Human-caused warming has doubled the chances that southern Brazil will experience extreme, multiday downpours like the ones that recently caused disastrous flooding there, a team of scientists said on Monday.
The deluges have killed at least 172 people and displaced more than half a million residents from their homes.
Three months’ rain fell in a two-week span of April and May in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul.
In the cooler climate of the 19th century, before large-scale emissions of greenhouse gases, such colossal downpours were far rarer, the researchers said.
That pushes more warm, moist air toward the south, where it can fall as rain.
Locations:
Brazil, Rio Grande do Sul, South America