Climate change is increasingly posing challenges to transportation. Here are just a few recent events related to climate change.

Hurricane Ian It may take four to eight weeks for logistics networks to fully recover from the damage from Hurricane Ian, according to FourKites, a supply-chain visibility platform. Climate change is worsening hurricane impacts in the United States by increasing the intensity and decreasing the speed at which they travel.

Record low levels in Mississippi River Drought has caused water levels along the Mississippi to drop to near-historic low levels. As of Friday, the Coast Guard reports that there are 144 vessels and 2,253 barges queued up and waiting to get through two stretches of the river where traffic has been halted.  The Army Corps of Engineers has been dredging portions of the river for the past week in an attempt to deepen channels and get barge traffic moving again. The logjam is coming at the worst time as the soybean and corn harvests are each about one-fifth complete and supplies will start piling up. Shippers are scrambling for other ways to move goods after near-historic low water levels have forced barge companies to stop taking orders for immediate delivery of everything from metals to agricultural products to fertilizers. As these shipments are forced to move to other transport modes like rail and truck, congestion is likely to increase further.

In Europe, draught caused low water levels on the Danube in July and August, revealing sunken WW2 warships in places. Low water levels on the Rhine also threatened to disrupt trade. Across Europe, transport is just one of the elements of river-based commerce that’s been upended by climate change.

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