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Once again, Portugal and Spain find themselves dealing with the consequences of extensive flooding after Storm Claudia brought torrential downpours and powerful gusts the previous week.

Claudia's Genesis and Journey

The storm system formed from a low-pressure zone that had previously caused early season cold and snowy conditions through the eastern regions of the Canadian territory and the north-eastern US in early November.

Claudia tracked eastwards across the Atlantic Ocean during the second weekend of November before slowing and stalling to the north-west of the Spanish and Portuguese landmass, trapped within a trough of an ever more meandering atmospheric river.

Consequences for the Iberian Peninsula

Galicia in north-west Spain was hit first, with three to six inches of rain pouring down along its western coastline in just one full day up to the evening of Wednesday as a sluggish front of rain crawled across the western sectors of the Iberian peninsula.

Additional rainfall and electrical storms on Thursday last week brought flooding to areas in Portugal where an older couple lost their lives in the city of Lisbon after floodwaters from the swollen Tagus entered their home as they rested.

Stormy conditions lasted through the weekend, with a twister tearing through a outdoor lodging area and a adjacent hotel in the town of Albufeira in the Algarve region on the weekend's Saturday, killing an 85-year-old British woman and harming two dozen and eight persons.

Extended Consequences across Europe

This system triggered broader repercussions across the western European nations. By pulling tropical air from the subtropical zones, the system assisted in raising temperatures in south-west France to 85.6 degrees Fahrenheit, the state's maximum ever autumn temperature.

By last Friday, this hot and moist atmospheric body clashed with a chilly atmospheric body across more northern parts of the continent, generating a precipitation zone extending from Ireland's west to the Russian Federation.

In the Britain, this stationary front of rain delivered exceptionally large precipitation amounts, causing significant waterlogging in the Welsh region.

As this weather phenomenon loses strength at the start of the week, the chilly atmospheric system will advance southward, delivering to Europe its premier experience of colder weather.

Simultaneous Occurrences in California, USA

The US state of California experienced an "atmospheric river" the previous week, bringing intense precipitation and high-velocity gusts that resulted in sudden inundations and mudslides in zones affected by blazes in the recent past.

More than 50mm of rain was recorded in southern California on Friday, with a another 50 millimetres across extensive areas of California on Saturday.

In excess of 100 millimetres of rain accumulated over coastal areas of southern California in all, attaining eight inches in total in spots on high ground.

Such a weather system is a narrow band of tropical, saturated air coming from the tropical or subtropical regions.

Locations with fire damage including Palisades and Altadena region suffered the most intense the sudden floods and earth movements, leading to evacuations.

Elsewhere in California, a elderly male died after his car was carried away from a inundated overpass, and a young girl aged seven and her dad were pulled into the ocean by big swells on the the state's central shoreline.