CO2: 426.46 ppmSea surface temperatures over the North Indian Ocean were 0.2C higher than the average over the past three decades, researchers say
Cyclones like those in Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Malaysia that killed 1,750 are ‘alarming new reality’
Ongoing monsoon rains are hitting areas already devastated by cyclone and further destabilising hillsides
Hundreds of villages remain buried under mud and debris
Regional experts warn that without rapid cuts in fossil-fuel emissions and serious investment in resilience – from restoring forests to enforcing planning rules – disasters like this year’s may become regular rather than rare, Stuti Mishra reports
Sri Lankan leader says island battling ‘largest and most challenging natural disaster in our history’
From Sri Lanka’s central highlands to Indonesia’s flood-swollen river basins, a wave of climate-fuelled cyclones and monsoon rains has unleashed one of the deadliest weather patterns south and southeast Asia has seen in years, killing more than 1,600 people, displacing hundreds of thousands and affecting millions.
Across southeast Asia, record-breaking rains and flooding caused by back-to-back tropical storms have claimed hundreds of lives and brought devastation and displacement upon entire communities, UN agencies said on Tuesday.
Catastrophic flooding displaces more than four million people