Day: November 6, 2026

Southern Italy Rising Up to 10 Times Faster Than Thought as Tectonic Slab Tears Beneath Calabria

University of Oregon geologist Becky (Rebecca) Dorsey and colleagues found that high- elevation marine terraces in southern Calabria, Italy (up to ~1,000 m or 3,300 ft above sea level), are rising 5– 10 times faster than previously estimated, linked to an active tear in the Ionian slab beneath the region.

Annotated cross-section illustration of Calabria’s rising edge, showing uplifted marine terraces, brittle crust, crustal layers, Ionian oceanic slab detachment, mantle flow, and rapid isostatic rebound.
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University of Oregon geologist Becky (Rebecca) Dorsey and colleagues found that high- elevation marine terraces in southern Calabria, Italy (up to ~1,000 m or 3,300 ft above sea level), are rising 5– 10 times faster than previously estimated, linked to an active tear in the Ionian slab beneath the region.

In 2025 fieldwork, a UO- led team sampled sands from these step- like marine terraces along the Siculo- Calabrian rift zone (a >100- mile or ~160 km fault belt).

They applied luminescence dating, previously avoided at such heights because the terraces were thought to be ~1 million years old and beyond the method’s range.

The samples yielded a weighted mean burial age of about 118.8 ± 8.7 thousand years (ka). Combined with mapping and fault morphology, this indicates the terraces are erosional remnants of a single, once- continuous surface that has been rapidly deformed and uplifted.⁠

Calculated uplift rates range from <1 to >12 mm per year, with active normal-fault throw rates of 0.8– 4.2 mm/yr, much faster than earlier long- term estimates based on the older assumed ages.

The rapid post-~120 ka uplift is interpreted as an ongoing isostatic response to tearing of the Ionian slab (an oceanic segment of the African plate) directly under southern Calabria, rather than slower, more uniform processes.⁠

The results, published 6 November 2026 in Communications Earth & Environment, challenge prior models of the terraces and improve constraints for seismic- hazard assessment in this active region.

Insights into slab dynamics here may also inform understanding of other subduction zones, such as Cascadia.⁠

Related earlier work by Dorsey and others (using ⁴⁰Ar and ³⁹Ar dating) already suggested the highest terraces are younger than ~0.5 Ma (roughly half the widely cited ~1 Ma age), implying long- term average uplift >2.5 mm/yr; the new luminescence data refine the recent, faster rates.

Map of the Siculo-Calabrian Rift Zone showing active normal faults across southern Italy, elevation, marine terraces, and a geological cross-section.
AI generated by Grok

Slab tear (or slab tearing and break- off) is a geodynamic process in which a subducting oceanic plate (the “slab”) ruptures and partially or fully detaches from the rest of the lithosphere.

This commonly occurs in subduction zones that experience rollback, oblique collision, or a transition from oceanic to continental subduction.

How the mechanism works

  1. Subduction and density contrast
    Dense oceanic lithosphere sinks into the mantle under its own weight (slab pull). When lighter continental lithosphere begins to enter the trench, or when the slab is stretched by rapid trench retreat (rollback), tensile stresses build up inside the slab.
  2. Initiation of the tear
    A rupture nucleates, often near the ocean– continent transition or at a pre-existing weak zone. The tear can propagate:
    • Vertically (through the thickness of the slab), creating a “window”.
    • Laterally (along the strike of the subduction zone), allowing the tear to lengthen over time.
  3. Propagation and detachment
    Once the tear advances, the detached portion of the slab continues to sink independently. Mantle material (asthenosphere) can flow through the gap (toroidal flow around the torn edges). The remaining attached segment may continue to subduct or experience further tearing.
  4. Surface response– isostatic rebound
    Removal of the dense slab load beneath the overriding plate causes the crust above to rise rapidly (isostatic uplift). Predicted rates for this transient phase are typically 5– 14 mm/yr over timescales of a few hundred thousand years or less, much faster than the longer- term rates produced by other processes such as crustal thickening or steady mantle flow.

Application to southern Calabria and the Ionian slab

In the Calabrian Arc (southern Italy):

  • The Ionian slab (an oceanic remnant of the African plate) has been retreating southeastward for millions of years, opening the Tyrrhenian Sea behind it.
  • Tomographic and seismic data indicate that slab tearing is already complete beneath the southern Apennines, northern Calabria, and northeast Sicily.
  • A ~50– 100 km segment remains (or was until recently) more continuous beneath southern Calabria. Evidence points to an active, southward-propagating tear under this region.
  • The high -elevation marine terraces dated at ~119 ka record uplift rates of up to ~12 mm/yr. These rates match the rapid, short- lived isostatic rebound expected from ongoing slab tearing and unloading, rather than slower, longer-lived processes such as toroidal mantle flow alone.

In short, the tear removes a heavy “anchor” from beneath the crust, allowing the surface to spring upward quickly. This produces the fast, transient uplift documented in the southern Calabria study and helps explain the region’s elevated seismic hazard, as the same process drives active normal faulting.

The same style of slab tearing and rebound is inferred in other subduction systems worldwide where similar rapid topographic growth is observed.

