I think whats essential, on this topic, on Climate Change, is that we have a cross party, nonpartisan approach to it. Raging bush fires are burning out of control across australia, with authorities in the state of victoria saying its now too late for people to evacuate. Temperature are exceeding a0 degrees in every state. The search continues for father of four and firefighter Anthony Knott whos now been missing for 10 days. In a year that saw the planets hottest month on record, nick miller and Sarah Keith Lucas reflect on the most significant meteorological events of 2019, in weather world. This time on weather world, were in cambridge, where right here, during 2019s record setting european heatwave, the temperature was the highest the uks ever recorded. At the uks hottest weather station, ill discover how you go about accurately recording temperature, and ill be finding out whats behind another year of record heatwaves. The science is overwhelmingly clear that the cause of this Climate Change is our activities as humans putting more and more Carbon Dioxide and other Greenhouse Gases into the atmosphere. And im at Cambridge University, where a new look at pioneering Data Collected in the 19705 is revealing the real impact Climate Change is having on our melting ice sheet today. Also on weather world, 2019s biggest storms, from devastation in the bahamas, hit by its most powerful hurricane, to the fire ravaging parts of our world. And climate in crisis as a swedish teenager becomes the face of public protest. How the 20105 became a decade like no other for our climate. Cambridge, famous for its university, its scientists, its punting on the river, and now its heat because of this. This weather station, which onjuly the 25th 2019 recorded a new National High temperature for the uk of 38. 7 degrees celsius. Now, in a year when Climate Change has become increasingly labelled a climate crisis, that may be an unwanted accolade, but nonetheless its a record that now cambridge holds. But how do you go about verifying a temperature like that, accepting it in a National Record . Well, philjohnson from the met office was involved in that process on that day. Phil, tell me what you did. Well, hi, nick. Well, first of all we had a good indication that record temperatures would be broken. From there we could actually start monitoring temperatures in real time. However, part of our network is done by volunteers such as at Cambridge UniversityBotanic Garden. And so it wasnt until the following day where we heard that the temperature had been broken. We needed to come in here and first of all check that the actual instrument had been read correctly. Then we performed a comparison or verification with a precision thermometer to make sure the instrument was actually performing correctly. And in addition, we needed to check the environment, the surroundings where the screen is. And is the instrument actually deployed correctly . Is it exposed correctly . And there is a thermometer inside this box. But tell me why its enclosed like this. We want to measure the air temperature. If the thermometer was actually outside, then well be heating the thermometer directly from the sun, and so that would give a false reading, the same as if you put a thermometer on the wall, youre actually measuring the temperature of the wall and not the air temperature. And theres a very good reason you dont want to open this box today to show us the thermometer inside. Its a very, very sensitive piece of equipment. As soon as we open the door, we actually may get a little spike in the temperature, which we cant accept for our readings. And the principles of recording heat like this are the same anywhere in the world. Indeed, the World Meteorological organization, they provide standards where we should measure temperatures. For the met office our standard is 125 centimetres above ground level, normally above grass, some countries are a little bit higher, but generally we are within their guidelines. Phil, really good to talk to you. Thank you. And it wasntjust in the uk that heat was hitting the headlines in 2019, farfrom it. Australia in november, and its largest city, sydney, is almost lost in smoke as multiple fires burn in dry, hot, windy conditions, producing catastrophic fire danger. Firefighters face near impossible conditions as temperatures soar. And worse is to come in december, as the country endures its hottest day on record. In august, the world watched as a Record Number of wildfires burned in the amazon amid a political storm about blame. In the usa in october, californias largest fire of the season so far rages north of san francisco. Earlier injune, the city had its hottest three days ever recorded in summer. And it was a series of astonishing summer heatwaves in europe that shattered records across multiple countries, including here in france injune, as the temperature reached nearly 46 celsius. Then injuly, new National Records were set in germany, belgium, the netherlands and the uk. And as the year came to a close, the World Meteorological organization said the last decade was set to be the planets hottest on record. Joining me now to talk about all things heat here at Cambridge UniversityBotanic Garden is dr emily shuckburgh, Cambridge Universitys chief climate scientist. So what stands out for you from whats been happening heatwise around the world in 2019 . Well, i think obviously what stands out for me beyond all else is the record temperatures that were recorded here in these gardens back in the summer. 