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Portugal and Spain are once more dealing with the consequences of significant flooding following Storm Claudia delivered torrential downpours and powerful gusts the previous week.

The Storm's Formation and Trajectory

This meteorological event formed from a region of depressed atmospheric pressure that had previously caused early season cold and snowy conditions through the eastern sectors of Canada and the north-eastern US at the start of November.

Claudia journeyed east across the Atlantic during the second weekend of November before losing momentum and stopping to the north-west of the Spanish and Portuguese landmass, snared in a dip of an increasingly amplified air current.

Impact on Iberia

Galicia in north-west Spain was initially impacted, with three to six inches of rain falling along its western coastline in just a single day up to the evening of Wednesday as a leisurely moving system of rain crawled across the western areas of the Iberian peninsula.

More downpours and stormy weather on Thursday caused inundations to parts of Portugal where a senior pair died in the city of Lisbon after floodwaters from the swollen Tagus entered their home as they were asleep.

Unsettled atmospheric states lasted through the weekend, with a violent whirlwind devastating a outdoor lodging area and a close-by inn in Albufeira in the south in Portugal's south on Saturday last week, killing an 85-year-old British woman and injuring 28 people.

Wider Effects across Europe

The storm produced broader repercussions across the western European nations. By drawing warm air from the subtropics, the system assisted in raising temperatures in south-west France to nearly 30 degrees Celsius, the country's highest recorded autumn temperature.

By last Friday, this tropical air mass met a frigid air system across the northern areas of the continent, forming a band of rain running from Ireland's west to Russia.

In the United Kingdom, this stalling band of rain produced record-breaking rain accumulations, leading to major inundations in the Welsh region.

As the storm progressively weakens early this week, the cold air mass will push south, providing the continent its first taste of winter.

Related Incidents in California, USA

The Golden State underwent a so-called atmospheric river recently, causing heavy rain and strong winds that provoked rapid flooding and mudslides in zones impacted by blazes previously in the year.

In excess of 50 millimetres of rain poured down in southern California on last Friday, with a additional two inches broadly over the state on the subsequent Saturday.

More than 100mm of rain was deposited on shoreline regions of southern California in all, attaining a full 200 millimetres in areas of elevated terrain.

Such a weather system is a plume of hot, humid air coming from the equatorial or near-equatorial zones.

Regions previously burned including Palisades and Altadena experienced the most intense the sudden floods and landslides, forcing residents to flee.

Across California, a elderly male passed away after his vehicle was washed off a inundated overpass, and a seven-year-old girl and her father were pulled into the ocean by large waves on the Central Coast.