[Reader-list] 53 deg C in Pakistan

[Nagraj Adve]

Temperatures reach record high in Pakistan

Meteorologists record a temperature of 53.7C (129F) in Mohenjo-daro as
heatwave continues across Pakistan and India

    * John Vidal and Declan Walsh in Islamabad
    * guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 1 June 2010 17.53 BST


Mohenjo-daro, a ruined city in what is now Pakistan that contains the
last traces of a 4,000-year-old civilisation that flourished on the
banks of the river Indus, today entered the modern history books after
government meteorologists recorded a temperature of 53.7C (129F). Only
Al 'Aziziyah, in Libya (57.8C in 1922), Death valley in California
(56.7 in 1913) and Tirat Zvi in Israel (53.9 in 1942) are thought to
have been hotter.

Temperatures in the nearest town, Larkana, have been only slightly
lower in the last week, with 53C recorded last Wednesday. As the
temperatures peaked, four people died, including a prisoner serving a
life sentence for murder and an elderly woman. Dozens are said to have
fainted.

The extreme heat was exacerbated by chronic power cuts which have
prevented people from using air-conditioning. The electricity has cut
out for eight hours each day as part of a severe load-shedding regime
that has caused riots in other parts of Pakistan where cities are
experiencing a severe heatwave with temperatures of between 43C and
47C.

"It's very tough," said M B Kalhoro, a local correspondent for
Dawn.com, an online newspaper. "When the power is out, people just
stay indoors all the time."

The blistering heat now engulfing Pakistan stretches to India where
more than 1,000 people have reportedly died of heatstroke or heart
attacks in the last two months. Although Europe and China have
experienced cooler than average winters, record or well-above average
temperatures have been recorded in Tibet and Burma this year.

Southern Europe was yesterday rapidly warming after a particularly
cool winter. Thirteen provinces in southern Spain, including
Andalucia, Murcia and the Canary islands, were put on "yellow alert"
after meteorologists forecast temperatures rising to 38C (99F) in
Cadiz, Córdoba, Jaén, Malaga and Seville.

According to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association
(NOAA), the national climate monitoring service that measures global
temperatures by satellite, 2010 is shaping up to be one of the hottest
years on record. The first four months were the hottest ever measured,
with record spring temperatures in northern Africa, south Asia and
Canada.

The global temperature for March was a record 13.5C (56.3F) and
average ocean temperatures were also the hottest for any March since
record-keeping began in 1880.

As a result of high sea surface temperatures, the Atlantic hurricane
season, which officially started today is now expected to be one of
the most intense in years. Last week NOAA predicted 14 to 23 named
storms, including eight to 14 hurricanes, three to seven of which were
likely to be "major" storms, with winds of at least 111mph. This is
compared to an average six-month season of 11 named storms, six of
which become hurricanes, two of them major.

On Sunday, scientists reported that Africa's Lake Tanganyika, the
second deepest freshwater lake in the world, is now at its warmest in
1,500 years, threatening the fishing industry on which several million
lives depend. The lake's surface waters, at 26C (78.8F), have reached
temperatures that are "unprecedented since AD500," they reported in
the journal Nature Geoscience.

Some scientists have suggested that the warming experienced around the
world this year is strongly linked to warmer than usual currents in
the Pacific Ocean, a regular phenomenon known as El Niño. Others say
that it is consistent with long-term climate change.