Extract from ABC News
There are fresh warnings about soaring heat in south and south-east Asia as a UN report warns global temperatures will very likely hit new records within the next five years.
Parts of Pakistan nudged 50 degrees Celsius on Sunday, with Jacobabad hitting 49C.
Large parts of northern India are currently under continued heatwave warnings of similar extremes.
It is the latest in what has been a widespread and intense period of heat over the past two months, with records tumbling across several countries including China, Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, Bangladesh and India.
While this time of year is usually hot, climate scientists say conditions over the past eight weeks have been exceptional.
CSIRO climate scientist Nandini Ramesh said it was a scenario being experienced time and time again with climate change.
"This time of year is already one where people are expecting a lot of heat," she said.
"And unfortunately, with climate change, what we expect is for that time of year when it's already quite hot to just get hotter.
"So these sorts of heat waves are expected to occur more with climate change."
It is the second year in a row heat extremes have been recorded over the region.
Extreme heat that set in across India and Pakistan last year resulting in the hottest March in the subcontinent in more a century, extending into April.
It killed 90 people.
Dr Ramesh said the frequency of such extremes was "sounding alarm bells".
"I think people are aware that this is really not good," she said.
It comes as a World Meteorological Organisation report found there was a 98 per cent chance one of the next five years would be the warmest recorded.
El Niño likely to exacerbate heat
While cooling rains are now prevailing across the continent, climatologists say the likely development of El Niño could exacerbate the heat further.
India Institute of Tropical Meteorology climatologist Jasti Chowdary said El Niño was typically associated with a delay in the onset of the monsoon, which arrived in June.
The Indian Meteorological Department has issued a statement predicting the onset of the monsoon would start four days late.
Dr Chowdary said a delay could have significant consequences.
"If the progress of the monsoon is slow, the heat might prevail over north-west parts of India and it may have noteworthy consequences," he said.
But Dr Chowdary and Dr Ramesh said El Niño was unlikely to have played a role in the heat to-date.
Dr Chowdary said the fingerprint of climate change and lingering warm waters in surrounding oceans were likely to have helped drive the unusual heat.
"Southeast Asia is so closely related to temperatures for the Western Pacific as well," he said.
"This year, because there was a prolonged La Nina, it has caused the Indian Ocean as well as the Western Pacific to become warmer and that warming is persisting.
"When you have this strong warming [plus] a high pressure system, it is probably going to influence the heatwave conditions over that region."
Dr Chowdary said Cyclone Mocha also played a role in the prolonged dry conditions across parts of India in May.
Could Australia face similar impacts?
Dr Ramesh said the humidity associated with Asia's heatwave made conditions there particularly dangerous.
"It makes it much harder for the human body to tolerate," she said.
While Asia's heatwave has been developing in a tropical climate, different to southern Australia, the general forces at play could hint at what is to come.
El Niño is known to bring drier, warmer conditions to eastern Australia.
The Bureau of Meteorology is projecting a 50 per cent chance it will form this winter or spring, while the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has put the odds at a much higher 90 per cent.
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