Map of Sicily and southern Italy showing major faults around the Tyrrhenian and Ionian Seas, including Mount Etna, Catania, Messina, and Reggio Calabria.
Main faults of the Siculo-Calabrian rift zone (northernmost section not shown)
Siculo-Calabrian Rift – Siculo-Calabrian rift – Wikipedia

Rapid transient uplift driven by active slab tear, southern Calabria, Italy

Southern Italy preserves a well-studied record of deformation and uplift related to migrating oblique collision, trench retreat, and tearing of subducted ocean slabs. However, the surface expression of these processes is incompletely understood due to a lack of reliable ages for marine terraces >200 m above sea level. Here we use luminescence methods to date marine terrace sands from 118 to 955 m elevation in southern Calabria and interpolate the results with surface mapping. Burial ages overlap across the full range of sampled elevations with a weighted mean of 118.8 ± 8.7 thousand years before present. Calculated uplift rates vary from <1 to ~12 mm yr⁻¹ and throw rates on active normal faults are 0.8–4.2 mm yr⁻¹. We infer that rapid uplift is an ongoing isostatic response to active tearing in the Ionian slab, consistent with recent geophysical observations and predictions of geodynamic models. These results are useful for assessment of geohazards in southern Calabria and northeast Sicily, one of the highest seismic risk areas in the Mediterranean region.

Key findings

  • Luminescence dating (single- grain post- infrared infrared stimulated luminescence on K- feldspar) of sands from marine terraces at elevations of ~107– 1040 m asl yields overlapping burial ages with a weighted mean of 118.8 ± 8.7 ka.
  • The terraces are interpreted as erosional remnants of a single, once- continuous deformed surface that has been differentially uplifted and faulted.
  • Time- averaged uplift rates calculated from the mean age and elevations range from <1 to ~12 mm yr⁻¹ (commonly reported in related coverage as 5– 10 times faster than earlier long- term estimates based on ~1 Ma ages for the highest terraces).
  • Active normal- fault throw rates are 0.8– 4.2 mm yr⁻¹.
  • The rapid post-~120 ka uplift is best explained as ongoing isostatic rebound from active tearing of the Ionian slab (an oceanic segment of the African plate) beneath southern Calabria, rather than slower processes such as toroidal mantle flow. This is consistent with geophysical data and geodynamic models predicting faster rates (5– 14 mm yr⁻¹) over shorter timescales (<500 kyr) for slab- breakoff unloading.⁠

The work integrates new luminescence ages with surface mapping, fault- zone morphology, and prior constraints (including evidence that high terraces are <0.48– 0.50 Ma).

It improves understanding of mantle- driven surface processes and seismic hazards in the Siculo- Calabrian rift zone.

A PDF download is available from the Nature page. Let me know if you’d like more details on methods, figures, specific rates, or related papers.

Journal: Communications Earth & Environment, volume 7, Article number: 858 (2026)

DOI: 10.1038/s43247-026-04207-2

Published: 6 November 2026, Open access

Authors: Rebecca J. Dorsey,
Nathan D. Brown,
Sergio G. Longhitano,
Marco Meschis,
Domenico Chiarella &
Charles P. Ogle

Wrong, Newswise, Irresponsible Climate Messaging, Not Climate Change Itself, Is Fueling Student Anxiety

Newswise, cites a University of Utah article “How Anxiety Over Climate Change Affects Students,” to claim that that hundreds of undergraduates feel powerless, frustrated, and anxious about climate change, arguing that universities need more resources to help them cope.

The anxiety may be real, but the implication that physical climate change is causing it is false, and unsupported by the study.

Cartoon classroom showing students anxious about exaggerated climate news headlines, with a banner stating that irresponsible climate messaging fuels student anxiety.
AI generated by Meta

From ClimateRealism

By Anthony Watts

Screenshot of a Newswise article from the University of Utah about how climate change anxiety affects students, overlaid with large red text reading “BLAME THE MEDIA.”

Newswise, cites a University of Utah article “How Anxiety Over Climate Change Affects Students,” to claim that that hundreds of undergraduates feel powerless, frustrated, and anxious about climate change, arguing that universities need more resources to help them cope. The anxiety may be real, but the implication that physical climate change is causing it is false, and unsupported by the study. The study itself points toward a different explanation: generalized anxiety, political ideology, and repeated exposure to alarming climate information in classrooms and online.

University of Utah researchers surveyed 547 students and found that 54 percent frequently or strongly felt powerless about climate change and 55 percent felt frustrated. Yet the researchers explicitly caution that their findings do not establish a causal connection between climate change and anxiety. One author acknowledges the relationship could run in either direction, with people already prone to generalized anxiety potentially being more susceptible to climate anxiety.

That distinction is crucial. A student saying, “I’m terrified of climate change” demonstrates that the student is frightened. It does not demonstrate that the physical climate caused the fear.

In fact, the study itself provides evidence that climate messaging may be the biggest part of the problem. Students with greater exposure to stories about climate change in classrooms and online reported greater climate anxiety. Students holding more liberal political views also tended to report greater anxiety. The researchers found a “strong positive correlation” between exposure to online climate information and climate anxiety.

That should have been the headline.

The survey didn’t examine temperature, sea level, hurricane, flood, drought, or wildfire incidences or trends. It measured what students believe about climate change. Its Climate Anxiety Index asked students about propositions such as “The things I most value will be destroyed,” “The future is frightening”, and “Humanity is doomed”. Those are measurements of beliefs about catastrophe, not measurements of knowledge of real climate information.

There is another revealing number. Only 14.8 percent of respondents listed climate change among their three greatest concerns. The sample was also drawn from three Environmental and Sustainability Studies courses and one communications course, and 63 percent of respondents leaned politically left. The researchers themselves caution against broadly generalizing the results.

Other research points directly toward the media’s role. A 2024 study in the Journal of Health Communication examined climate anxiety and media exposure among college students. Media-exposure variables explained about 33 percent of the variance in climate anxiety, with frequency of media use and attention to climate news significantly predicting greater anxiety.

