2024 has so far offered a lot of weather, and the changes have come suddenly on both the authorities and most people. Because when you finally found out exactly how many layers you had to wear before going out, the weather turned. Suddenly all the stilettos had to come off again, and the rain jacket on. At the weekend, temperatures were down to minus 16 in Oslo. But on Monday, temperatures up to 7 degrees were measured. In Odda in Vestland, it went from minus 10 on Saturday to plus 9 on Monday. Large parts of the country have experienced the same. Vaksdal municipality set up crisis management due to rainfall and many closed roads. The water gushed through the center of Dale. On-duty meteorologist Geir Ottar Fagerlid says the mild weather we are experiencing now is closer to normal. – In the first half of January, Norway was in an area with very cold air, so the precipitation that fell was mainly snow in most of the country. People had to dig out their cars in Arendal on New Year’s Day. Photo: Tor Erik Schrøder / NTB – Crazy weather is generally the norm. This was due to jet streams. Strong wind currents that had a slightly different direction than they usually do. But now they are closer to normal again, according to Fagerlid. It also causes more fluctuations in the weather. – We will have a lot of yo-yo weather in the future, and this is because we will be visited by a lot of low pressure in the future. But it may primarily apply to southern Norway, in northern Norway the weather is more stable, at least this week. He says the stable, cold winter weather we saw over large parts of the country at the beginning of January is not really typically Norwegian. A boat in the frost smoke in the Oslofjord during the cold wave that lay over the city at the beginning of January. Photo: Håkon Mosvold Larsen / NTB – Crazy weather is generally speaking what is normal weather in Norway. All year. A weakened “polar vortex” can cause large variations According to the Norwegian Meteorological Institute, the so-called “polar vortex” controls much of the weather we get. – The cold weather in some places in the northern hemisphere can be explained by a weather phenomenon called the “polar vortex”, says climate researcher Rasmus Benestad. – The polar vortex is a large air circulation that surrounds the polar regions. This circulation usually keeps the cold air in the polar regions isolated from warmer air masses further south, Benestad explains. From time to time, the polar vortex can weaken, which can lead to abrupt transitions in the weather. A weakened polar vortex can cause the cold air to move south. Then you can experience that the temperature drops dramatically and that the weather becomes cold in areas that usually have a milder climate. There can be several reasons why the polar vortex weakens. Melting of ice in the Arctic, changes in ocean currents and a reduced temperature difference between cold Arctic air masses and warmer air further south are some of the main causes, according to the Norwegian Meteorological Institute. Flooding on the pier in Bergen. Photo: NTB – Normal with big variations Climate researcher Bjørn Samset says that geography means that Norway will have big changes. – It is normal to have large variations, but we are probably now seeing an effect of climate change causing more precipitation. He believes we will see more such winters in the future, but that there will be large variations from year to year. Sometimes we won’t get any snow at all. Climate change in Norway has a tendency to intensify the conditions we had before, he says. – It is placed on top of the weather, so what we experience becomes more extreme on average. But Samset is careful not to link what we have seen recently too closely to climate change. – Mostly weather, but a small part of it is also climate change, I would say. Diana Fjellestad lives at Røyknes in Vennesla, along the river Langåna. On Monday, her lawn was flooded and she explained that trees came down the river.
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This may be the explanation for the “yo-yo weather” – news Norway – Overview of news from different parts of the country
