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Once again, Portugal and Spain find themselves battling the aftermath of widespread inundation following Storm Claudia brought torrential downpours and strong winds over the past seven days.

Claudia's Formation and Trajectory

This meteorological event developed from a low-pressure zone that had earlier caused early season freezing temperatures and snowfall through eastern parts of the Canadian territory and the American north-east in early November.

This storm journeyed east across the Atlantic in the middle of the second week of November before decelerating and halting to the northwestern area of the Iberian peninsula, caught in the trough of an ever more meandering atmospheric river.

Effects in Spain and Portugal

Galicia in north-west Spain was hit first, with three to six inches of rain coming down along its western coastline in just a single day up to Wednesday night as a sluggish front of rain crawled across the western areas of the region.

Additional rainfall and electrical storms on the following Thursday caused inundations to areas in Portugal where a senior pair perished in the capital Lisbon after floodwaters from the swollen Tagus entered their home as they slept.

Unsettled atmospheric states continued into the weekend, with a violent whirlwind ripping through a camping ground and a adjacent hotel in Albufeira in southern Portugal on Saturday last week, killing an 85-year-old British woman and harming 28 people.

Broader Impacts across Europe

The storm produced broader repercussions across western Europe. By drawing warm air from the warmer regions, the system helped temperatures in France's south-west to 85.6 degrees Fahrenheit, the nation's all-time high November temperature.

By the following Friday, this warm and humid air mass met a chilly atmospheric body across the northern areas of the continent, forming a precipitation zone running from western Ireland to the Russian Federation.

In the United Kingdom, this stationary front of rain delivered exceptionally large precipitation amounts, causing major inundations in Wales.

As the storm loses strength early this week, the chilly atmospheric system will move towards the south, delivering to Europe its first taste of colder weather.

Parallel Events in the state of California

The US state of California experienced a so-called atmospheric river recently, delivering heavy rain and high-velocity gusts that provoked flash flooding and debris flows in zones impacted by wildfires in the recent past.

In excess of 50 millimetres of rain fell in southern California on last Friday, with a another 50 millimetres broadly over the state on Saturday.

Over four inches of rain fell over shoreline regions of the state's south in total, attaining a full 200 millimetres in spots on high ground.

This meteorological feature is a narrow band of hot, humid air coming from the equatorial or near-equatorial zones.

Burn scar areas including Palisades and Altadena region suffered the most severe the sudden floods and landslides, forcing residents to flee.

Across California, a man in his seventies passed away after his vehicle was washed off a inundated overpass, and a child of seven years and her father were swept into the sea by powerful waves on the California's Central Coast.