https://electroverse.net/extreme-patagonia-snowstorm-kills-at-least-100000-sheep-and-5000-cattle/
Following on from late-July’s historic snowstorms –which prompted local meteorologists to label this as one of the region’s “cruelest winters of the past 20 years“– Patagonia has been struck again, and this time well-over 100,000 livestockk animals have succumb to the elements.
The only outlet I can find which has picked up on this story is the South Atlantic News Agency: en.mercopress.com. Apparently, no MSM source feels it worthy to document South America’s extreme snowstorms and frosts, which, according to estimates from the provincial Livestock Secretariat, Tabaré Bassi, are likely to have caused the death of 70% of the flock in the Argentine province of Rio Negro.
As reported by en.mercopress.com, officials made their first estimates of losses over the weekend, but will have to wait until October to obtain more concrete numbers: “Anyhow,” says Bassi, “we are talking of at least 100,000 sheep and 5,000 cattle”.
“We estimate that the worse losses are along the mountainous terrain between 1,000 and 1,300 meters above sea level, while at sea level we can expect sheep mortality in the range of 30%”.
Bassi calls this a survival challenge for the farmers in the region, particularly those with with flocks no larger than 250. These small highland farmers make money out of the wool and survive the winter feeding on the mutton, and “we will have to give them some sort of support,” insists Bassi.
Rio Negro province Senator Alberto Weretilneck presented an initiative in Congress requesting extraordinary economic aid for these farmers due to this agriculture emergency caused by adverse climatic conditions — one such initiative could be to apply zero export duties to wool.
The province has now declared an agriculture emergency, and, according to the Senator, implementing further measures is urgent, particularly in light of the latest weather forecast which are calling for worsening conditions.
Much of South America has been battered by extreme, record-smashing, and rarely-reported polar cold of late, as a powerful mass of Antarctic air continues to ride anonymously-far north on the back of a meridional jet stream flow (a phenomenon linked to the historically low solar activity we’re currently experiencing):
GFS 2m Temp Anomalies (C) for Aug 22 [tropicaltidbits.com]
In addition, the Southern Hemisphere as a whole has been tracking between -0.5C and -1C below the 1979-2000 climatological average throughout June, July, and Aug this year, according to data collated by the Climate Change Institute at the University of Maine.
And looking forward, the GFS reveals another blast of polar cold will send shivers up South America’s spine as we enter the month of September. Again, as with the blast just gone, temperature departures as much as 24C below the winter averages will be suffered, and additional livestock-freezing snowfall will bury large parts of Patagonia, Argentina, Chile, Paraguay, Bolivia, and even Peru:
GFS 2m Temp Anomalies (C) for Sept 1 [tropicaltidbits.com]
GFS 2m Temp Anomalies (C) for Sept 2 [tropicaltidbits.com]
GFS Snowfall (cm) for Aug 24 – Sept 9 [tropicaltidbits.com]
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