A glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) triggered a rapid surge in water levels along the Teesta River basin in Sikkim, India at approximately 01:30 LT on Wednesday, October 4, 2023. The water levels soared to heights of 5 – 6 m (15 – 20 feet), resulting in significant infrastructure damage, at least 8 fatalities, and more than 60 individuals reported missing.
A strong and shallow earthquake registered by India’s National Center for Seismology as M6.2 hit Nepal at 09:21 UTC (15:06 local time) on October 3, 2023. The agency is reporting a depth of 5 km (3.1 miles). USGS and EMSC are reporting M5.7 at a depth of 10 km (6.2 miles). The quake was preceded by M4.6 and followed by M3.6, M3.1, M3.5, M4.3, M3.9 and M3.0 by 14:00 UTC.
A recently published study in the journal Geophysical Research Letters has revealed that the Gulf Stream transport of water through the Florida Straits has weakened by approximately 4% over the past 40 years. Researchers state with 99% certainty that this is more than what would be expected from random variations, marking the first definitive evidence of significant change in the current.
Typhoon “Koinu” — known as Jenny in the Philippines — formed over the Pacific Ocean on September 27, 2023, as the 14th named storm of the 2023 Pacific typhoon season. The system is forecast to continue strengthening and make landfall over southern Taiwan on October 4.
On September 27, 2023, a powerful weather system named Storm Elias brought a second wave of severe flooding to central Greece, particularly affecting the city of Volos and the island of Evia. The storm came on the heels of the devastating Storm Daniel earlier this month.
Heavy rainfall and the bursting of river banks led to severe flooding in the Western Cape area of South Africa from September 23 to 26, 2023. The disaster resulted in multiple fatalities, thousands of evacuations, and significant infrastructure damage.
Storm Agnes formed on September 25, 2023, as the first named system of the 2023/24 North Atlantic storm season. Agnes is set to bring severe winds and waves to Ireland and the UK on Wednesday, September 27, 2023. Forecasters are particularly concerned due to unusually high sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic, which are contributing to the storm’s rapid intensification.
Tropical Storm “Ophelia” made landfall near Emerald Isle, North Carolina, around 10:15 UTC on September 23, 2023, with maximum estimated winds of 110 km/h (70 mph). The storm has since weakened into a post-tropical low but continued to pose a flooding risk across the Mid-Atlantic.
On September 19, 2023, the northeastern coastal province of Jiangsu in China was struck by a significant severe weather outbreak, with multiple tornadoes causing damage to more than 1 600 homes and tragically claiming the lives of at least 10 residents.
Two coronal mass ejections (CMEs) impacted Earth on September 18, 2023, producing G3 – Strong geomagnetic storming.
