Athletes and spectators are in for "extreme" conditions during the Summer Games in Beijing, warns the Canadian Olympic Committee's chief meteorologist.
China is in the midst of typhoon season and the Games fall smack-dab in the middle of the rainiest month of all -- August. To top it off, wet weather traps smog and particulates in a city infamous for poor air quality, says Doug Charko of the COC.
Charko, formerly of Environment Canada, was hand picked by the COC in 2006 to conduct a 10-year study of August weather patterns in subtropical Beijing.
He found temperatures during the Olympiad typically hover in the low 30s C but humidity makes it feel anywhere from the low to high 40s C, with heavy rain falling every two to three days.
"That's quite extreme by Canadian standards," said Charko.
During the 17-day Olympiad, Charko expects between five and seven days of persistent rainfall and a handful more days with scattered thunderstorms.
Weather delays can wreak havoc for organizers on tight event schedules, not to mention for athletes on rigorous eating, sleeping and training plans.
There is also a very real possibility the Olympic village will be hit with leftovers from typhoons that tend to make landfall south and east of Beijing.
"I'd say there is about a 20 per cent probability of Beijing experiencing typhoon remnants during the Olympiad," said Charko. A typhoon is an Asian hurricane packing dangerous winds and torrential rains, explained Charko.
Athletes competing in cities such as Hong Kong and Qingdao will likely be worse off than those in Beijing. They will be stationed in cities along paths most commonly travelled by typhoons. Equestrian riders will have to contend with frightened horses and sailors with choppy waters, thanks to heavy thunderstorm activity that usually plagues the region in August.
While they can't control the weather, the Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee for the Games has gone to great lengths to make sure it never catches them off guard. They have even banned vague forecasts such as "probability of rainfall," hoping to minimize confusion for athletes and spectators alike.
The Beijing Meteorological Bureau has also put in place a controversial weather modification strategy. The technique, known as cloud seeding, involves using rockets to launch silver iodide, salts and dry ice into threatening clouds overhead. This is said to reduce the size of raindrops, in turn delaying a downpour and allowing clouds to pass by.
Charko says the technique can work on a "very small scale" but it won't stop large weather systems such as thunderstorms. Chinese authorities hope the tactic will be enough to keep the Beijing's National Stadium, known as the "Bird's Nest" because of its open concept, rain-free during the Aug. 8 opening ceremonies.
"The politicians and media have latched onto this concept and painted with more effectiveness than is true," said Charko.
Olympic weather forecasts are "a priority," Zheng Guoguang, head of the China Meteorological Administration (CMA) says on the official Beijing 2008 Olympic Games website.
A dozen of the world's top meteorologists along with 30 members of China's weather team will work around the clock during the Games tracking high temperatures, humidity, torrential rains, thunder, lightning, hale, gale, typhoons, fog and smog. Their goal is to provide weather updates every three to six hours for each venue.
In fact, the CMA has been practising its Olympic inclement weather "drills" for the past two years. Last year, Chinese authorities sounded the foul weather alarm 776 times and sent out 1.2 billion alert text messages to mobile subscribers.
Though informed citizens, athletes and visitors will surely ease the situation, and even make the Games safer, that won't stop bad weather from dampening the Olympic spirit.
Eight typhoons hit China in 2007 and this season has already proved treacherous. In Qingdao, typhoons at sea caused a vast algae carpet to cover kilometres of waterway where Olympic sailors are set to compete this August.
Tropical storm Fengshen made landfall in late June to regions already devastated by extreme flooding that killed at least 63 people and forced the evacuation of 1.66 million.
Charko says the Chinese also made "small but noticeable" improvements in an effort to minimize the pollution problem in Beijing. The government has planted more trees to clean up the air, replaced the administration's fleet of vehicles with newer, more efficient cars and cleaned up state controlled industry.
"But at the end of the day, Beijing is a city of 18 million people. I don't care how clean the vehicles are, they still pollute," said Charko.
Most Canadian athletes have visited Beijing over the few years to get a feel for the conditions.
Charko says most don't experience any serious problems. "You get a bit of a cough after a few days," said Charko. "It's more of a long-term health risk."
