Hirota, who is also a researcher with a tropical ecology group at the Serrapilheira Institute, said: “Last year, we had the floods, and now, we get this extreme heat immediately after … We’re becoming less and less able to predict these events because they never used to happen this way … For the living beings in these places – whether humans, animals, or plants – it’s also becoming ever more difficult to adapt to such abrupt changes.”.
During historic floods last May that left more than 180 dead in Brazil’s southernmost state, Rio Grande do Sul, the water rose to the ceiling of the Olindo Flores school in the city of São Leopoldo, destroying furniture, books and parts of its infrastructure.
“These extreme events – heatwaves, cold spells, and intense flooding like what happened in Rio Grande do Sul in 2024, followed now by an extreme drought – are becoming more frequent and more intense … and this frequency and intensity are the result of the climate crisis,” she said.
Record highs delay start of classes in Rio Grande do Sul, where floods fueled by climate crisis left 180 dead last May.
Marina Hirota, a scientist and professor of meteorology at the Federal University of Santa Catarina, said that while it was still too early for in-depth analyses of the current heatwave, both it and last year’s floods are “potentially linked to the climate crisis”.
