, for example, or installing electric heat pumps.
In the meantime, as the Spanish government is doing, municipalities can look to improve coordination and communication among emergency services and other agencies that can save lives when extreme weather does hit.
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