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Introduction
This paper has a very limited aim. Although
the Mediterranean Sea during wartime and war’s impact on climatic
changes would
certainly be a very interesting subject for study, it goes far beyond
the scope
of this study.
This paper is confined to listing certain
significant weather events affecting the Mediterranean during the early
winter
of 1939/40 in support of the thesis that the arctic North European
winter of
1939/40 was primarily caused by the war at sea in the North and Baltic
Sea.
Actually, the war in the Mediterranean
started only on May 11, 1940. It became aggressive and a devastating
experience
for all combatants as well as for many Mediterranean countries. The
fact
whether the naval warfare in the waters between Europe and Africa in
any way
contributed to the downward move in global temperature since 1940 has
attracted
little interest until now.
This question is also of less interest for
theses on climatic changes due to ‘wars at sea’ as the
Mediterranean
Sea has a
very different feature from the North and Baltic Sea. While these seas
could
cause an arctic winter in Northern Europe, (see: Cooling the North Sea;
2_12), and Cooling the
Baltic Sea, 2_13), nothing like that would have happened as a
result of a war at sea in the Mediterranean. The sea gets a lot of
sunshine
even during the winter and has a relatively warm water body. The
homogenous
water of the Mediterranean Sea with an average depth of 1536 m has
average
temperatures of 12.8°C and 11.5°C at its deepest in the western
basin of 3,719
m and 5,500 m in the Ionian Sea south of the Greek mainland
respectively.
With such warm water body it is very
doubtful whether the global cooling for four decades since 1940 was in
any way
connected with naval warfare in the Mediterranean from 1940 to 1943.
Presumably, the opposite happened. Enormous naval activities most
likely
increased evaporation and thereby lessened the cooling trend even
though at a
very low level. Due to its minimal relationship with the Atlantic
Current
System, the Mediterranean can definitely be excluded from being a
serious
contributor to a halt in the warming trend from 1940 to about
1980.
However, the naval warfare in the
Mediterranean Sea ‘created’ abnormal winter weather
conditions in
south-western
Europe, e.g. -12°C (close to Cap de Rosas/Golf of Lion) on December
24, 1940,
while the whole of Southern France was down to about
-6°C. The ‘war weather
case’ in respect of the Mediterranean Sea still waits to be
written. After all, the Mediterranean Sea may have
contributed to the day-to-day weather conditions as raised in this
paper: Cyclones
and Butterfly Effect (2_15), particularly
during the winters of 1940/41 and
1941/42.
Although the war at sea had not reached the
Mediterranean Sea in 1939, the effect was felt, as the following list
of events
will show. Reason assumed for this is the war at sea in the North and
Baltic
Sea blocked the West Wind Drift, which resulted in Atlantic cyclones
being
barred from travelling eastwards via Central Europe. (Lost West Drift,
2_12).
The ‘blocked’ cyclones therefore had only two options,
either to go
north, or
to move south. The path to the North is described in: “Finland
invaded
–
December 1939” (2_41); and the path
to
the South in this paper.
What certainly played a decisive role in
the weather in Mediterranean countries during the final days of the
year 1939
was a major earthquake in Anatolia/Turkey on December 28. It is
impossible to
verify here as to from which date weather in the Mediterranean Sea was
influenced by ‘modification’ resulted by naval activities
in the
Atlantic or in
the North and Baltic Sea. It could have happened as early as December 2
or 3,
1939, when Libya experienced a heavy rainfall, 25 l/square metre,
within 8
hours, brought about by a cyclone
(Source: Zeitschrift für angewandte Meteorologie, 57. Jg, Heft 8,
p.271.).
The report listed in the following two
sections is not commented on any further. Details of weather-related
events
concerning the Turkish earthquake are available in: Earthquake in
Turkey (2_51)
Events attributed to the earth quake in Turkey and
Subsequent
Black Sea cyclone on 27/28 December
29. December 1939; From Agram in Yugoslavia
minus temperature of 32°C is reported. (Neue Zurcher Zeitung,
31. December 1939).
30. December 1939; In all parts of
Switzerland the lowest temperatures varying between minus 5°C
(Locarno and
Lugano) and minus 31°C (La Brevine) had been recorded in the most
beautiful
weather. In the Dolomite the temperature was minus 21°C yesterday.
(Neue Zuercher Zeitung, 2 January 1940). Cold air blew from the East
(Neue Zurcher Zeitung, 14. January 1940).
