We can’t say yet if grid-breaking thunderstorms are getting worse – but we shouldn’t wait to find out

Thu, 28 Mar 2024 04:59:02 +1100

Andrew Pam <xanni [at] glasswings.com.au>

Andrew Pam
<https://theconversation.com/we-cant-say-yet-if-grid-breaking-thunderstorms-are-getting-worse-but-we-shouldnt-wait-to-find-out-224148>

"On February 13, six transmission line towers in Victoria were destroyed by
extreme wind gusts from thunderstorms, leading to forced electricity outages
affecting tens of thousands of people. The intense winds knocked trees onto
local power lines or toppled the poles, which caused about 500,000 people to
lose power. Some people went without electricity for more than a week. A month
earlier, severe thunderstorms and wind took out five transmission towers in
Western Australia and caused widespread outages.

Intense thunderstorm events have made news in recent years, including the
January 2020 storms that caused the collapse of six transmission towers in
Victoria. Perhaps the most far-reaching storms were those in 2016, when all of
South Australia lost power for several hours after extreme winds damaged many
transmission towers.

So are these thunderstorms with extreme winds getting worse as the climate
changes? It’s possible, but we can’t yet say for sure. That’s partly because
thunderstorms involve small-scale processes harder to study than bigger weather
systems."

Cheers,
       *** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net               Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/                 Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/            Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/               Manager, Serious Cybernetics

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