🔗 Share this article

Once again, Portugal and Spain find themselves recovering from significant flooding in the wake of Tempest Claudia unleashed torrential downpours and strong winds the previous week.

The Storm's Formation and Trajectory

This weather system formed from an area of low pressure that had beforehand driven unseasonably early freezing temperatures and snowfall through eastern parts of the Canadian territory and the American north-east in early November.

This storm tracked eastwards across the Atlantic Ocean over the second weekend of November before losing momentum and stopping to the north-west of the Iberian region, caught in the trough of an progressively more wavy jet stream.

Consequences for the Iberian Peninsula

The northwestern Spanish region of Galicia was the first affected, with three to six inches of rain pouring down along its Atlantic coast in just a single day up to Wednesday evening as a slow-moving band of rain drifted across the western sectors of the region.

Additional rainfall and electrical storms on the following Thursday led to floods to Portuguese localities where an older couple died in the capital Lisbon after water from the overflowing Tagus River flooded their dwelling as they rested.

Stormy conditions persisted into the weekend, with a twister ripping through a outdoor lodging area and a nearby hotel in the town of Albufeira in the Algarve region on Saturday, claiming the life of an British woman aged 85 and injuring 28 people.

Wider Effects across Europe

The storm produced wider effects across western Europe. By pulling tropical air from the subtropics, the system assisted in raising temperatures in France's south-west to 85.6 degrees Fahrenheit, the nation's all-time high autumn temperature.

By the following Friday, this hot and moist atmospheric body met a cold air mass across the northern regions of Europe, creating a precipitation zone extending from the west of Ireland to Russia.

In the United Kingdom, this stationary front of rain delivered very high rainfall totals, resulting in major inundations in Wales.

As Claudia continues to weaken early this week, the cold air mass will advance southward, giving Europe its premier experience of winter.

Related Incidents in the state of California

California underwent a so-called atmospheric river the previous week, delivering intense precipitation and strong winds that resulted in sudden inundations and debris flows in areas scarred by blazes earlier this year.

More than 50mm of rain poured down in southern California on Friday, with a another 50 millimetres broadly over the state on Saturday last.

Over four inches of rain accumulated over coastal parts of the state's south in all, attaining 200mm overall in spots on high ground.

An atmospheric river is a plume of warm, moist air originating from the tropical or subtropical regions.

Regions previously burned including Pacific Palisades and the town of Altadena endured the most severe the sudden floods and landslides, forcing residents to flee.

Elsewhere in California, a elderly male passed away after his car was washed off a submerged bridge, and a child of seven years and her dad were dragged into the Pacific by powerful waves on the Central Coast.