September 18, 2018: Scientists Doing Scientists - Politicians Ignoring Them

 

9/18/18: Scientists are clear about climate change. A warming atmosphere means more water vapor in the air, heavier rains, and more of them. 

Hurricanes also gather strength from warmer oceans. 

 

Scientists doing science…politicians ignoring them. 

There’s nothing complicated with the science – but America has a science idiot in the White House. 

For a little light reading, simply go to NASA’s website and start worrying about what they’re reporting. 

If that doesn’t cause you to spit out your morning coffee, visit the website of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. That is: Scientists doing science.

The warning signs are right there on the bottom.

 

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THE DEATH TOLL from Hurricane Florence reaches 33. Experts say there was a 0.1% chance a single storm would dump so much rain on the region, meaning Florence would be a “once-in-a-thousand-years” event. 

Wilmington, N.C. received a record 26.58 inches of rain. 

Flooding is widespread. Many rivers are expected to rise to record levels. The Lumber River has already hit 22.21 feet, a record. The Washington Post notes that besides the Lumber, the: 

Cape Fear, Neuse and Black rivers in North Carolina, which also flooded during Hurricane Matthew in 2016, will set records this week.

 

In Fayetteville, N.C., the Cape Fear River surpassed flood stage early Sunday after rising 20 feet in 24 hours [emphasis added]. It won’t hit major flood stage in Fayetteville until Monday night, according to the National Weather Service, and will peak around 62 feet – three feet higher than its maximum crest in Hurricane Matthew.

 

In South Carolina, the Pee Dee and Waccamaw rivers are expected to crest sometime Saturday, also at record levels. 

Flood-related pollution is expected to complicate recovery. Four coal ash holding ponds have already been breached, dumping heavy metals like arsenic and mercury in the water. Near Lake Sutton, enough coal ash slurry spilled from a holding pond to fill 150 dump trucks. Nine hog “lagoons” filled with manure from industrial farms have been inundated. Seventeen others are threatened. 

First, your house is flooded. 

Second, you have pig poo fouling the water. 

Third, North Carolina lawmakers – Republican ones – might want to rethink the way they look at climate change. A law passed in 2012 ordered state and local agencies to ignore scientific models that predict rising sea levels when determining coastal development policies.

 

Michael Mann, a climate expert at Penn State, cautions that Trump administration policies, added to willful blindness at the state level, will only add to future problems. Florence, “fueled in part by bathwater-hot Atlantic Ocean temperatures” churned across the Carolinas at the same time Trump was ordering “another assault on policies aimed at curbing carbon emissions.” 

Future generations are going to pay for our sins. How bad are those sins? A Danish vessel, the Venta Maersk, is currently sailing through the Arctic Ocean. The ship left Vladivostok on August 23, steamed north through the Bering Strait, then turned east across the top of Russia. Since humankind first learned to travel by sea, this route has never been open without the aid of powerful icebreakers. Now, the Arctic is warming at a rate twice as fast as the rest of the planet and ice is retreating. Since 1979, Arctic ice has been shrinking by 33,220 square miles annually. That means every four years an area the size of New Mexico is ice-free for the first time. 

Scientists are beyond worried.

A journey never before possible in recorded history.