A cold snap entering Vietnam has cooled down the baking weather in the northern region, with the resort town of Sa Pa in Lao Cai Province experiencing a low temperature of 12.7 degrees Celsius on Monday, the Vietnamese national weather agency reported. This cold front has brought rain and ended the scorching heat in both northern and central Vietnam, the National Center for Hydro-Meteorological Forecasting said.

The low temperature in Sa Pa is an abnormal phenomenon, as such cold rarely occurs in July, the middle of the summer, said Le Thanh Hai, deputy general director of the center. “A cold spell causing a sharp drop in temperatures in July is very rare,” Hai said, adding that 44 years ago, on July 6, 1971, the temperature in Sa Pa, also under the impact of a cold snap, was 14.9 degrees. This abnormal phenomenon may be an impact of climate change, which makes weather conditions more and more complicated and hard to forecast, the official said.   Such temperatures will likely last for several days in Sa Pa, he added. Other northern mountainous areas also recorded unusually low temperatures, including 16.5 degrees in Mau Son Town (Lang Son Province) and 17.2 degrees in Pha Din (Son La Province).   

Meanwhile, hot weather has hit a few areas in the region from the central city of Da Nang to the south-central province of Binh Thuan. Currently, climate change is developing in a complex manner and will likely continue to cause abnormal weather phenomena, Hai said, asking authorities of all localities to take precautions to cope with possible sudden, extreme weather conditions in the future. “Such extraordinary conditions may even break the records for hot or cold weather in the country,” he warned.

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