NiMet says extreme weather to persist in 2019

The Director General of the Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NiMet), Prof. Sani Mashi has said 2019 will witness harsh weather conditions.

The NiMet DG disclosed this weekend during a press briefing to mark the 2019 World Meteorological Day.

The 2019 WMD has the theme, ‘the Sun, the Earth and the Weather.’ March 23 is set aside to celebrate the anniversary of the convention establishing the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) in 1950.

He explained that 2018 was one of the hottest years ever witnessed in history globally, even as he said the condition will continue through 2019.

“On this note, it is very clear that our environment is in a serious challenge of extreme weather events as a result of climate change which is seen as the single most prominent risk,” he said.

“As such, 2018 was found to be one of the four warmest years without an El Nino. 2019 as an El Nino year, has already begun with pockets of extreme events in form of severe storms currently ravaging Mozambique and parts of Australia,” he explained.

He, however, said NiMet is positioned to continue to meet Nigeria’s weather and climate challenged in 2019 and beyond.

Mr Bernard Gomez, WMO’s Representative for North, Central and West Africa, said climate change had led to an increase in extreme weather conditions at local levels as well as at national and global levels which according to him, may still become intense later in the year.

He said that humankind had continued to strive on this planet because they had able to adapt to the climate.