During the upcoming Lunar New Year China will get a much-needed
respite from the arctic weather that has blasted much of the
country for the past three weeks, the China Meteorological
Administration (CMA) said Monday.
CMA spokesman Yu Xinwen told a press conference in
Beijing?on Monday that during the weeklong holiday, which will
start on Wednesday, most of the southern parts of the country would
have fine weather. The northern parts would see no evident
snow.
On Monday and Tuesday, light snow and sleet would fall on some
parts of the country's northwest and in areas south to the Yangtze
River. Icy rain is forecast for some mountainous areas of
Guizhou.
Yu said since Jan. 10, snow, sleet and low temperatures have
swept China's southern regions, a rarity for the area. The worst
winter weather in five decades has been more extreme in the central
provinces of Hubei and Hunan. A lingering blizzard, which has
lasted more than two weeks, was the longest in the past 100 years.
In Hunan, ice sticking to electricity transmission cables was
between 30 and 60 millimeters thick.
According to Yu, Anhui Province had experienced continuous snow
for 24 days, the longest in more than 50 years, while Zhejiang
Province had its worst snowstorm in the past 84 years.
Henan, Sichuan, Shaanxi, Gansu, Qinghai and Ningxia also
recorded their highest precipitation since 1951.
Yu said China was not unique in the extreme winter weather. The
Iraqi capital Baghdad was hit with a rare snowfall last month,
while Iran and Afghanistan suffered snow disasters.
Between Jan. 19 and Jan. 31, some Middle East nations, including
Syria, recorded heavy snow, while flights in Israel were cancelled.
Over the past couple days, the eastern and western parts of the
United States were also ravaged by blizzards.
Experts held the rudimentary reason for the disastrous weather
was the abnormal atmosphere circumfluence. Owing to lingering
stability of the circumfluence, cold air met warm air in the lower
and middle reaches of the Yangtze River and areas to the south of
the river. Wet air closure in the southern part of the
Qinghai-Tibet Plateau contributed to the unstable troposphere.
A phenomenon called La Nina aggravated the freak weather,
experts noted.
In an article carried by Sunday's People's Daily, Zheng
Guoguang, CMA head, said La Nina is a large pool of unusually cold
water in the equatorial Pacific that develops every few years and
influences global weather. It is the climatic opposite of El Nino,
a warming of the Pacific.
Zheng said the La Nina conditions developed in August throughout
the tropical Pacific and strengthened at the fastest pace in 56
years. The average sea-surface temperature during the past six
months was half a degree Celsius lower than normal years.
Earlier reports said the snow had been falling since
mid-January, leading to human deaths, structural collapse,
blackouts, accidents, transport problems and livestock and crop
destruction.
(Xinhua News Agency February 4, 2008)