Strange Climate

Climate in Japan is strange these days. On Friday, it marked over 40°C in four cities for the first time in these six years. A lot of people were carried to hospitals and some were dead with overheating disease. This extremeness is not only caused by natural factors, but by artificial reasons. This is the time when the Japanese need to begin serious discussion over changing their life style.

In those four cities, Shimanto city in Kochi prefecture and Kofu city in Yamanashi recorded the third highest temperature in Japan. It was 40.7°C, following 40.9°C in Kumagaya city and Tajimi city in 2007, and 40.8°C in Yamagata city in 1933. 40.7°C is paralleled with 105°F. High atmospheric pressure from Pacific Ocean covered Japan as a whole, and the consecutive high pressure raised air temperature namely in the cities away from coast side.

Victims of heatstroke are mainly old people. One woman in Mito city fell down during her work in vegetable field and died in a hospital. Another man in Nara died in his mowing. Lack of water, mineral and sodium causes solidification of blood. It is not only heat, but humidity that affect that disease.

A hot day produces a lot of victims alongside of waters; seaside, lakeside and riverside. A number of people, from fourteen-years-old boy to seventy-three-years-old man, were drowned in playing, swimming or fishing. To escape from heat on the land, many people approach water, risking their lives.

Heavy rain is also a major problem in Japan this summer. In Akita and Iwate, unprecedentedly heavy rain for a few hours drew landslides and killed six and one is still missed. The rain was coming too quick to let the residents evacuate. High humidity easily makes cumulonimbus, which causes heavy rain.

It is obvious that the prevalence of electric devices, including cooler, refrigerator, computers in office and many more, affects the climate change in Japan. Heat island phenomenon, isolated place with higher air temperature than other places around in urban area, can be seen in everywhere in Japan. Especially, air conditioners in houses and offices, emitting high and humid air outside of building, may make environment of cities worse.

It was not strange that people escaped heat by opening the windows and splashing water around building. In addition, Japan had seen a sense of limitation of electric power after the disaster in nuclear power plant in Fukushima. Before climate is getting severer, the Japanese lifestyle needs to be changed. Shortening business time, wearing ethnic cool clothes, and shading windows are some examples.