38. 7 degrees celsius. And the really significant thing about heat of that level, though, is the effect that it has on peoples lives and particularly on vulnerable people, either the very young or the very old. And weve seen spikes in death rates particularly amongst the elderly in the heatwaves that weve seen in recent years. And thats a significant concern. And in terms of those record temperatures and how they fit into the heatwaves, is that something which is going to happen more frequently, or is already happening more frequently . We are seeing it already. So heatwaves in some parts of the world that used to happen maybe a couple of times a century before any Climate Change, were now seeing it occurring every few years. And as the temperatures increase globally, those frequencies will increase still further. Whats driving the heat and the increasing heat that were getting . The science is overwhelmingly clear that the cause of this Climate Change is our activities as humans putting more and more Carbon Dioxide and other Greenhouse Gases into the atmosphere. So today our Carbon Dioxide levels are coming close to being 50 higher than they were before the start of the industrial revolution. And that has driven globally temperatures to be more than one degree celsius warmer than that time. And that might sound like quite a small number, but the implications of that are really significant increases in the risk of extreme weather events. Good to talk to you. Well be back with you again later in the programme. Now its time to cross to sarah, whos looking at whats going on with temperatures at the other end of the extreme. A warming world is still capable of extreme cold and back injanuary 2019 in the usa, chicago recorded its lowest temperature in sa years, with minus 30 degrees celsius. You see this on my glasses . This is notjust fog, but frost. Its ridiculous out here, and its going to get worse. Where you expect it to be cold, temperatures are on the rise. In fact, the arctic is warming twice as fast as the rest of the planet, and in 2019 recorded its second smallest sea ice extent in the satellite era. But the arctic hit the headlines for Something Else in 2019 fire. Millions of hectares of forest burned within the Arctic Circle in scenes described by experts as unprecedented. Higher temperatures and a greater frequency of lightning are partly to blame. In order to better understand whats been happening in our polar regions during 2019, ive come here to the Scott Polar Research institute at the university of cambridge. Its the oldest dedicated Polar Research institute in the world. And professorjulian dowdeswell is the director. So, julian, tell me a little bit about the work that goes on here. Our main expertise, i suppose, of where we put most of our resource is what we call the icy world and in particular, ice and environmental change. And, of course, a huge amount has changed since captain scott, shackleton and Edward Wilson first went into the interior of antarctica. Scotts First Expedition collected over 20 volumes of data concerning the antarctic at that time, which provides arguably the earliest baseline against which we can judge contemporary change in that part of the polar regions. And over that hundred years, how has our perception of and our relationship with the polar regions changed, because theyre very much at the forefront of our minds these days . When i started in the field as a doctoral student a0 years 01 so ago now, people thought that the polar regions were interesting, but a little bit divorced from the rest of the world, indeed from the rest of the Global Climate system. And now, of course, we know that absolutely is not the case. And indeed both the arctic and the antarctic are major drivers of the growth of the Global Climate system. The poles are just about as far away as you can get from the big, industrial, carbon emitting parts of the world. So why is it that the poles are quite so sensitive to Climate Change . The arctic is almost inarguably the most sensitive part of the whole Global Climate system. But in the last 20 or 30 years, theres been an enormous change in the summer sea ice cover in the arctic. In fact, a change from about eight million Square Kilometres per year to only about four and a half or 5. And what you do by removing that ice by the end of the summer, because its slightly warmer in the arctic, is you change the reflectance of the surface very greatly, and you swap something thats very bright and reflective for something thats much more like my jumper, for something thats really absorbent. That happens year on year. Each year, theres a bit less sea ice. Each year, the temperature is, of the water in particular, just a fraction warmer, which makes it more difficult the next year for the sea ice to form, thats a self reinforcing process. And that is the reason really that ice reflectance, that feedback, that is the main reason why the arctic is the most sensitive part of the whole Global Climate system. And 2019 has been another year of extreme weather around the world, from record breaking heatwaves, floods and also wildfires even to the north of the Arctic Circle. So what really stands out in 2019 in terms of whats going on at the poles . Fires are a big thing throughout the globe. And, of course, they manifest themselves by things like black carbon in ice cores. And we