This year, the US set a new record for the number of weather disasters that have cost $1 billion or more, reports the Associated Press. This year already broke the 2020 record and there are still four months left.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced that this year there have been 23 weather disasters in the US that cost at least $1 billion, breaking the 2020’s record of 22 billion-disasters in a year.

This year through August, the extreme weather events have cost more than $57.6 billion and at least 253 lives have been lost in these tragedies.

“We’re seeing the fingerprints of climate all over our nation,” said Adam Smith, the NOAA applied climatologist and economist in an interview Monday. “I would not expect things to slow down anytime soon.”

Smith said that there has been a rise in the number of these disasters due to more areas being built in risk-prone locations and to climate change.

“The climate has already changed and neither the built environment nor the response systems are keeping up with the change,” said former Federal Emergency Management Agency director Craig Fugate.

Climate scientists have said that the increase in weather disasters also could have a boost from El Niño.

Stanford University climate scientist Chris Field said that if we can build resilience and to stop climate change, maybe we could reduce damage from these extreme disasters.