I guess your asking "when has the climate not changed?". Of course, the earth has gone through many changes in climate over the last 4.5 billion years. But what we're seeing now is very rapid relatively speaking.
Not a denier but I'm always told that you have to look at the trends instead of individual weather events. But I guess it has been getting hotter in Europe over the last several years. Canada is apparently warming at twice the rate of the rest of the world.
Not sure this is specific to dying. In a fairly recent update, if you press the F2 key, the volume of the external sounds like the engines more slowly ramps up instead of being instantaneous.
This does sound like something wrong with your controls setup. I don't experience anything like this. Maybe attach a track.
EDIT: Make sure you're not hitting your wheel brakes accidentally. That will definitely make you skid.