Storm, depression or tempest. The names vary, but the trail of destruction and loss of human life that the Kristin weather phenomenon left in Leiria, leading to a state of emergency being declared in 60 municipalities, is difficult to forget. Faced with adversity, researchers from the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon (Ciências ULisboa) accepted the challenge and appeared on television and radio channels and in newspapers with the aim of revealing what may be behind the storm that has ravaged the country in recent days.
Kristin: Ciências ULisboa researchers explain everything about the storm that affected Portugal
Climate, Highlight•29 January, 2026
Extreme weather events may become more frequent
"It is not the first and will not be the last. This type of winter has happened before. Like all situations that lead to extreme weather, just like all situations that lead to disasters, a plane never crashes for just one reason, it is always a combination of factors. Here we have a combination of factors that did, in fact, lead to this situation," said Carlos da Câmara, professor at the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon and the Instituto Dom Luiz, in an interview on SIC's Jornal da Noite on Wednesday.
Carlos da Câmara points out that Kristin could be the result of a combination of factors.
Shortly before Carlos da Câmara entered the studio, Ricardo Trigo, who is also a researcher at Ciências ULisboa and IDL, had already revealed more details about extreme weather phenomena on SIC Notícias.
Also on SIC Notícias, but on Wednesday afternoon, it was up to Filipe Duarte Santos, a researcher with a career at Ciências ULisboa, to reveal the science behind this extreme weather phenomenon – and to issue a warning to the competent authorities and the population.
Ricardo Trigo explained what lies at the root of phenomena such as Kristin depression.
‘We have to prepare for extreme events, for storms, which have always existed, but are now more frequent. There are more storms like this in 10 years than there were in the past,’ said the researcher.
Filipe Duarte Santos also commented on the same topic as president of the National Council for the Environment and Sustainable Development on Antena 1, on Antena Aberta programme and on the Fórum TSF episode on the same day.
Filipe Duarte Santos warned of the need to be cautious about the occurrence of extreme phenomena.
Gil Lemos, a researcher at Ciências ULisboa and IDL, appeared on RTP Notícias and pointed out that Portugal has been under the influence of several uninterrupted depressions that "result from an anticyclonic block at higher latitudes in the Arctic region, leading to these depressions descending to lower latitudes, which then directly impact us".
On Friday, Gil Lemos was due to return to the TV studios to provide further explanations about these meteorological phenomena on RTP.
Gil Lemos links an ‘anticyclonic block’ with the low pressure systems recorded in recent days.
Those who prefer reading to listening can also refer to the explanations provided by Carlos da Câmara in Expresso and in an equally detailed article in Observador, which provides a better understanding of the concepts of Sting Jet and cyclogenesis.
In these latest media appearances, there is even a metaphor that helps to understand what leads to depressions such as Kristin: ‘As in all situations that lead to extreme weather, we have a combination of factors that led to this situation. This Kristin is a carriage on a train of depressions,’ concluded Carlos da Câmara.