Students aren’t simply looking out the dormitory window, observing modest long-term warming, and spontaneously descending into despair. What they are being told is what makes them anxious.

After years of headlines warning about a “climate emergency,” an “existential threat,” tipping points, disappearing coastlines, civilization-threatening weather, and only a few years left to “save the planet,” why would anyone be surprised that many young people are frightened?

Climate Realism has documented this problem before, noting that climate anxiety is routinely presented as evidence of how dangerous climate change is without asking whether relentless catastrophic messaging helped create the anxiety. Another Climate Realism analysis discussed the widely cited survey in which 56 percent of young respondents said they believed humanity was doomed.

Humanity is not doomed. Even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Sixth Assessment Report doesn’t say that. It identifies risks, largely manageable risks, from additional warming, but that is worlds apart from telling students civilization has no future or that having children may be irresponsible.

Another peer-reviewed study makes the point even more sharply. Hannes Zacher and Cort Rudolph examined 2,066 people in a 2023 Climatic Change paper, “Environmental knowledge is inversely associated with climate change anxiety.” They found that greater general environmental knowledge and greater climate-specific knowledge were both associated with less climate anxiety, even after controlling for demographics, personality, and environmental attitudes.

In plain English, the people who knew more of the facts and had a better understanding of science were less anxious about climate change.

That matters because much of the popular conception of the world’s climate future comes from computer projections, including extreme emissions scenarios presented as likely futures. RCP8.5 is the classic example. Climate researchers warned in Nature against treating that very high-emissions pathway as the most likely future. Roger Pielke Jr. and Justin Ritchie likewise documented the misuse of extreme climate scenarios as “business as usual.”

A hypothetical worst case escaped the scientific literature and became, in popular culture, a forecast. Then adults seem surprised when young people believe it.

Watts Up With That has addressed the same issue in; “A Generation of Kids Thinks They Have No Future. Science Just Admitted Why” asked whether adults had frightened young people by presenting extreme projections as their expected future. “Worry About Climate Fearmongering, Not Climate Change” noted that young people already face academic pressure, social media, finances, relationships, and uncertainty about their futures. Adding repeated warnings that Earth itself is becoming uninhabitable hardly improves their mental health.

Meanwhile, real-world indicators don’t suggest a planetary apocalypse. Our World in Data shows that death rates from natural disasters have fallen dramatically during the past century. Better forecasting, infrastructure, communications, agriculture, emergency response, and rising wealth have made humanity far more resilient to environmental hazards.

Students should be taught the difference between observations and projections, plausible scenarios and extreme scenarios, manageable risks and planetary doom. They should also learn about adaptation, technological progress, uncertainty, and human resilience.

Instead of merely creating climate-anxiety support groups and steering frightened students toward climate advocacy or psychiatric care, universities might try something more fundamental: report the state of the climate accurately. Tell them humanity isn’t doomed. Tell them computer models are not observations. Tell them the worst emissions scenario are in fact impossible. Tell them humans are remarkably adaptable. Better yet, buy them a copy of Climate at a Glance and assign it as required reading.

The University of Utah study has identified a real problem, but Newswise has the diagnosis backwards. It does not demonstrate that climate change is psychologically harming students. It shows that students who are generally more anxious, politically predisposed to climate concern, and more frequently exposed to climate information in classrooms and online report greater climate anxiety.

If young people are repeatedly told that their planet is dying, their future is frightening, humanity may be doomed, and having children might be irresponsible, we shouldn’t be astonished when surveys discover that they’re anxious.

Perhaps before universities create another climate-anxiety support group, educators and journalists should consider whether the first treatment for climate anxiety ought to be less alarmism, more context, and a much larger dose of reality grounded in real world data, which with regard to extreme weather and human health, is generally positive.

The Sheer #%&@! Gall of Nature Magazine. EU Chief Science Advisers Say Democracy Depends on Trusted Science, and Ignore How the Trust Was Squandered

Nature ran a Comment on November 3 by the seven members of the European Commission’s Group of Chief Scientific Advisors, Martin Kahanec, Naomi Ellemers, Adam Izdebski, Rafal M. Łukasik, Dimitra Simeonidou, Rémy Slama and Mangala Srinivas, headlined “How democracy depends on science — and must protect it.”

Vintage-style Nature Magazine cover featuring a bold editorial headline about EU chief science advisers, public trust in science, and democracy.
AI generated by Meta

From Watts Up With That?

By Charles Rotter

Nature ran a Comment on November 3 by the seven members of the European Commission’s Group of Chief Scientific Advisors, Martin Kahanec, Naomi Ellemers, Adam Izdebski, Rafal M. Łukasik, Dimitra Simeonidou, Rémy Slama and Mangala Srinivas, headlined “How democracy depends on science — and must protect it.”

The standfirst sets the terms:

Verified information from trusted experts is crucial to help the public and governments navigate rapid changes and increasing complexity.

How democracy depends on science — and must protect it | Nature

The advisers are worried that the public has stopped listening:

But for science to strengthen democracy, researchers must be trusted, too. Moreover, the legitimacy of expertise has become increasingly contested over the past few years in Europe and elsewhere.

Scientific advice is subjected to politicization in many countries, with consensual insights and clear evidence (such as on climate change) being dismissed as ‘just another opinion’ or as being driven by a political agenda. Public trust in expertise has become polarized along political lines.

