UN warns of more Australia bushfire like events in 2020

• In 2019, the average global temperature was 1.8 degrees Celsius — a limit that signifies major changes to life on Earth.
  
• According to the World Meteorological Organisation, extreme heat conditions are likely to drive more events like Australia bush fires that killed a billion animals.
  

The world had suffered enough in 2019 with bushfires in Australia, Amazon forest fires to drought and floods in South Asia. But, it looks like Mother Nature is not backing down this year either.

"Unfortunately, we expect to see much extreme weather throughout 2020 and the coming decades, fuelled by record levels of heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere," said Petteri Taalas, head of the UN's World Meteorological Organization.

Drought, heat and fire
Last year was also the second hottest year ever, according to the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO). This extreme heat is likely to spill over and drive more events like Australian bush fires that killed a billion animals and put koalas at the brink of extinction.

“Australia had its hottest, driest year on record in 2019, setting the scene for the massive bush fires which were so devastating to people and property, wildlife, ecosystems, and the environment,” said Taalas.

The average global temperature was 1.8 degrees Celsius in 2019 — a limit that signifies major changes to life on Earth. One of the effects is the rising temperature of oceans.

Oceans turning acidic
Warming oceans are likely to turn water more acidic, threatening sea life. It will also make it tougher to live near the coast line affecting people from Miami beaches to Bangladesh as water levels will continue to rise. However, scientists are not yet aware of the extent of destruction caused by heat, yet.

"It's a very complicated system, and we don't fully understand which species will have to shift their range, which ones may go extinct or which ones may prosper,” said Nick Bond, a professor of atmospheric sciences at the University of Washington in Seattle.

But what we know is that we have a lot to do, in very less time.
According to the UN, humans have only 10 years left to save Earth from mass extinction. Earth has entered the sixth era of mass extinction already and requires urgent plan of action.

See also:
Shocking pictures of extreme natural disasters in 2019 that reminded the world that climate change is for real