can actually trace how those have changed over the decades. Over the past 800,000 years in the longest Antarctic Ice cores, we can see that co2 levels are very strongly coupled with temperature over successive glacial, interglacial cycles. Thank you so much, julian. And thinking about how we use historic ice data to look forward into the future, a little bit later in the programme ill be back looking at some newly available digitised ice data that is helping climate scientists map what could potentially happen to our climate in the future. Now for some of your weather watcher pictures, starting with these scenes from november when parts of england suffered severe flooding in a deluge which contributed to south yorkshire, nottinghamshire and lincolnshire seeing their wettest autumn on record. But the autumn rainfall wasnt evenly distributed across the uk. In fact, parts of northern and western scotland were much drier than average in autumn and exceptionally dry in november. Become a bbc weather watcher by signing up online at bbc. Co. Uk weatherwatchers, and you could be in the running for pic of the season, which in autumn was won by tonys view of the stormy seas in wales. Still to come on weather world. Underwater why a warmer world could also mean a wetter world. Now on weather world, some of 2019s biggest storms, starting with Hurricane Dorian seen approaching the bahamas in september. The few images taken as the category five storm hit paint a terrifying picture as a flooding storm surge ploughs across the abaco islands. The aftermath is apocalyptic. The near complete devastation here at Marsh Harbour on great abaco is a product of the strongest storm ever to have hit the bahamas and one of the most powerful on record in the atlantic. In the western pacific in october, hagibis is the strongest typhoon in 60 years to hitjapan. The storm leaves behind widespread damage, including to these bullet trains swamped by the floodwaters. Earlier in march, cyclone idai is one of the strongest ever to hit africa. This is what it did to the city of beira in mozambique. Idai is the southern hemispheres second deadliest Tropical Cyclone on record. And in may, cyclone fani ploughs into the east coast of india. Its the strongest storm here in 20 years. But countless lives were saved thanks to a Mass Evacuation in advance of the storm. No Tropical Cyclone in italy, but a storm surge all the same combines with the venice high tide in november to produce the worst flooding here in over 50 years. St marks basilica was said to have suffered grave damage with its crypt completely flooded. In the uk, 2019 has brought bouts of severe flooding, most recently in november across parts of yorkshire and the midlands as record autumn rainfall sent some rivers to their highest levels ever recorded. Extinction rebellion during 2019, public protest and direct action about Climate Change reached new levels. Chanting spain in december, and thousands demonstrate as madrid hosts the United Nations climate conference. Arriving by train, teenage Swedish Environmental activist Greta Thunberg has a police escort, such is the interest in someone whos become the face of the climate protest movement. Addressing the conference, she said not enough is being done to combat the climate crisis. To stay below 1. 5 degrees, we need to keep the carbon in the ground. 0nly setting up distant dates and saying things which give the impression that action is under way will most likely do more harm than good, because the changes required are still nowhere in sight. Well, im back here at Cambridge Universitys Botanic Garden with Cambridge Universitys chief climate scientist, dr emily shuckburgh. Emily, we talked earlier about how warm the world has become. But in that video, we saw lots of rain and flooding. So how does this warmer, wetter world fit together . Yes, it might sound counter intuitive, mightnt it . But, actually, a warmer atmosphere can hold more water in it. Thats just simple physics as to how that happens. And that means that theres more that its wetter, essentially, to be able to rain down and heavy rainfall events. And thats the essential reason why weve seen more and more flooding here in the uk, but also, flooding events around the world as well. And weve seen really powerful hurricanes and typhoons as well. Is that something that also fits into Climate Change science . Mm, the way in which Climate Change interacts with hurricanes and cyclones is quite complex. But in terms of the damage caused by those hurricanes and cyclones, its very clear that much of that damage is exacerbated by Climate Change. So weve just talked about how Climate Change can cause heavier rainfall and a lot of the damage associated with cyclones, this comes from the flooding, the storm surges that weve seen associated with those. So heavier rainfall, greater storm surges, but also Sea Level Rise across the world. As the seas have been rising, those storms are going to penetrate that much further inland, causing that much more damage. And amidst all of that background of heat, flooding and storms, 2019 has really been a year of political activism, public activism as well when it comes to Climate Change, more awareness about that, hasnt it . Weve seen young people around the world really rising up and saying our future is at stake and their future really is at stake. Its decisions that we all make over the coming decade that will determine not just our childrens