It seems like every week in 2023, the Brazilian media is talking about a new extreme weather event. Over a dozen states in the country have been on red alert over the last week thanks to an unseasonable heat wave that has seen thermometers break all sorts of records — something completely unprecedented for the end of winter. This week, Brazil’s South is set to be hit by a cyclone — or rather, yet another cyclone, after dozens died as a result of flooding earlier in September. And amid all this, there’s a drought in the Amazon — and not just any drought, potentially the worst on record.
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This episode used music from Uppbeat and Envato. License codes: Aspire by Pryces (B6TUQLVYOWVKY02S), Ecology Climate Crisis (5DEUXC7VQL) and Science Fiction Drama by GentleJammers (BDMCNMP)
In this episode:
- Euan Marshall is The Brazilian Report’s deputy editor and covers environmental and indigenous affairs.
Background reading:
- Though it was at the end of winter, Brazil recorded some of the world’s highest temperatures last week, and climatic conditions risk the appearance of a “smoke belt” from the Amazon to Brazil’s South.
- In late July, we highlighted that Brazil would be in for an eccentric winter, with extreme weather variations on the cards. That turned out to be correct.
- And in May, we warned that El Niño would lead to a more severe dry period in the Amazon, with the risk of the forest becoming a “tinderbox ready to catch fire.”
- The state of Rio Grande do Sul is facing the risk of another extratropical cyclone. At the start of the month, flooding in the state left dozens dead.
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