30. December 1939; “Rome’s heaviest
snowfall
in recorded history -six inches- made the Romans feel like the New
Yorkers did
in the 1888 blizzard. There had been nothing nearer to this since the
snow fall
for three days from December 16 to 18, 1846. (NYT, 31. December 1939).
30. December 1939; “Naples region today
reeled under an unprecedented severe snow storm which indirectly caused
a train
accident …”. (NYT, 31. December 1939)
30. December 1939; Cold wave over the
Riviera. In Genoa a rapid fall in temperature was followed by an
extensive
snowstorm. Trieste reports heavy winter storms. Milano had minus ten
degrees
Celsius during Saturday night. (Neue
Zurcher Zeitung, 31. December 1939).
30. December 1939; Rome covered by 25-30 cm
snow; Venice minus 5°C; severe cold in Yugoslavia with minus
23°C (Frankfurter
Zeitung, 31. December 1939); cold wave in Bulgaria, the lowest at
Rustschuk at
the Danube river with minus 20°C. Banja Luka/Westbosnia minus
27°C; in
Slovenian cities minus 26°C; Belgrade minus 18°C (Neue
Zurcher Zeitung, 2. January 1940). The Danube River carries
ice; and along the shores ice is building up; also in some bights at
the
Adriatic Sea icing has started (ditto)
30. December 1939: “The cold wave that
followed the snow has spread all over Italy. Ice floated down the Grand
Canal
in Venice and entered the lagoon and Venetians feared that, if it kept
up
tonight, the whole lagoon would be frozen by tomorrow morning. “
(NYT,
31.
December 1939).
1. January 1940; Rome has not seen so much snow
since 1846, although at that time
snow fall lasted three days with a total of 22cm; this time the snow
lasted
only eight hours at a temperature of minus four degrees Celsius (Neue
Zurcher
Zeitung, 2. January 1940)
Atlantic Weather diverts cyclones to the Mediterranean
1. January 1940; The Atlantic island Madeira
reports heavy thunderstorm with heavy flooding (Neue Zurcher Zeitung,
2. January
1940).
4. January 1940; Heavy rains during several
days in Southern Spain caused severe flooding Water in Guadalquivir
River has
risen by 15 metres (Neue Zurcher Zeitung, 5. January 1940).
6. January 1940; Heavy flooding in Tajo
river in Portugal (Neue Zurcher Zeitung, 8. January 1940)
11. January 1940; In Northeast and Central
Italy heavy storms with a wind speed upto 120 km from the West was
reported, (Neue Zurcher Zeitung, 11. January 1940).
11. January 1940; Macedonia. Several people
froze to death in Macedonia (NYT, 12. January 1940).
11. January 1940; Greece. Storms lashed the
Greek coast, driving the passenger vessel Leon ashore (NYT12.
January
1940)
13. January 1940; Rome. Reports of death,
injury and extensive damage to property came from all over Italy today
as a
result of one of the worst storms in years, which in Rome disrupted
telephone
service. Thirteen persons were known to have been killed and three
ships
wrecked. (NYT, 14. January 1940)
13. January 1940; Temperatures fell in
Portugal; Sierre de Estella reports 9°C below zero temperatures;
and very
unusual snowfall at Coimbra (Neue Zurcher Zeitung, 14. January 1940).
14. January 1940; Snowstorms continued all
over Spain preventing ships from leaving ports. The speed train from
Valencia
to Taragona stranded in snow (Neue Zurcher Zeitung, 14. January 1940)
15. January 1940; Heavy snow storms all over
Spain continues. (Neue Zurcher
Zeitung, 15. January 1940).
18. January 1940; In the Navarrov region a
violent snowstorm rages; the road from Irun to Madrid is covered with
70cm snow
(Neue Zurcher Zeitung, 18. January 1940)
21. January 1940; In Paris (Porte de Lilas) minus
20 degrees Celsius; it is the severest winter since 1917 with 22
degrees below
zero (Neue Zurcher Zeitung, 22. January 1940).
23. January 1940; At Madrid it has been
snowing continuously for the last few days. Snow cover was higher than
in the
winter of 1906. Never before has so much snow been recorded. At Bilbao
the
traffic was interrupted and work at the sea port stopped (Neue Zurcher
Zeitung,
25. . January 1940)
25. January 1940; All over a number of
Spanish provinces cold has doubled. In Madrid the temperature fell to
-18°C; at
Valladolid to -13°C. (Neue Zurcher Zeitung, 26. January 1940)
The
list ends on 25. January 1940.
Further
meteorological developments in the Mediterranean were not reviewed.
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