How democracy depends on science — and must protect it | Nature

In their telling the politicization is something done to science by outsiders, with a little help from “a small number of powerful technology companies,” and by people whose doubts spread “through networks of people connected by identity, grievance or distrust.” It doesn’t seem to occur to seven chief scientific advisers that the distrust was earned, or that the institutions they speak for did a good share of the polarizing themselves. They come close to saying it in one paragraph:

Expertise strengthens democratic legitimacy when it is transparent, diverse, independent and open to scrutiny — as prescribed by the rules of science. But it weakens legitimacy when it is perceived as opaque, unclear, politicized, elitist or disconnected from people’s lived experiences.

How democracy depends on science — and must protect it | Nature

“Perceived” is doing the heavy lifting there. The record of the last six years shows scientific institutions being opaque, politicized and elitist in plain view, in their own emails and their own journals, and the public noticed.

Start with lockdowns. On October 4, 2020, Martin Kulldorff, Jay Bhattacharya and Sunetra Gupta published the Great Barrington Declaration, arguing for focused protection of the elderly instead of blanket lockdowns. Four days later the director of the NIH, Francis Collins, wrote to Anthony Fauci, in an email Bhattacharya later put before Congress:

This proposal from the three fringe epidemiologists who met with the Secretary seems to be getting a lot of attention – and even a co-signature from Nobel Prize winner Mike Leavitt at Stanford. There needs to be a quick and devastating published take down of its premises. I don’t see anything like that online yet – is it underway?

https://www.congress.gov/118/meeting/house/115561/witnesses/HHRG-118-IF16-Wstate-BhattacharyaJ-20230328.pdf

Collins wanted a takedown rather than a debate, and he was the man who controlled most of the biomedical research money in the United States, aiming it at professors from Stanford, Harvard and Oxford. Bhattacharya now runs the NIH, which is one way to settle an argument about who was fringe.

The advisers write that “the opinion of a single scientist might result in partial understanding” or “reliance on a dissenting voice that differs from the majority view,” and that high-level expert groups do better. The highest-level expert opinion of early 2020 on where the virus came from was a five-author paper, “The proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2,” published in Nature Medicine, a Nature journal, on March 17, 2020. It said “we do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible.” The authors’ private Slack messages, released in 2023, say something else. Kristian Andersen, on February 1, 2020:

I think the main thing still in my mind is that the lab escape version of this is so friggin’ likely to have happened because they were already doing this type of work and the molecular data is fully consistent with that scenario.

Top Scientists Misled Congress About Covid Origins, Newly Released Emails And Messages Show

The channel was named “project-wuhan_engineering” until February 6, when it became “project-wuhan_pangolin.” The House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, in its December 2024 final report, found that the virus “Likely Emerged Because of a Laboratory or Research Related Accident” and that Proximal Origin was “‘Prompted’ by Dr. Anthony Fauci to ‘Disprove’ the Lab Leak Theory.” The subcommittee’s Democrats disputed the Fauci finding. The FBI (moderate confidence) and the Department of Energy (low confidence) lean toward a lab origin, and in January 2025 the CIA joined them, with low confidence. The origin is officially still unproven either way, which is exactly the point, since the paper that called the lab scenario implausible has never been retracted, despite the reams of evidence against it, and the journal that published it is the one now lecturing about “communicating disagreement” and “quantifying uncertainties.”

Then came the mRNA vaccines. In March 2021 CDC director Rochelle Walensky told MSNBC that vaccinated people “do not carry the virus,” and the CDC had to walk it back. Pfizer’s trial was never designed to measure transmission, which Pfizer executive Janine Small confirmed to the European Parliament in October 2022, while mandates and vaccine passports across Europe had been sold on the duty to protect others. In 2025 the FDA required stronger myocarditis warnings on the mRNA vaccines, with the highest risk in males aged 16 to 25, a group whose own risk from COVID was low and who were being told to get boosted to keep their jobs and their places at university.

Then there’s the Lancet. In July 2024 it published a three-author correspondence, not a peer-reviewed study, that took the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry’s count of direct deaths, applied a rule of thumb of four indirect deaths for every direct one, and floated a figure of up to 186,000. The number went around the world under the Lancet’s name. The statistician Mike Spagat, who has spent decades studying war mortality, took the method apart, and the Lancet later ran a letter of concern about it. Whatever one thinks of the war, a medical journal lending its name to a multiplier applied to figures from one of the combatants is not the “verified information from trusted experts” the advisers have in mind.

On climate, the advisers’ example of a consensual insight being unfairly dismissed is climate change itself. Their reference for the dismissing is Lewandowsky, Ecker and Cook, and their reference for the doubt-manufacturing is Oreskes and Conway’s Merchants of Doubt, which tells you which side of the argument the European Commission’s science advice listens to. For a decade the most extreme emissions scenario, RCP8.5, was described in papers and press releases as “business as usual,” until Zeke Hausfather and Glen Peters wrote in Nature itself in 2020 that the “business as usual” story is misleading. I’ve written about that at length. In 2023 Patrick Brown, a co-author of a Nature paper on wildfire, wrote in The Free Press that he had left out the non-climate drivers of fire because he believed a paper focused on climate change was what high-profile journals wanted. Nature disputed his account, but nobody disputed that he knew which story would sell.

Gender medicine is where the “majority view” of the expert bodies held up worst. In August 2023 the American Academy of Pediatrics reaffirmed its 2018 policy on puberty blockers and hormones for minors while commissioning, after the fact, a systematic review of the evidence for it. The Cass Review for NHS England, published in April 2024 after commissioned systematic reviews from the University of York, called the evidence base “remarkably weak.” Court documents reported by the BMJ and others show that WPATH, the professional body whose standards of care the American societies relied on, commissioned evidence reviews from Johns Hopkins and then claimed approval rights over what could be published. WPATH denies it prohibited publication. The children and their families were owed the evidence, whatever it said, and the people who were supposed to produce it treated it as a communications problem.

