Pakistan isn't the only place that's had some wild weather lately. -- 30/6/03 onwards The year of profitability 2nd half FY4

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Subject: Pakistan isn't the only place that's had some wild weather lately.

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Reported Indonesia 17/8/2010==Fin 48

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Date Posted: 13/11/10 2:52:39

Pakistan isn't the only place that's had some wild weather lately.

There have also been floods in China and a dangerous heatwave in Russia.

So is there any kind of link between them?

And could it be evidence of climate change which we hear so much about?

Here's Sarah with the answers.

SARAH LARSEN, REPORTER: Living on planet Earth has always meant living with the best and the worst of the weather. But sometimes the weather behaves in a way you just don't expect and in extreme cases it can be deadly. This is Russia, a country known for its cold winters and mild summers. But right now people are struggling to cope with a record heatwave. Moscow's covered with smoke from bushfires around the country. Many people have died. In China and Pakistan too much rain has caused devastating floods. Even in Australia we've seen some strange weather lately - tornadoes and water filling lakes that have been dry for years.

REPORTER: So what's with this weird weather? Is this what they mean by climate change? And is there more to come?

I went to the Bureau of Meteorology to find out. Meteorology means the study of weather and that's exactly what these guys do. They track what it's doing now and forecast what it's going to do next.

REPORTER: The strange weather that we're seeing in places like Pakistan and Russia. Is that climate change?

PAUL LIANIO, METEOROLOGIST: If we experience it on a day to day basis its actually weather. So what we're seeing in Pakistan, what we're seeing in Russia, it's very unusual weather.

Paul explained that weather and climate are not the same thing. Weather is what's going on in the atmosphere at any one time.

PAUL: If we step outside now and the wind is blowing our hair, that's weather.

We measure the weather in four main ways; temperature, air pressure, wind and moisture in the air. Temperature is affected by the sun. Its rays hit different parts of the earth at different angles, giving us different temperatures around the globe. Water from the ocean evaporates into the air and is carried around the planet by winds. And the winds are caused by air pressure; how hard the air is pressing down on the earth. Those elements work together in a complex system that we call weather. Climate is what the weather does over a longer period of time. It tells us about what to expect from the seasons and the places we live. Climate researchers like Lorien study weather records dating back decades and even centuries and compare the conditions back then to today and they use other techniques to look back even further to see what the climate was like millions of years ago.

REPORTER: Are there patterns?

LORIEN MARTIN, CLIMATE RESEARCHER: Yes there are patterns. There are patterns over the short term and longer term.

Those long-term patterns are what we mean when we talk about climate change. Most climate scientists reckon the world is heating up and that could mean more extreme weather events. But extreme weather events have always happened, so it doesn't necessarily mean a changing climate.

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