future, but their grandchildrens and their grandchildrens future as well. Thanks for talking to us in this lovely setting on such a sunny day. Thank you a uk climate scientist and his team at Reading University are helping us to visualise how much the world is warming with these climate stripes here showing each years average Global Temperatures since the 18805 in a coloured stripe, clearly progressing from blue to red over time a5 temperatures have warmed. Bbc weather presenter ben rich takes a look at how you can look for a climate stripe to show the temperature trends where you are. This is the show your stripes website, and on the home page, were greeted by the same Global Climate stripes weve just been looking at. But the great thing about this website is we can delve a little deeper. We can look at patterns in different places around the world. And its quite simple to do. If i click on region and then select africa, for example, i can then choose a country. In this case, im going to choose ethiopia. And these are the climate stripes for ethiopia. This data goes back to 1901. It comes from berkeley earth. And you can see this pattern of things getting warmer over the years, and in some parts of the world, we can dig even deeper than that. The usa is a great example. If i click on region, choose north america, then find the usa, were able to select different states of the us. If i choose florida, again, here are the climate stripes. This data comes from noaa, the us weather and climate service. This data goes all the way back to 1895. A5 youd expect with a smaller area, there is a bit more variability 5ome warmer years earlier on, 5ome cooler one5 later on. But generally speaking, you can see that warming pattern, and that is the striking thing about this website. Basically, wherever you look around the world, you will find that trend of accelerated warming in recent years. Im back at the Scott Polar Research institute at the university of cambridge and, profe55orjulian dowdswell, youre going to take me back in time to look at some of the research that was done here almost half a century ago and look at why its so relevant to whats happening today. After the end of the second world war, the surface of the Antarctic Ice sheet began to be mapped, but there was no knowledge at that time at all of what the thickness of the Antarctic Ice sheet was. It was realised by the late 505 that ice was semi transparent to radio waves at certain frequencies. And what that means is if you fly a transmitter and a receiver at that frequency, this is the atmosphere and beneath it is the ice surface, which we can see is a very strong reflector. And then some of the megahertz energy from the transmitter actually penetrates through from the ice surface, through the ice itself to the rather more diffuse bed and that energy is reflected again back to the receiver. And that allows us for the first time to actually map not just the surface, but the thickness of the Antarctic Ice sheet. So thinking back to this data that was gathered almost half a century ago, Technology Must have come on a long way since then, so how do you get this into a kind of format that we can use and compare to our modern records now . Well, technology has changed a lot. And, of course, were in the digital age. So we, together with colleagues at Stanford University in the us, have realised that we can actually redigiti5e these old film records at very, very high resolution. And this we actually did last year with the help of the hollywood film industry. We remastered, effectively, these films in analogue form into digitalform. We can compare our data from the 19605 and the early 19705 with modern satellite and airborne measurements from just the past decade or so. And then we can compare things such as elevation change and thickness change. So when youre comparing what the ice was like a0 or 50 years ago to whats happening now, have there been any surprises in this data . 0h, alway5. I mean, in some ways, things havent changed in some places, and in other areas, things have changed much more than we expected. For example, there are channels on the underside of some of the floating margins of the ice 5heet, we call these floating ice shelves, that in fact have stayed in the same position and about the same size through the whole 40 to 50 year period. And thats interesting because it shows in those cases the lack of change. And there are other areas where we compare modern thickness with the thickness 30 or a0 year5 ago, and there we see changes of over 100 metres. So what this suggests is that some parts of the antarctic, as one might expect, are actually more sensitive and some are less sensitive to external climatic stimuli. Thank you so much forjoining u5 and for talking us through some of the really fascinating and important work thats going on here. A great pleasure. November 2013, and typhoon haiyan bear5 down on the philippines, the deadliest in a decade of more powerful Tropical Cyclones. As we enter the 20205, we asked university of reading climate 5cienti5t dr Nicolas Bellouin for his personal take on the 20105, a remarkable decade of weather and change for our climate. This has been an extraordinary decade in terms of weather and climate, and many records have been broken, many kinds of records all across the planet. It has been a warm decade. Indeed, seven out of the ten warmest years have happened since 2010, and 2016 is the warmest year on