Snowfall in Sahara Desert is getting more frequent! Why?

This is the Sahara desert blanketed by a rare snowfall. The desert, more commonly known for its hot and dry climate, is currently witnessing this very rare occurrence.

On January 18th, temperatures had plummeted to -2 deg C near the town of Ain Sefra in northwest Algeria. The area is surrounded by the Atlas Mountains and is 1,000m above sea level. But the phenomenon is still rare as it has seen snow just five times in the last 43 years. This is because there is not usually enough water in the air despite it being able to get very cold at night.

The desert is much hotter the majority of the time, with an average temperature during the day hitting 38 deg C. Ain Sefra, also known as the gateway to the desert, has a heat record of more than 50 deg C.
There are speculations that this rare snowfall is due to climate change. The occurrence reveals how these types of events are going to get extremely common in the future as the climate is continuously changing due to global warming.

Such situations, including snowfalls in Sahara, a long cold spell in North America, very warm weather in the European part of Russia and sustained rains which sparked flooding in Western European countries, have been occurring more frequently. The high recurrence of these extreme conditions does stem from global warming.

With increasing climate change, scientists expect that the winter is going to change more than the summer. So we have to pay more attention to our winter weather forecasts.

As for the Sahara, with more of such unexpected events, the desert is expected to become green again in about 15,000 years!


Down to Earth is Science and Environment fortnightly published by the Society for Environmental Communication, New Delhi. We publish news and analysis on issues that deal with sustainable development, which we scan through the eyes of science and environment.