Weather forecasts How the climate crisis is challenging meteorologists

Why do TV and radio forecasts rarely contextualise extreme weather events in terms of the climate crisis?

- Stuart Jeffries

After all, the latest data suggests Britain is getting hotter, wetter and stormier. The number of "very hot days" of 30C or more has trebled in recent decades, according to the Met Office's latest climate report. Last year was the second hottest on record, with only 2022 warmer.

"If you believe, as I do, that climate change is the most fundamental challenge facing humanity, any contribution to making its causes and effects more widely known will have a role to play," says Sunil Amrith, a professor of history at Yale University's School of the Environment and the author of the forthcoming book The Burning Earth.

Extremely wet days occurred 20% more frequently from 2014 to 2023 than from 1961 to 1990. Disturbing, too, was data from the tide gauge at Newlyn in Cornwall showing the sea level was higher in 2023 than any year since 1916.

The Met Office forecaster and presenter Alex Burkill says: "We don't always have a huge amount of time to talk, particularly on TV. If there's important weather to be discussing, you don't really want to waste time talking about climate change. You'd much rather get the information the public need to make sure they stay safe."