On an insufferably hot Santa Ana condition day in SoCal, it’s worth asking if the fire season we face this year is directly linked to the lack of rain we’ve experienced for the last three years, and, more broadly, from the “megadrought” identified by numerous researchers this century. Here’s what that long-term drought looks likeContinue reading “SoCal Megadroughts and Megafires: Caused by Climate Change?”
Category Archives: disaster
Australian Winter Turns Apocalyptic: Global Warming Blamed
Is my headline an exaggeration of reality? If you ask a denier site such as Watts Up With That, no doubt they would scoff, and say it's the usual natural variability. But deniers not only ignore the bad news about global warming obvious to most people on the ground, in places like Sydney and SoCal,Continue reading “Australian Winter Turns Apocalyptic: Global Warming Blamed”
Grizzly Die-Off as Salmon Crash: Fish Farms Suspected
A sad story from the Globe and Mail in Canada. Grizzly bears in British Columbia are dead or dying, stream-walkers say, because nine million sockeye salmon expected to return from the ocean this summer have failed to appear. The cause? The immediate cause for the salmon crash is believe to be sea lice, but expertsContinue reading “Grizzly Die-Off as Salmon Crash: Fish Farms Suspected”
A New Word for Disaster: Pyrocumulus
This century we as a culture have learned words for a lot of what might be called "new disasters" — climactic scenarios rarely if ever experienced on the planet in the past, such as Category Five, Sea Level Rise, and Arctic Amplification. Well, here's another to add to the list: Pyrocumulus. Here's what the pyrocumulusContinue reading “A New Word for Disaster: Pyrocumulus”
Dr. Jeff Masters on the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum
Dr. Jeff Masters, best known as a hurricane watcher for Wunderblog, is respected enough across the political spectrum such that it is possible — not likely, but possible — that his warning about the dangers of replicating the PETM will be taken seriously. So it's worth a look. Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution,Continue reading “Dr. Jeff Masters on the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum”
Swine Flu Exposes Media Weakness
As has been reported on Grist last week and in more detail today considerable evidence points to the possibility of a link between a ginormous Smithfield factory pig farm in the Vera Cruz area and the outbreak of the swine flu in Mexico. A couple of examples from Tom Philpott's post today in Grist: OnContinue reading “Swine Flu Exposes Media Weakness”
Arctic Ice-Free in Summer of 2013?
According to a Canadian expert who has spent the last ten summers on a remote island in the once-frozen north with his research team, the Arctic could be ice-free by the summer of 2013: OTTAWA (Reuters) – The Arctic is warming up so quickly that the region's sea ice cover in summer could vanish asContinue reading “Arctic Ice-Free in Summer of 2013?”
Lovelock Predicts Global Warming Will Kill Billions
Seasoned journalists tend to look down on the Q & A format as useful only for those who can't really write, but when it comes to truly original thinkers — such as James Lovelock, famous for the Gaia idea that the earth is a self-regulating system — I dare disagree. It's difficult to hear "theContinue reading “Lovelock Predicts Global Warming Will Kill Billions”
Your Fine: $101 Million. Payable: Forever
Steven Emory Butcher, the man who while burning trash, set off the longest-burning wildfire in recorded California history, was sentenced Monday to 45 months in Federal prison and fined $101 million. Butcher is not just homeless but mentally ill. It's easy to mock the absurdity of the fine, but in a typically excellent Slate pieceContinue reading “Your Fine: $101 Million. Payable: Forever”
Tea Fire Burns Through Westmont College into Montecito
A fire started yesterday afternoon in Santa Barbara has already burned through Westmont College down into Montecito, consuming between 80-100 homes. Initial news reports are fragmentary but not reassuring, and the pictures are alarming. Here's a first-hand account from Ray Ford, of the Santa Barbara Independent, and a picture from a resident, Justin Fox, whoContinue reading “Tea Fire Burns Through Westmont College into Montecito”
Kit Stolz 