record ever. That brings heatwaves a5 theyve been recurring in many parts of the globe. And with that comes the risk of fires, which have peaked in brazil and have been very strong in australia, in california and in south east asia, but also in sweden, which recorded record fire in 2018. Precipitation has also hit records. China had its wettest year in 2016 and the us in 2018. Flash flooding is now recurring often in africa and in france, italy and spain. So the question for me as a climate 5cienti5t or perhaps more generally for us as a society is whether this is a transition towards an even warmer world or a call to action to avoid further . The effects of Severe Weather can sometimes hit with little warning. In the uk in march, watch this man narrowly escape di5aster as strong winds caused part of a building to collapse. And sometimes we can bring near di5aster on ourselves. In november, this man and child are lucky to escape with just a soaking as big waves hit the coastline of the isle of wight. And finally, what to some can seem like the worst of weather is, for others, pure joy. Australia in november, and it rains in new south wales. In a state hit by severe heat, drought and fire, the reaction i5 understandably enthusiastic. And thats it for this time on weather world from cambridge. Theres more to see online, including highlights from our previous programmes at bbc. Co. Uk weatherworld. Lets see what a new year a new decade of weather bring5. It will bring more weather world. So, until were back, keep checking the forecast. The weather 5tays pretty quiet as we end 2019 and go into a new decade. Plenty of dry and sunny weather out there at the moment to be enjoyed. Thi5 there at the moment to be enjoyed. This was the scene a bit earlier on in east sussex. We have some blue skies and 5un5hine acro55 in east sussex. We have some blue skies and 5un5hine across many parts of england and wales but you can see from the earlier rainfall imagery we have some rain moving its way through scotland at the moment, 5inking south and east, it weakening a5 5inking south and east, it weakening as it does so and we will see some patchy rain in Northern Ireland eventually far north west of england around the lake district. Is that when clears in scotland there will be some sunny 5pells, also acro55 many parts be some sunny 5pells, also acro55 many pa rt5 of be some sunny 5pells, also acro55 many parts of england and wales and if youre heading out on about it will feel quite mild. Temperatures getting into double figures, 10 12d. Through tonight, this area of rain will weaken out, disappearing that we are left with a legacy of cloud across many parts of england and wales, that will keep temperatures above freezing while acro55 northern pa rt5 of england above freezing while acro55 northern parts of england into 5outhern scotla nd parts of england into 5outhern scotland and Northern Ireland, clearer skies here, you can see by the blue here there will be a touch of frost into new years eve, temperatures down to 2 in newcastle, about four, five or 6 degrees further south. For new years eve, abbott of an area of low pressure years eve, abbott of an area of low pre55ure towards years eve, abbott of an area of low pressure towards the south west, that will bring some cloud, a few shower5, that will bring some cloud, a few showers, and we keep quite a bit of cloud acro55 showers, and we keep quite a bit of cloud across wales, the midlands into the south east of england. The be5t into the south east of england. The best of the sunshine will be acro55 the north and east. It will be a pitch earlier here computer today. Temperatures down to a 7d. Further south will get temperatures in double figures. If youre heading out into about, lots of dry weather to be expected, there will be a parameter cloud, particularly in the west, as we approach midnight there may be 12 fog patches starting to develop but nothing to spoil any fireworks di5plays you may be going to planning. Going into 2020, the new decade, an area of High Pressure towards the south east, extending its influence acro55 towards the south east, extending its influence across the uk. Another breeze towards the far north west, in the Early Morning or fog will clear away and there will be a lot of cloud around on new years day but there will be some holes developing. Some 5un5hine breaking through that cloud, temperatures around about average for the time of year. 5 9, 10 degrees. A5 around about average for the time of year. 5 9, 10 degrees. As we start 2020, the weather will be fairly quiet. A 5pell 2020, the weather will be fairly quiet. A spell of wet windy weather on thursday but then dying down again. This is bbc news, im joanna gosling. The headlines at 12 a 19 year old british woman is found guilty of lying after she told cypru5 police she had been gangraped by 12 israelis. Her lawyer is planning an appeal. There was supporting evidence, we say, which goes to show that she was actually telling the truth. And its very worrying for a court to rely upon a retraction statement. The world will face irreversible heating unle55 firm5 shift their priorities soon a warning from the Outgoing Bank of england governor. I would say were in a climate crisis, just like a financial crisis. I think whats essential on this topic, on Climate Change, is that we have a cross party, nonpartisan approach to it. Too late to evacuate. Thousands risk being cut off as scores of fires burn out