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Climate extremes

The worst heat waves to come

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The combination of high temperatures and humidity could, within just a century, result in extreme conditions around the Persian Gulf that are intolerable to humans, if climate change continues unabated.

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Figure 1: The heat wave of July 2015 in the Persian Gulf.

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Acknowledgements

Fig. 1a is based on the ECMWF analysis (www.ecmwf.int) and was provided by Daniel Lüthi (ETH Zurich). The meteorological surface data analysed includes hourly data from a large number of airports in the region. The author is indebted to Ralph Rickli (Meteotest, Bern) for providing the raw data for Fig. 1b and for professional support in analysing the Iranian heat wave. Useful comments from Erich Fischer, Niki Gruber and Jan Rajczak (ETH Zurich) on an earlier version of this article are also appreciated.

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  1. Christoph Schär is at the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science, Universitaetstrasse 16, ETH Zurich, CH-8092 Zurich, Switzerland,

    Christoph Schär

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  1. Christoph Schär
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Correspondence to Christoph Schär.

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Schär, C. The worst heat waves to come. Nature Clim Change 6, 128–129 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nclimate2864

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