Heatwaves and cyclones: India's tryst with climate change

livemint.com:

IMD issuing a ‘red alert’ warning of severe heatwave conditions on 28 May for two days across six states: Rajasthan, Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, Western Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.As a study published by the Delhi-based think tank Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) —titled Decoding The Urban Heat Stress Among Indian Cities—a few days ago shows, cities are becoming increasingly vulnerable to rising heat stress, especially deadly humid heat. The fact that cities are registering higher night temperatures adds to the deadliness.At the same time as these heatwaves, a major cyclone, Remal, made landfall in the Bengal coast on 26 May, causing extreme damage, and claimed a few lives.

In fact, even as the cyclone lost its strength after landfall and became a major storm, it remained intense enough to cause heavy rains leading to major landslides in Northeast states like Manipur. For a depression to develop into a severe cyclone in so short a time, the reason was abnormally high sea surface temperatures (SSTs) in the Bay of Bengal, another result of climate change.In the weeks leading up to the formation of the cyclone, Koll had said in another social media post on 19 May, Bay of Bengal SST had been persistently 2-3 degree Celsius above normal.