CariCOF: 2024 heat season expected to be worse than 2023 for Caribbean

The Caribbean Climate Outlook Forum (CariCOF) released its Heat Outlook which gives a round up of the weather that the region will  experience between April and September of 2024. It has been suggested that this year, temperatures will be decidedly higher during the heat season, especially in comparison to 2023.

It must also be noted that these conditions are expected to persist till October and temperatures thus year are likely to reach record heights, especially in August and September.

The CariCOF outlook says that April to June will mark the period during which the Caribbean transitions into the heat season, including the initial stages of the season. The Caribbean islands and Belize will experience a transition that is even warmer than usual.

August and September will be the months during which heat will be quite high both during the day-time as well as during night-time. This is expected to have several implications on the region, including but not limited to intense and recurrent episodes of heat stress and will affect vulnerable populations and livestock due to excessive humidity and high temperatures, specifically in September.

An issue that will affect Caribbean nation quite badly will be the rise in colling needs, which will rise quicker and higher than most years. The months of August and September will be worse than most in this regard.

Usually, Belize and Trinidad experiences fifteen to twenty heatwave days, Jamaica, Cuba and Puerto Rico have five to fifteen, while other parts of the region have less than ten such days.

This year though, the heat season will present with fifty or more heat wave days in Belize, thirty to fifty are expected in Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago and the Windward Islands, while Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Saint Lucia will experience at least 30 heatwave days.

The situation is such that several islands in the Caribbean have already recorded very warm days in April, which is being perceived as a sign of things to come. On the 6th of April, Grenada issued a heatwave advisory after it recorded eight straight days with temperatures above 31.7 degrees Celsius.

Antigua and Barbuda issued a similar excessive heat warning on the same day. The British Virgin Islands issued a heat advisory on the 8th of April after the British Virgin Islands Department of Disaster Management recorded a temperature of 85F with a heat index of 95.