US incurs losses of $ 67.1 billion due to separate weather and climate disasters: NOAA

New Delhi: The United States of America has incurred a total loss of $67.1 billion due to 24 separate weather and climate disasters in the last nine months (January to September 2023 as per The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration(NOAA).

As per the report, the each disaster stuck US cost more than $1 billion for January through the end of September 2023.

The United States was hit by 18 severe storm events, including two flooding events, one each winter storm, a tropical cyclone (Idalia), a wildfire event, and One drought/heat wave in the last nine months.

“The total cost of these events (not including the costs of Idalia) exceeds $67.1 billion,” said NOAA.

Since 1980, when NOAA started to track these events, the U.S. has sustained 372 separate weather and climate disasters where overall damages/costs reached or exceeded $1 billion, it said.

“The cumulative cost of these events exceeds $2.630 trillion” it further added.

September 2023 was remarkably warm and quite dry across the contiguous United States.  The month also brought record heat and flooding rains to parts of the nation, according to scientists from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information.

The average September temperature across the contiguous U.S. was 67.8 degrees F2.9 degrees above the 20th-century average, making it the seventh-warmest September in NOAA’s 129-year climate record.

New Mexico and Texas both saw their warmest September on record, while Minnesota had its second warmest. An additional 10 states saw their top-10 warmest September on record.

The average precipitation last month was 2.10 inches, ranking the month in the driest third of all Septembers in the historical record.

Ohio had its fifth-driest September on record with Indiana and Michigan seeing a top-10 driest September. Connecticut had its third-wettest September on record, while Nevada and New Jersey had one of their top-10 wettest September.

Meanwhile, more than 44,000 wildfires burned around 2.4 million acres so far this year. During the month of September drought coverage expanded to more than 82 percent of Hl, a 21.4 % increase in drough over the month.