On April 14 and 15, 2024, entire regions of the Arabian Peninsula were affected by extreme rainfall. More than 14cm of rain fell in Dubai in 24 hours, the equivalent of a year and a half of precipitation; which constitutes the heaviest rainfall in the United Arab Emirates since records began in 1949.
According to the World Weather Attribution, these rains caused the deaths of at least 19 people in Oman, including ten children who died when a school bus was swept away by the waters. In the United Arab Emirates, four people died in cars swept away by water. In both countries, rainfall caused enormous damage to buildings and cars, power outages and flooding.
More than 1,000 flights were canceled and delayed for several days after the runway at Dubai Airport, the world’s busiest international airport, was flooded.
The scientific report is interesting in more than one way. This article will not only talk about World Weather Attribution (WWA) reportbut also and above all the terrible misinformation that followed this event, with thousands of trolls (and a few “media experts”) who took the opportunity to talk about cloud seeding, which would have been the main cause of this precipitation.
What does the World Weather Attribution report say about flooding in Dubai?
Since 2014, an initiative led by a pan-European collaboration of attribution scientists, the World Weather Attribution (WWA), has carried out a number of rapid attribution studies. Why “fast”? Before, it took months or even years to have an attribution study. The studies also had to be peer reviewed.
Here, a quick study from WWA tells us that heavy rainfall in El Niño years, like that which hit the UAE and Oman last week, has become 10 to 40 percent heavier.
Observations also indicate that El Niño plays an important role in the likelihood of heavy rain events in this part of the world. To find out everything about El Niño, read this summary article.
Let us also remember what the 6th IPCC report tells us:
Human-caused climate change is already affecting many extreme weather and climate events in all regions of the world. Evidence of observed changes in extreme events such as heatwaves, heavy precipitation, droughts and tropical cyclones, and, in particular, their attribution to human influence, has strengthened since the Fifth Assessment Report .
The part of uncertainty
Although the researchers could not determine precisely how much of the increase is due to human-caused climate change, they believe that warming, caused by the burning of fossils, is the most likely explanation for the increase. increase in precipitation.
The title of this article could also have been “deadly floods may have been caused by human-caused climate change”. A title with clearer certainty would have been more selling, as the WWA press release also suggests. But that would not have been factual and would not have been in line with what their study says.
According to the WWA, anthropogenic climate change still remains the most likely explanation, and for several reasons:
- A warmer atmosphere can hold more moisture, the Clausius-Clapeyron relationship indicates that at 1.2°C of global warming, the atmosphere can hold about 8.4% more moisture.
- Changing circulation patterns induced by global warming may increase precipitation intensity in some regions.
- Finally, there are no other explanations for the increased precipitation in the region.
Further attribution studies will therefore be needed to refine the results here. Note that it is rather rare for the World Weather Attribution to be so careful in the terms used. You can read other interesting studies where the signal was much clearer.
Cloud seeding and misinformation
As soon as the floods hit Dubai, thousands of accounts immediately declared that it had nothing to do with climate change but rather “cloud seeding”.
There is indeed a cloud seeding program in the United Arab Emirates that aims to enhance precipitation from warm clouds by seeding them with particles large enough to activate the collision-coalescence process (Bruintjes et al, 2012), as well as using electrical charges to try to improve this process.
In this case, the UAE National Center for Meteorology, which oversees the country’s operations, said no cloud-seeding missions were carried out to combat the storm. And given the massive size of the storm system, we would have had extreme precipitation regardless of the possible influence of cloud seeding.
The conclusion of the WWA is very clear:
Finally, cloud seeding was not implemented as part of this event and, furthermore, even if implemented, it has no influence on the amount of available atmospheric moisture, which was the main abnormal variable preceding the precipitation episode. We can therefore conclude that cloud seeding did not have a significant influence on the event.
Trolls and media pundits
Even if some scientists immediately communicated and ruled out the hypothesis of cloud seeding, thousands of trolls (mainly in English) insisted that it had nothing to do with climate change, that it was Dubai, that they were customary in doing so, etc.
The information was even suggested by Bloomberglending credence to the theory since their article was opposed to anyone who brought up human-caused climate change.
The subject was even raised publicly by media experts and other “experts” on Linkedin and Instagram, who spread their disinformation sometimes with a conspiratorial tone “weird, the French press doesn’t talk about it”. Well fortunately she doesn’t talk about it, and if she does talk about it, she should specify that it is not the cause of this extreme precipitation!
The most worrying, however, is the speed and force with which disinformation has spread. We are only at the beginning of the era of mass climate disinformation, as researcher David Chavalarias describes:
Dubai is not ready for climate change
The WWA report helps to understand the risk and impact factors of the April 2024 floods in the United Arab Emirates and Oman, by providing keys to understanding the factors of vulnerability, exposure and capacity to respond. adaptation at play during these extreme precipitation events.
Indeed, urban planning in the UAE and Oman finds itself at a critical juncture, playing a decisive role in exacerbating or mitigating flood risks in the context of rapid urbanization and climate change .
Inequalities in the face of climate change, including within the same city
In the United Arab Emirates, particularly in cities like Dubai and Abu Dhabi, the pace of coastal development has accelerated on land located just meters above sea level, making more than 85% of the population and 90% of infrastructure vulnerable to rising sea levels and extreme weather events.
The proliferation of impermeable concrete surfaces and insufficient drainage infrastructure amplify flooding during heavy rains, compounding vulnerability by the concentration of large buildings in urban areas.
Finally, remember that the elderly, people with disabilities, women caring for children, racial and ethnic minorities, migrant workers and low-income people are particularly vulnerable to flood risks and that property losses and human are probably underestimated.
Could this serve as a warning to the UAE to reduce its oil production and export? Given the presidency of COP28 and its declarations, there is room for doubt.
For further