Science in Action
New developments in science and science news from around the world, weekly from BBC World Service.
3 Episodes
Excesses of Rain
As we were putting the finishing touches to last week’s Science in Action, the US National Weather Service was warning of Hurricane Helene’s fast approach to the Florida coast – alerting people to ‘unsurvivable’ storm surges of up to 6 metres. But the category 4 storm powered, as forecast, far…
Historic weather extremes revealed using tree-rings
Valerie Trouet of the University of Arizona tells us how tree-ring data has been used to show how the jet stream has shaped extreme weather in Europe for centuries, influencing harvests, wildfires and epidemics. Monash University’s Andy Tomkins discusses how, around 460 million years ago, the Earth was briefly encircled…
Flash floods in the Sahara
The Sahara Desert has been experiencing unusually heavy rainfall due to an extratropical cyclone, causing flash floods in Morocco. We hear from Moshe Armon of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. A 485 million-year temperature record of Earth reveals Phanerozoic climate variability. Brian Huber of the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural…