The combination of the increasingly heated planet and the disorderly occupation of the land may have been the cause of the tragedy in Petrópolis, which resulted in dozens of deaths and destruction throughout the city as a result of heavy rains. This is the assessment of meteorologist Giovanni Dolif, who gave an interview to CNN this Wednesday (16).
The researcher from the National Center for Monitoring and Alerts for Natural Disasters (Cemaden) considered that “the warming planet generates a more frequent number of extremes, and these extremes have more amplitude”. Dolif assesses the sum of this phenomenon with the disorderly occupation “has put us at risk”.
According to the meteorologist, the Southeast region concentrates the largest number of vulnerable people in relation to the risks of flooding. In addition to large urban agglomerations, the rugged geography makes the possibility of disasters higher.
“It is a region that has this combination of a large number of people in areas with this slope and susceptible to the occurrence of these landslides”, he considered.
Dolif explained that even with a wide network of sensors measuring rainfall parameters across the country, it is still a challenge to accurately predict the amount of water that will fall. “We couldn’t predict such an intense event days in advance,” he said.
“It is really a very big challenge for meteorology to predict these very intense and very punctual events”, said the meteorologist.
According to Dolif, it is possible to predict that there will be rain in the mountainous region of Rio, however, it is not possible to say if it will be a typical summer rain or if it will accumulate more than 200 mm of water as was the case with the heavy rains in Petrópolis.
“So it is possible to qualify that it will be a heavy rain, but it is still difficult to quantify how strong this rain will be”, he explained.
The meteorologist warned of “the chance of new storms”, and assessed that the arrival of a cold front could intensify the rains. “The exact amount of rain and the point where it will happen is still a challenge for meteorology and science, and we need to continue advancing and investing in this direction”, reinforced Dolif.
See images of the impact of the rains in Petrópolis
Source: CNN Brasil
