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The Iberian nations are again recovering from significant flooding after Tempest Claudia unleashed torrential downpours and powerful gusts over the past seven days.

Claudia's Genesis and Journey

This weather system formed from a low-pressure zone that had earlier ushered in unseasonably early cold and snowy conditions through eastern parts of the Canadian territory and the north-eastern United States in early November.

Claudia tracked eastwards across the Atlantic in the middle of the second week of November before decelerating and halting to the north-west of the Iberian region, snared in a dip of an progressively more wavy air current.

Effects in Spain and Portugal

Spain's Galicia area in the northwest was the first affected, with a substantial 80 to 150 millimetres of rain falling along its western coastline in just one full day up to the evening of Wednesday as a leisurely moving system of rain crawled across the western sectors of the peninsula.

Additional rainfall and electrical storms on Thursday last week led to floods to Portuguese localities where an elderly couple died in the city of Lisbon after water from the overflowing Tagus River invaded their residence as they were asleep.

Stormy conditions lasted through the weekend, with a violent whirlwind tearing through a campsite and a close-by inn in Albufeira in Portugal's south on the weekend's Saturday, fatally injuring an elderly British lady and injuring two dozen and eight persons.

Broader Impacts across Europe

The storm produced broader repercussions across the western European nations. By pulling tropical air from the warmer regions, the system helped temperatures in southwestern France to 29.8C (85.6F), the nation's all-time high late autumn reading.

By Friday, this tropical air mass clashed with a frigid air system across the northern areas of the continent, generating a rainfall belt extending from Ireland's west to the Russian Federation.

In the UK, this stalling band of rain produced exceptionally large precipitation amounts, causing significant waterlogging in Wales.

As this weather phenomenon continues to weaken in the coming days, the frigid air will push south, giving Europe its first taste of the winter season.

Simultaneous Occurrences in California, USA

The US state of California underwent a plume of tropical moisture last week, bringing torrential rain and strong winds that led to sudden inundations and landslides in zones affected by wildfires earlier this year.

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

In excess of 100 millimetres of rain was deposited on shoreline regions of the state's south in total, reaching 200mm overall in areas of elevated terrain.

An atmospheric river is a plume of tropical, saturated air stemming from the tropical or subtropical regions.

Regions previously burned including Palisades and Altadena region endured the most intense the flash flooding and mudslides, prompting evacuations.

In other parts of the state, a man in his seventies died after his car was washed off a flooded bridge, and a child of seven years and her father were swept into the ocean by big swells on the Central Coast.