Here is a softer side to the disruptive weather phenomenon known as El Nino: An enormous blanket of colorful flowers has carpeted Chile’s Atacama Desert, the most arid in the world.
The cyclical warming of the central Pacific Ocean might be causing droughts and floods in various parts of the world, but in the vast desert of northern Chile it has also caused a vibrant explosion of thousands of species of flowers with an intensity not seen in decades.
Yellows, reds, purples and whites have covered the normally stark landscapes of the Atacama, where temperatures top 40oC this time of year.
Photo: AFP
From violet-and-white Chilean bell flowers, or “countryside sighs” (Nolana paradoxa), and red “lion claws” (Bomarea ovallei) to yellow Rhodophiala rhodolirion, they have filled the normally pale desert valleys with rivers of color.
“This year has been particularly special, because the amount of rainfall has made this perhaps the most spectacular of the past 40 or 50 years,” University of Atacama desert specialist Raul Cespedes said.
El Nino, which wreaks havoc on world weather patterns every two to seven years, has hit particularly hard this year, causing unusually heavy rainfall in the world’s driest desert.
That has caused dormant flower bulbs and rhizomes — underground stems that grow horizontally — to germinate.
“When you think of the desert, you think of total dryness, but there’s a latent ecosystem here just waiting for certain conditions to arise,” Cespedes said.
The desert flowers are perhaps nature’s consolation for what has been a devastating year for Atacama.
They first bloomed in March, after heavy rains that caught the region by surprise and caused massive floods that killed more than 30 people.
They are now blooming for the second time this year, at the outset of the southern hemisphere’s summer.
“This is a very unusual phenomenon. Because of the floods in March there was an exceptional winter bloom, which had never before been recorded ... and then there was another bloom in spring,” Chilean National Tourism Service Director for the Atacama region Daniel Diaz said.
“Two flowerings a year is very unusual in the most arid desert in the world, and that’s something we’ve been able to enjoy this spring, along with people from all over the world. There’s a lot of interest in seeing it,” he told reporters.
The region has seen a 40 percent increase in tourists since the flowers began blooming.
“It is so unusual, yet so real,” said British tourist Edward Zannahand, who made a special stop in Atacama on what he described as a road trip around the world.
Four people jailed in the landmark Hong Kong national security trial of "47 democrats" accused of conspiracy to commit subversion were freed today after more than four years behind bars, the second group to be released in a month. Among those freed was long-time political and LGBTQ activist Jimmy Sham (岑子杰), who also led one of Hong Kong’s largest pro-democracy groups, the Civil Human Rights Front, which disbanded in 2021. "Let me spend some time with my family," Sham said after arriving at his home in the Kowloon district of Jordan. "I don’t know how to plan ahead because, to me, it feels
Poland is set to hold a presidential runoff election today between two candidates offering starkly different visions for the country’s future. The winner would succeed Polish President Andrzej Duda, a conservative who is finishing his second and final term. The outcome would determine whether Poland embraces a nationalist populist trajectory or pivots more fully toward liberal, pro-European policies. An exit poll by Ipsos would be released when polls close today at 9pm local time, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points. Final results are expected tomorrow. Whoever wins can be expected to either help or hinder the
North Korea has detained another official over last week’s failed launch of a warship, which damaged the naval destroyer, state media reported yesterday. Pyongyang announced “a serious accident” at Wednesday last week’s launch ceremony, which crushed sections of the bottom of the new destroyer. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un called the mishap a “criminal act caused by absolute carelessness.” Ri Hyong-son, vice department director of the Munitions Industry Department of the Party Central Committee, was summoned and detained on Sunday, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported. He was “greatly responsible for the occurrence of the serious accident,” it said. Ri is the fourth person
The collapse of the Swiss Birch glacier serves as a chilling warning of the escalating dangers faced by communities worldwide living under the shadow of fragile ice, particularly in Asia, experts said. Footage of the collapse on Wednesday showed a huge cloud of ice and rubble hurtling down the mountainside into the hamlet of Blatten. Swiss Development Cooperation disaster risk reduction adviser Ali Neumann said that while the role of climate change in the case of Blatten “still needs to be investigated,” the wider impacts were clear on the cryosphere — the part of the world covered by frozen water. “Climate change and
RSS