Katrina's real name
By Ross Gelbspan | August 30, 2005
THE HURRICANE that struck Louisiana yesterday was nicknamed Katrina by the National Weather Service. Its real name is global warming.
Breaking News Alerts When the year began with a two-foot snowfall in Los Angeles, the cause was global warming.
When 124-mile-an-hour winds shut down nuclear plants in Scandinavia and cut power to hundreds of thousands of people in Ireland and the United Kingdom, the driver was global warming.
When a severe drought in the Midwest dropped water levels in the Missouri River to their lowest on record earlier this summer, the reason was global warming.
In July, when the worst drought on record triggered wildfires in Spain and Portugal and left water levels in France at their lowest in 30 years, the explanation was global warming.
When a lethal heat wave in Arizona kept temperatures above 110 degrees and killed more than 20 people in one week, the culprit was global warming.
And when the Indian city of Bombay (Mumbai) received 37 inches of rain in one day -- killing 1,000 people and disrupting the lives of 20 million others -- the villain was global warming.
As the atmosphere warms, it generates longer droughts, more-intense downpours, more-frequent heat waves, and more-severe storms.
Although Katrina began as a relatively small hurricane that glanced off south Florida, it was supercharged with extraordinary intensity by the relatively blistering sea surface temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico.
The consequences are as heartbreaking as they are terrifying.
Unfortunately, very few people in America know the real name of Hurricane Katrina because the coal and oil industries have spent millions of dollars to keep the public in doubt about the issue.
The reason is simple: To allow the climate to stabilize requires humanity to cut its use of coal and oil by 70 percent. That, of course, threatens the survival of one of the largest commercial enterprises in history.
In 1995, public utility hearings in Minnesota found that the coal industry had paid more than $1 million to four scientists who were public dissenters on global warming. And ExxonMobil has spent more than $13 million since 1998 on an anti-global warming public relations and lobbying campaign.
In 2000, big oil and big coal scored their biggest electoral victory yet when President George W. Bush was elected president -- and subsequently took suggestions from the industry for his climate and energy policies.
As the pace of climate change accelerates, many researchers fear we have already entered a period of irreversible runaway climate change.
Against this background, the ignorance of the American public about global warming stands out as an indictment of the US media.
When the US press has bothered to cover the subject of global warming, it has focused almost exclusively on its political and diplomatic aspects and not on what the warming is doing to our agriculture, water supplies, plant and animal life, public health, and weather.
For years, the fossil fuel industry has lobbied the media to accord the same weight to a handful of global warming skeptics that it accords the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change -- more than 2,000 scientists from 100 countries reporting to the United Nations.
Today, with the science having become even more robust -- and the impacts as visible as the megastorm that covered much of the Gulf of Mexico -- the press bears a share of the guilt for our self-induced destruction with the oil and coal industries.
As a Bostonian, I am afraid that the coming winter will -- like last winter -- be unusually short and devastatingly severe. At the beginning of 2005, a deadly ice storm knocked out power to thousands of people in New England and dropped a record-setting 42.2 inches of snow on Boston.
The conventional name of the month was January. Its real name is global warming.
Ross Gelbspan is author of ''The Heat Is On" and ''Boiling Point."
The Boston Global
=====
I am trying to find out why the name 'Katrina', got this one about
global warming.
Had asked an old lady from Shanghai, she claimed in 1940s, 31 degree
centigrade in Summer was quite normal,35 was extremely high.
It's quite true in China, or Eurasia.
But I cannot feel global warming in NY area, the winter here is
even colder.
Katrina is a Russian name, reminds me of the russian Lady Macbeth
(Shostakovich) - the 'crazy' Katarina.
- Re: Katrina's real nameposted on 09/23/2005
Have you seen the movie "the day after tomorrow"?
Colder winter is a sure sign of global warming. Because of the increasing heat, huge chunks of ice from north/south pole are breaking off and melting into the oceans, changing the tempreture and direction of the currents, which in turn bringing cold weather to the land. - posted on 09/23/2005
(CNN) -- Hurricanes aren't behaving like many of us are used to them behaving. They're bigger and meaner, and more numerous than many people have seen.
Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne tore up parts of Florida last year. After tweaking Florida, Katrina and Rita are wreaking havoc this year along the Gulf Coast from Alabama to Texas.
But don't rush to blame it on global warming, experts warn.
......
http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/science/09/23/hurricane.cycle/index.html - posted on 09/23/2005
Susan wrote:
Have you seen the movie "the day after tomorrow"?
Colder winter is a sure sign of global warming. Because of the increasing heat, huge chunks of ice from north/south pole are breaking off and melting into the oceans, changing the tempreture and direction of the currents, which in turn bringing cold weather to the land.
Haven't got a chance to see the movie.
The problem is, even Summer in my place is not as hot as
before. My air condition fee is almost null except the heating
fee gets higher and higher.
thanks for you reply and Zoroastrianism post.
Why Zoroastrianism ?
- posted on 09/24/2005
xw wrote:
The problem is, even Summer in my place is not as hot as
before. My air condition fee is almost null except the heating
fee gets higher and higher.
Yes the doom is near. When it comes NYC will be frozen up like what happens in the movie. U.S. will have to invade Mexico. You'd better live closer to Mexican border as I do for a quicker escape.
thanks for you reply and Zoroastrianism post.
Why Zoroastrianism ?
It is just something I've read lately. I didn't realize before that it has major influence on today's "mainstream" religions. - Re: Katrina's real nameposted on 09/24/2005
在中国好像是越来越闷热,大概是因为空气污染和尘埃,大气层变成了锅盖。
Please paste HTML code and press Enter.
(c) 2010 Maya Chilam Foundation