Europe floods: death toll rises – latest updates | Poland

Bibi van der Zee

The floods in Europe are just one of a number of extreme weather events around the world in the last few days.

Floods have also been devastating western and central Africa, with hundreds estimated to have died. Meanwhile in Southeast Asia Typhoon Yagi has been causing havoc, with at least 300,000 people displaced in Myanmar following heavy rains.

Although these specific events cannot be definitively attributed to climate change, it’s well established now that extreme rainfall is more common and more intense because of human-caused climate breakdown across most of the world, particularly in Europe, most of Asia, central and eastern North America, and parts of South America, Africa and Australia. This is because warmer air can hold more water vapour.

Flooding has most likely become more frequent and severe in these locations as a result, but is also affected by human factors, such as the existence of flood defences and land use.

Human-caused climate breakdown is supercharging extreme weather across the world, driving more frequent and more deadly disasters from heatwaves to floods to wildfires.

At least a dozen of the most serious events of the last decade would have been all but impossible without human-caused global heating.

Czech police has said that one person died and seven are missing amid flooding, AFP reported.

The death toll rose in central Europe over the weekend after severe flooding impacted the region, the Associated Press reported.

Six people died in Romania, one person in Austria and one person in Poland, while police in the Czech Republic said four people were missing.