And then the journals decided to campaign. In October 2020 Nature published “Why Nature supports Joe Biden for US president.” Scientific American, which had never endorsed a candidate in its first 175 years, endorsed Biden the same year and Kamala Harris in 2024. Nature even measured what its endorsement did, in a preregistered experiment by Floyd Jiuyun Zhang published in Nature Human Behaviour in 2023:

The endorsement message caused large reductions in stated trust in Nature among Trump supporters. This distrust lowered the demand for COVID-related information provided by Nature, as evidenced by substantially reduced requests for Nature articles on vaccine efficacy when offered. The endorsement also reduced Trump supporters’ trust in scientists in general. The estimated effects on Biden supporters’ trust in Nature and scientists were positive, small and mostly statistically insignificant. I found little evidence that the endorsement changed views about Biden and Trump.

Political endorsement by Nature and trust in scientific expertise during COVID-19 | Nature Human Behaviour

The endorsement changed nobody’s vote and cost Nature, and scientists in general, the trust of half the American electorate. Pew found that 87% of Americans had at least a fair amount of confidence in scientists in April 2020 and 76% in 2024, and among Republicans the share fell from 85% to 66%. That is the polarization “along political lines” the advisers complain about, and Nature’s own journal published the experiment showing how a Nature editorial helped cause it.

The advisers’ remedy is more of what produced the problem. They want “high-level expert groups, which engage directly with senior decision makers,” protection from the “dissenting voice that differs from the majority view,” and “independent monitoring and assurance of algorithmic systems,” which in the European Commission’s vocabulary means someone deciding which information reaches the public. Every episode above was a high-level majority view, and in most of them the dissenting voices, the ones the “trusted institutions” set out to suppress and even censor, were the ones that turned out closer to right.

The authors, shamelessly circling the wagons of their failing institutions, of course declare no competing interests.

=====

Quotes from Kahanec et al., “How democracy depends on science — and must protect it,” Nature, November 3, 2026, https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-026-03510-4.

Drought on Both Sides of the Atlantic: How 1930s Europe Compared to America’s Dust Bowl

The 1930s in Europe fell within the Early Twentieth Century Warming (ETCW), a period of notable global and regional warming (especially in the Arctic and high northern latitudes) from roughly the 1910s- 1940s, driven by a mix of natural variability (including a positive phase of the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation- AMO), greenhouse gases, and other factors.

Illustration comparing 1930s drought in America’s Dust Bowl and Europe, with cracked farmland, families, a European village, and a map of the Atlantic.
AI generated by Grok

The 1930s in Europe fell within the Early Twentieth Century Warming (ETCW), a period of notable global and regional warming (especially in the Arctic and high northern latitudes) from roughly the 1910s- 1940s, driven by a mix of natural variability (including a positive phase of the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation- AMO), greenhouse gases, and other factors.

Temperatures were generally elevated relative to the late 19th and early 20th century in many areas, but weather was highly variable by region and year, with extremes including droughts, heat, floods, and (by the end of the decade) severe cold.

Overall Climate Context

  • Warming was particularly strong in the European Arctic, Scandinavia, and northern and eastern areas during the 1920s- 1930s, with wintertime increases most pronounced. Circulation patterns often favored warmer air advection.⁠
  • The North Atlantic was warmer, with reduced sea ice in northern regions in parts of the period.
  • Precipitation and temperature showed strong regional contrasts. Eastern Europe tended toward dryness and heat in summers of the mid- to- late 1930s, while western and central areas experienced more mixed or wetter conditions in some years.

This region stood out for a prolonged, intense drought (roughly 1934- 1940, with roots earlier) that has few or no analogues in the instrumental record for duration and severity (per Palmer Drought Severity Index analyses).

Key features included:

  • Hot, dry summers (notable in 1931 and especially 1936- 1939) combined with precipitation deficits, including in the cold season.
  • Major hydrological impacts: multi- year deficits in river runoff (e.g., Volga runoff deficit averaging ~18% over a 9- year stretch starting around 1930, the longest such period on record in some analyses).
  • Linked to persistent anticyclonic conditions over Eastern Europe, broader AMO- related patterns, and North Atlantic SST anomalies.⁠

These conditions caused significant agricultural and water- resource stress.

Weather was more variable year- to- year:

  • Early 1930s examples (e.g., 1930 in France and UK areas): Mild or snow- poor winters in places; mixed summers with wet and flood- prone periods (e.g., heavy July rains and flooding in parts of France) alongside heatwaves (late August heat in France reaching the mid-30s °C in some spots). The UK had a generally poor summer with heavy rains and crop damage in parts of the year, plus a notable late- August heatwave.⁠
  • Heat extremes occurred in various years (e.g., high temperatures in Belgium and elsewhere in the mid- 1930s).
  • Some wet periods and floods contrasted with drier conditions elsewhere. Local station data (e.g., Strasbourg, Munich) show typical annual ranges with occasional extremes but no uniform continental pattern of aridity like the U.S. Dust Bowl.
  • Teleconnections from North American drought and heat may have influenced northern European extremes in some summers via atmospheric wave patterns.

The relatively mild winters of prior decades ended abruptly.

The winter of 1939– 40 was exceptionally cold across much of Europe (one of the most severe in decades or longer in many places), with follow- on cold winters into the early 1940s in some areas.

