At the end of last year, the United Nations Foundation reflected that 2022 was a “split screen” in terms of climate change. The world, it said, had taken “several important steps to curb the climate crisis while its impacts continued to worsen”, reminding us of the “increasingly severe and irreversible consequences” of an increase in temperature with floods, record-breaking heatwaves, severe drought in Africa, forest fires and cyclones throughout the year.

Cyclones are tropical rainstorms with strong, rotating winds, formed when low pressure is created in the oceans near the equator. 

Thunderstorms move across the surface of the ocean and if the surface water is warm (i.e. 27°C/80°F), the storm sucks up the heat energy from the water and carries it in the converging winds. The warmer the water, the more moisture in the air. 

In June 2023, Cyclone Biparjoy became the longest cyclone to have crossed the Arabian Sea. It lasted 13 days and three...