Human Writes: The climate crisis is triggering really bad weather

Civil Defence Force personnel evacuating villagers from Kampung Sinar Budi Baru in Kuching, Sarawak, in February 2021. Severe weather events will only increase as the climate crisis worsens. －ZULAZHAR SHEBLEE/The Star

Thunderstorms in the tropics don’t make a news story, but when they seem so relentless, and rage with such an extreme edge, it makes me wonder: Is this really normal? One thunderstorm last month even smashed the glass panel of a building in Kuala Lumpur, raining glass on people inside.

I wonder, too, about flood disasters which we’ve seen almost every year in the last several years. And what about scorching hot days, which seem to be ever more frequent? The weather does feel hotter than a few decades ago. I don’t recall such blistering heat growing up as a child in KL. Back then, I’d sit comfortably in my parents’ car with no air-conditioning, just the breeze from open windows – but there were no traffic jams to melt in then.