Impacts included widespread freezing of rivers and harbors, heavy snow, and record or near- record low temperatures in the UK, Germany, Low Countries, Scandinavia, and further east and south. This marked a shift after a run of milder conditions.

Regional details vary significantly (e.g., Mediterranean vs. Scandinavia vs. the plains), so specific countries or years can show different patterns.

_______________________________________________

The 1930s in Europe formed part of the Early Twentieth Century Warming (ETCW), also called the Early 20th Century Warm Period. This was a distinct phase of elevated temperatures (especially pronounced in the Arctic, northern high latitudes, and parts of Europe) that began accelerating in the 1910s- 1920s and peaked or remained elevated through the 1930s into the early 1940s in many regions.

The Little Ice Age (roughly mid- 14th to mid- 19th century, with residual cooler conditions lingering into the late 19th and early 20th century in some European records) was followed by a general recovery and warming.

The ETCW represented a relatively rapid phase of that recovery in the early- to-mid 20th century, driven by a combination of:

  • Natural variability (notably a positive phase of the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation- AMO and associated atmospheric circulation changes),
  • Rising greenhouse gases,
  • Reduced volcanic activity in parts of the period,
  • And other factors.

Warming was particularly strong in winter over northern Europe, Scandinavia, and the European Arctic, with surface air temperatures rising notably from the cooler conditions of the preceding decades.

European picture in the 1930s

  • Northern and high- latitude Europe experienced some of the strongest regional warming of the ETCW.
  • Eastern Europe (East European Plain) saw the warming expressed partly through prolonged drought and heat in the mid- to- late 1930s.
  • Western and central Europe had more variable year- to- year weather, but the broader background was warmer than the late 19th and early 20th century baseline.
  • The decade ended with a sharp interruption in the form of the severe winters of 1939- 40 (and following years in some places), which stood out against the preceding milder conditions.

In short, the 1930s continued the ETCW’s regional warming trajectory after the Little Ice Age, even while individual years and sub- regions showed the usual weather extremes (droughts, floods, heatwaves, and the late- decade cold snap).

This period is well- documented in both instrumental records and modern reanalyses.

_______________________________________________

Comparison of 1930s weather and climate in Europe vs. the U.S. Dust Bowl

Both occurred during the Early Twentieth Century Warming (ETCW) and a positive phase of the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO), against the backdrop of the Great Depression. However, they differed significantly in spatial scale, intensity of land- surface impacts, and overall character.

Similarities

  • Multi- year drought and heat:
    • U.S. Dust Bowl (mainly 1930- 1939/40): Severe, prolonged drought across the Great Plains (especially Southern and Central Plains), with extreme summer heat waves.
    • Europe: Eastern Europe (East European Plain) experienced a comparable multi-year drought (peak intensity roughly 1934- 1940), with hot, dry summers (notably 1931 and 1936- 1939) and major river- runoff deficits (e.g., prolonged low Volga flows).⁠
  • Natural climate drivers: Both linked to anomalous atmospheric circulation (persistent high- pressure systems), sea- surface temperature patterns in the Atlantic and Pacific, and broader ETCW warmth. Some research indicates teleconnections, where the intense North American drought and soil drying may have influenced Northern European summer temperatures via jet- stream wave patterns.⁠
  • Agricultural stress: Crop failures, water shortages, and economic hardship in the affected regions during the Depression era.

Key Differences

AspectU.S. Dust Bowl (1930s)Europe (1930s)
Core regionGreat Plains (Oklahoma, Texas, Kansas, etc.)Strongest drought in Eastern Europe / East European Plain; Western & Central Europe more variable
Dominant featuresExtreme drought + intense heat + massive dust stormsDrought & heat in the East; mixed wet/dry, floods, heatwaves in the West; severe cold winters at decade’s end (1939–40)
Dust storms and erosionIconic “black blizzards”; severe soil loss from over-plowed grasslandsNo equivalent widespread dust-bowl conditions or catastrophic wind erosion
Spatial extentConcentrated but devastating in the Plains; some broader U.S. effectsMore heterogeneous across the continent; not a single coherent “dust bowl”
Human amplificationMajor role: conversion of native prairie to cropland left soil exposedLand-use effects present but less decisive than in the U.S. Plains
Temperature contextRecord or near-record heat in the PlainsBroader ETCW warming (strongest in Arctic/northern latitudes); Eastern heat, but Western Europe saw more variability
End of periodDrought eased around 1939–40 with El Niño influencesShift to very cold winters (1939–40 was one of the most severe in decades across much of Europe)
ImpactsMass farm failures, ecological disaster, large-scale migration (“Okies”), health effects from dustSignificant agricultural and hydrological stress in the East; less continent-wide social upheaval of the same type (Europe was also moving toward WWII)

Overall Character

  • The Dust Bowl was a more extreme, self- reinforcing regional disaster in which drought, heat, and poor land management combined to produce dramatic dust storms and long- term soil degradation.
  • Europe experienced parallel drought and heat in the East as part of the same large- scale climate regime, but the continent as a whole was far more variable. Western and Central Europe saw wetter periods, flooding in some years, and ordinary heatwaves rat

In short: both featured multi- year drought and warmth tied to the ETCW, but the U.S. Dust Bowl was more intense, localized, and dramatically amplified by land- use practices, producing the iconic dust storms that have no close European counterpart in the 1930s. Eastern Europe’s drought was the closest analogue in severity and duration, while the rest of Europe experienced a more mixed climate.

