FLASH FLOODS MORE LIKELY PREDICTS UK’S MET OFFICE

Climate change is likely to result in more frequent heavy summer downpours with a greater risk of flash flooding in the UK, according to a joint study from the Met Office and Newcastle University. The research predicts that there could be five times the number of "extreme rainfall events" per hour, under extreme warming projections from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The study, published in the journal, Nature Climate Change, used the Met Office’s powerful climate change computer model to predict hourly rainfall for the first time, although researchers caution that the findings are based on only one computer model. The model ran for nine months at much higher resolutions than past research to improve data clarity. The new approach allowed the researchers to model the intense convective-type storms that were not captured before. The study found that summers in the future would be drier overall, but with a significant increased chance of intense downpours.