By Alexandre Aguiar - MetSul Weather Center (Brazil) and ICECAP contributor

Today (Thursday) mark the 200 years of the birth of one of the greatest mankind’s scientists. Few people know, but Charles Darwin made very important weather amd climate pattern observations. An AMS paper claims that he should also be credited for the ENSO discovery among other scientists. His observations are useful even to today’s global warming debate. For that reason, I wrote an article especially to ICECAP to mark this date.

A Tribute to Charles Darwin

Today, February 12th, marks the bicentennial of the birth of an extraordinary man. Charles Darwin (12 February 1809 - 19 April 1882) observed and proved that species of life have evolved over time from common ancestors, through a process he called natural selection. His theories caused much controversy and still today, in the 21st century, few people refuse to accept them. The author of Origin of the Species was much more than a naturalist. His contribution to Science reached also the meteorological field and his notes are useful even in today’s global warming debate.

One of the most important meteorological observations from Darwin in Argentina was the periodic frequency of droughts, a pattern that persists nowadays and it is closely related to the PDO and the ENSO variability. University of Buenos Aires’ Professor Eduardo Sierra for many years claim that Argentina experiences dry and wet cycles, related to the PDO, and that a dry period was very probable in the near future, what proven to be true with this current drought.

The current drought in Argentina takes place during one of the longest periods of negative PDO in one hundred years. According to the data from the University of Washington, updated in January 2009, the current period of negative PDO is already 16 months long. Prior to that, since 1900, there were very few periods of the length with consecutive months presenting negative values (20 months from July 1998 to February 2000; 19 months from December 1972 to July 1974; 25 months from July 1970 to July 1972; 28 months from July 1961 to August 1963; 25 months from February 1955 to February 1957). The long period of negative signal of the PDO in the early 60’s coincided also with a severe drought in Argentina, particularly in 1963.

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It is interesting to note that the massive drought described by Charles Darwin in Argentina coincided with a huge drop in the PDO (Pacific Decadal Oscillation), according to the reconstruction of Biondi et all. (North Pacific Decadal Climate Variability Since AD 1661 Journal of Climate, Volume 14, Number 1, pp. 5-10, January 2001)

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The weather observations from 1833 by Charles Darwin constitute and important warning to the near future. Severe droughts not rarely are followed by excessive rain. His notes from 170 years ago in South America, furthermore, reveal the persistence of a climate pattern observed 200 years ago that, despite its recurrence, today is seen as caused by manmade global warming and not nature following its natural path. Charles Darwin took notice of the periodicity of droughts, but nowadays we are forced to read catastrophic claims that ignore history. Those that doubted you have inherited the wind. We have inherited your knowledge. Thank you Mr. Darwin for your overall scientific contribution ! The last two words of the article belong to you.

See the full fascinating tale here.