Ice Age Climate Shifts Were Much Slower Than We Thought

Researchers from Xi’an Jiaotong University’s Institute of Global Environmental Change (led by first author Xiyu Dong, with contributions from Hai Cheng, Xu Zhang, and others) analyzed high- resolution oxygen isotope (δ¹⁸O) records from annually laminated speleothems.

In short, abrupt climate change is a well- established feature of Earth’s past climate system, driven by internal thresholds and feedback, and remains a key concern for understanding both historical variability and potential future surprises.

Illustration of an icy coastline and ocean currents with charts showing slow Ice Age climate shifts, AMOC circulation, speleothem records, and North Atlantic temperatures.
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A new study published in Science (DOI: 10.1126/science.aed4270) on November 5, 2026, finds that abrupt climate shifts during the last ice age, specifically Dansgaard- Oeschger (DO) events linked to the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), took substantially longer than previously inferred from Greenland ice- core records.

Researchers from Xi’an Jiaotong University’s Institute of Global Environmental Change (led by first author Xiyu Dong, with contributions from Hai Cheng, Xu Zhang, and others) analyzed high- resolution oxygen isotope (δ¹⁸O) records from annually laminated speleothems.

These came from Cherrapunji Cave (northeast India) and Shuixi Cave (southwest China), combined with published data from Zhangjia Cave. The records cover DO events 1 through 8.

Key findings:

  • Transitions in the Asian monsoon speleothem records consistently lasted longer than 100 years and averaged about 180 years.
  • This is far slower than the decadal- scale shifts seen in Greenland ice -core δ¹⁸O records, which had been used as the main proxy for the speed of AMOC strengthening.⁠

The annual laminae in the speleothems provided precise relative timing of transition durations (complementing absolute U– Th ages).

Modeling indicates a two- stage process: rapid retreat of sea ice in the northeastern North Atlantic quickly adjusted regional atmospheric circulation, producing the sharp Greenland δ¹⁸O rise.

Full AMOC strengthening and further northwestern North Atlantic sea- ice retreat followed more gradually, without major additional changes in atmospheric circulation modes or moisture pathways that would further alter Greenland δ¹⁸O.

Asian monsoon speleothem records capture the complete AMOC strengthening process.⁠

Implications: Natural AMOC transitions were not as rapid as ice- core data alone suggested. When discussing potential future AMOC tipping risks, the duration of any transition is as important as the climatic impacts.

The study highlights the value of combining high- quality, annually resolved paleoclimate records with process- based (isotope- enabled) Earth system models.

The authors note that additional high- quality speleothem records of DO events, better North Atlantic sea- ice reconstructions, and models that incorporate ice- sheet processes will further improve understanding.⁠

This revises the view of how quickly these past high- latitude Northern Hemisphere warmings (5- 16 °C) and associated AMOC changes unfolded, offering a more measured perspective for interpreting both past and potential future abrupt climate shifts.

Rapid Warming Could Tip the AMOC at Just 2°C — Slow the Pace and It May Survive Beyond 5°C

Rapid Warming Could Tip the AMOC at Just 2°C — Slow the Pace and It May Survive Beyond 5°C – Climate- Science.press

Abrupt climate change refers to large- scale shifts in the climate system that occur much faster than the gradual external forcing (such as orbital changes or rising greenhouse gases) that triggers them.

These transitions happen on timescales of years to a few decades, persist for decades or longer, and can cause major disruptions to ecosystems and human societies.

Two complementary definitions are commonly used:

  • Physical: The climate system crosses a threshold or tipping point and switches to a new state at a rate set by internal dynamics (e.g., feedbacks involving ocean circulation, sea ice, or ice sheets), faster than the forcing itself.
  • Impacts- based: A change so rapid and unexpected that natural or human systems struggle to adapt.

The best- documented cases come from the last glacial period (~120,000–11,700 years ago):

  • Dansgaard- Oeschger (DO) events: Repeated abrupt warmings of 5- 16 °C over Greenland (and the North Atlantic region), often within decades according to ice- core records, followed by gradual cooling. These occurred roughly every 1,000- 1,500 years. They are strongly linked to strengthening of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), which transports heat northward.⁠
  • Heinrich events: Massive iceberg discharges into the North Atlantic that disrupted ocean circulation, often associated with the coldest phases of DO cycles.
  • Younger Dryas (~12,900- 11,700 years ago): A sudden return to near- glacial conditions in the Northern Hemisphere during the last deglaciation, ending with rapid warming.

Other examples include the end of the Carboniferous rainforest collapse and possibly the Paleocene- Eocene Thermal Maximum.

Abrupt changes typically involve nonlinear feedbacks and thresholds:

  • Changes in AMOC strength (weakening or collapse reduces heat transport to the North Atlantic).
  • Sea -ice and ice- sheet dynamics (ice- albedo feedback amplifies warming or cooling).
  • Freshwater input from melting ice that stratifies the ocean and suppresses deep- water formation.
  • Atmospheric reorganization (shifts in monsoons, storm tracks, and the Intertropical Convergence Zone).

A recent Science study (November 2026) used annually laminated speleothems from Asia to show that the full AMOC strengthening during DO events 1- 8 actually took longer than previously thought, consistently over 100 years and averaging ~180 years, rather than the decadal scale suggested by Greenland ice- core δ¹⁸O alone.

Modeling indicates a two-stage process: rapid northeastern North Atlantic sea- ice retreat drives the sharp Greenland signal, while the complete AMOC recovery and further sea- ice loss occur more gradually. Asian monsoon records capture the fuller transition.⁠

This revises the view of how quickly these past “abrupt” ocean- circulation shifts unfolded and underscores that transition duration is as important as the magnitude of change when assessing future risks.

Modern climate models and observations raise concerns about possible abrupt shifts under anthropogenic warming, including:

  • Weakening or collapse of the AMOC.
  • Rapid ice- sheet mass loss (Greenland, West Antarctica) and associated sea-level rise.
  • Permafrost thaw releasing additional greenhouse gases.
  • Amazon rainforest dieback or other ecosystem tipping points.

While the current warming is primarily gradual and forced by greenhouse gases, the climate system can still exhibit nonlinear, abrupt responses once thresholds are crossed.

Paleoclimate records remain the primary evidence for such behavior, informing risk assessments for the coming decades to centuries.

In short, abrupt climate change is a well- established feature of Earth’s past climate system, driven by internal thresholds and feedback, and remains a key concern for understanding both historical variability and potential future surprises.

Rapid Natural Warming Spikes Occurred 25 Times — Last Ice Age Edition

Rapid Natural Warming Spikes Occurred 25 Times — Last Ice Age Edition – Climate- Science.press

The linked Science paper is titled “Glacial abrupt transitions in ocean circulation were much slower than ice-core records imply” (DOI: 10.1126/science.aed4270), published 5 November 2026.

It is a peer- reviewed research article from researchers including Xiyu Dong (first author), Xu Zhang, Hai Cheng, and co-authors from Xi’an Jiaotong University and collaborating institutions. The full text is behind Science’s paywall and subscriber access, but detailed summaries, the dataset, and press materials are publicly available.

Dansgaard– Oeschger (DO) events involved rapid high- latitude Northern Hemisphere warmings of 5- 16 °C, tightly linked to strengthening of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC).

Prior estimates of AMOC transition speeds (often within decades) relied heavily on Greenland ice-core δ¹⁸O records, which reflect both temperature and moisture- source changes.

Using high- resolution δ¹⁸O records from annually laminated speleothems (cave deposits) that more directly track AMOC- driven changes in the Asian monsoon:

  • Two new records from Cherrapunji Cave (northeast India) and Shuixi Cave (southwest China), plus published data from Zhangjia Cave.
  • Coverage of DO events 1- 8.

Results: The transitions consistently lasted >100 years and averaged ~180 years, substantially longer than the decadal- scale shifts in Greenland ice- core δ¹⁸O.⁠

Annual laminae enabled precise relative dating of transition durations (complementing absolute U– Th ages).

Modeling supports a two- stage process:

  1. Rapid sea- ice retreat in the northeastern North Atlantic quickly adjusted regional atmospheric circulation, producing the sharp Greenland δ¹⁸O rise.
  2. Further AMOC strengthening and northwestern North Atlantic sea- ice retreat occurred more gradually, without major additional shifts in atmospheric circulation or moisture pathways that would further change Greenland δ¹⁸O.

Asian monsoon speleothem δ¹⁸O records capture the full AMOC strengthening process.

Natural AMOC transitions were slower than previously inferred from ice cores alone. The authors note that discussions of future AMOC tipping risks should emphasize transition duration alongside potential impacts.

Supporting data (U- Th dates, δ¹⁸O time series, annual lamina thicknesses, anchored ice- core records, stacked series, and lamina- counting code) are archived on Dryad (doi:10.5061/dryad.xgxd254wx).⁠

The study underscores the value of combining annually resolved speleothem records with isotope- enabled Earth- system modeling for quantifying rates of past abrupt climate change.

Milankovitch Cycles, the Last Glacial Period, and Why Earth Is Still in an Ice Age

Milankovitch Cycles, the Last Glacial Period, and Why Earth Is Still in an Ice Age – Climate- Science.press

Journal: Science, Vol 394, Issue 6824

DOI: 10.1126/science.aed4270.

Provided: Xi’an Jiaotong University

Authors: Xiyu Dong, Xu Zhang, Yuchen Sun, Gayatri Kathayat, Youwei Li, Sune O. Rasmussen, Anders Svensson, Christo Buizert, Ashish Sinha , Stephen Barker, Carlos Pérez-Mejías, Gregor Knorr, Rishui Chen , Kan Zhao, Wenjing Du, Haiwei Zhang, Hanying Li, Andrea Columbu, Liangcheng Tan , Yuao Zhang, Youfeng Ning, Martin Werner, Yongjin Wang, R. Lawrence Edwards and Hai Cheng

Abstract

Dansgaard-Oeschger (DO) events during the last ice age are thought to reflect rapid shifts in the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). Greenland ice cores suggest warming transitions within only a few decades—or even just over 10 years. Using precisely dated speleothem oxygen-isotope records from the Asian monsoon region, we have shown that the same DO warmings unfolded over more than a century. Isotope modeling revealed that Greenland records primarily capture a rapid atmospheric reorganization triggered by the initial sea-ice retreat in the northeastern North Atlantic, whereas the parallel AMOC recovery and hemispheric thermal adjustment proceeded much more slowly. These findings reveal that natural AMOC transitions evolved more slowly than the rapid North Greenland oxygen-isotope shifts would imply, thereby refining our understanding of “abruptness” during DO events.

AMOC Collapse Would Be Catastrophic: And Ice- Age Records Show It’s Happened Before

Potential Catastrophe: The Impact of AMOC Collapse on Climate

North Atlantic’s Cold Blob Reveals Complex, Shifting Link to Weakening Ocean Current

North Atlantic Cold Blob Reveals AMOC Weakening Is Complex

Ocean Circulation Continues for Centuries Even After Key AMOC Engine Shuts Down

How Ocean Circulation Endures After Key AMOC Shutdown