(C) Daily Kos
This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered.
. . . . . . . . . .



The age of fire, water, and ever-shrinking ice [1]

['Daily Kos Staff']

Date: 2023-09-09

2023 has been a year for the record books when it comes to temperatures, fires, rainfall, and floods. It’s also been a year in which the temperature of the oceans has soared, ice at the poles has diminished, and record-size hailstones have fallen during severe storms. The U.S. has already seen at least 15 severe weather events, generating costs of over $1 billion each—and we’re only halfway through a hurricane season that’s predicted to be “above normal.”

In so many ways, 2023 has been the hottest, wettest, stormiest, and most unpredictable year most people have ever experienced. It could also be, terrifyingly enough, the coolest and most stable year any of us will know in the future.

This is the year the climate crisis went from something that many people ignored, to a reality that saw some of those people taking to boats to escape flooding, or driving in caravans through massive fires. And way too often, in the United States and around the world, people have been unable to escape these climate-driven disasters in a year that has already been terrible—and is far from over.

Heat

The thing that most Americans will remember about the summer of 2023 is simply the heat. Multiple high-pressure “heat domes” clamped down on the West, Midwest, and East at different times over the summer, bringing with them rafts of shattered temperature records, some of them genuinely amazing.

Whether it was Phoenix sweltering through 31 straight days at or above 110 degrees, or how records for the hottest day in human history kept being surpassed, the sheer daily caloric weight was enough to bring another record that no one wants: record deaths.

Saguaro cactus succumbed to heat stress near Phoenix, Arizona.

x BIG heat coming to Washington, D.C. this week!



This could be the hottest 5-day stretch since July of 2020, and D.C.'s hottest September stretch on record.



I even came close to putting a 100º on my forecast for Tuesday or Wednesday, but I'll reconsider tomorrow.@FOX5DC pic.twitter.com/7qARttavRr — Matthew Cappucci (@MatthewCappucci) September 3, 2023

x A testament to how extreme & overwhelming the climate is this summer is, this Record “Shattering” heat dome has been barely covered by the national media. It’s largest US heat dome in recent memory and in a large part of the nation’s middle the most intense, by a long shot. 1/ pic.twitter.com/d9GOGvHE7l — Jeff Berardelli (@WeatherProf) August 21, 2023

x Phoenix continues to set record high temps and stretches. There were 31 days in July of 110+. There has been an extreme heat advisory warning for days now. Todays high ⬆️116. The beautiful, majestic Saguaros are dying. 🥵 Climate change is NOT a hoax. 😡 Wake up folks. pic.twitter.com/KctwvBotlb — Annie (@AnnieForTruth) August 28, 2023

Smoke

For those in the U.S., the orange sunsets and mountain mists at first seemed sort of pretty … until it all thickened into a haze that obscured the sky and left those with breathing issues gasping. Wildfires have devastated California and other Western states in the past few years, and there were many such fires in 2023. But it was the incredible devastation in Canada, where more than 800 active fires burned simultaneously, that gave areas of the U.S. stretching from Kansas City to New York a sample of what it’s like to exist in areas where air quality is nearly unlivable.

The New York City skyline nearly obscured by smoke from Canadian wildfires.

x This morning @Space_Station pass starts over BC Canada - showing the smoke from wildfires in the skies/valleys - leading to views of ID and MT (Flathead Lake).

Aug 27, 2023 - 8:21 PDT pic.twitter.com/xvQIuTZscn — ISS Above (@ISSAboveYou) August 27, 2023

x Bad air: Smoke from wildfires burning in Northern California and Oregon is expected bring air quality to low-moderate levels across the Bay Area today, the seventh consecutive day that an air advisory has been issued for the region. https://t.co/QJX8nUBiuD pic.twitter.com/h1yANO6RNV — NBC Bay Area (@nbcbayarea) August 31, 2023

x Unprecedented wildfire smoke helped make air quality maps more popular than ever. That's helping make them better too. The @EPA combined scientific and crowdsourced sensors to track and map air quality and the

impact of smoke across North America. https://t.co/ZxbzIvaykk pic.twitter.com/F3w9899w1D — Francisco Nobre (@nobre_f338) September 8, 2023

Fire

Those wildfires in Canada, in the Pacific Northwest, and in the forests of several other Western states have become almost routine. They’re not any less horrible or any less destructive; they’re just so common that some have suggested that we’re now living in the “Pyrocene epoch.” Literally: the age of fire.

But the most surprising and devastating fire of 2023 has to be the one that just was not supposed to happen. Not in a place surrounded by water, considered by many to be the closest thing to paradise on Earth. The official death toll for the fire that destroyed the town of Lahaina on the Hawaiian island of Maui now stands at 115, with 66 people still missing according to the governor. The costs of that fire have been estimated at more than $5.5 billion. That’s not counting the damage done to one of the world’s most diverse and fragile ecosystems, or the threat the fire represents to the island’s culture. And that fire was far from alone.

Marine One lands at the ruins of flame-ravaged Lahaina on the island of Maui.

x Last week, a cold front passed through the province following several days of hot, dry weather. pic.twitter.com/fHbPsizjbr — BC Wildfire Service (@BCGovFireInfo) August 22, 2023

x WATCH: Aerial footage shows extensive wildfire damage in Lahaina on Maui.



We're LIVE with the latest updates on recovery. pic.twitter.com/esnEDrmjZ2 — The Weather Channel (@weatherchannel) August 14, 2023

x This is the Canadian wildfire season of 2023.



Hopefully it will be over soon. pic.twitter.com/4g0hBJ9Iq8 — Kyle Brittain (@BadWeatherKyle) August 31, 2023

x Wildfires are wreaking havoc through Hawaii. Billowing clouds of smoke and ash. People yelling "go, go, we can't do anything for her!" Others left for dead. People, jumping into the ocean to survive.



Climate change is a civilizational emergency. 1/8 pic.twitter.com/sDX3KuUodD — ❤️ Umair (@umairh) August 10, 2023

x This dramatic footage shows a highway in Sicily as wildfires descend on the area. The clip was taken by a mother-daughter duo on July 24. Centamore Natalia Mariagrazia told Storyful her mother burst into tears after having safely navigated through the smoke and flames. pic.twitter.com/0wyIcIXkWi — NowThis (@nowthisnews) July 28, 2023

Water

Increasing temperatures mean increasing rain. That’s because warmer air simply holds more moisture, and warmer oceans give up that moisture more readily. The climate crisis drives flooding of all kinds, and 2023 brought plenty of examples.

In the United States, the rains brought to Southern California by the rare Hurricane Hillary were swiftly followed by a monsoonal thunderstorm. The resulting floods generated mudslides, damaged homes, and refilled Tulare Lake, which was once the largest freshwater lake west of the Mississippi before it was drained to provide agricultural land and water for surrounding towns in the 1930s.

Other areas of the Southwest saw record rainfall this year and record snowmelt following a wet winter. This has added up to 20 feet to some of the reservoirs in the area, but is far from enough to reverse a decades-long combination of drought and overuse that has put those reservoirs on a path to destruction.

A highway leads out into California’s Tulare Lake.

x 6.2 inches of rain fell in one hour today in Hong Kong causing severe flooding.



It has been an awful week of flooding around the world in Greece, Turkey, Spain, Italy, China and Brazil killing dozens.

pic.twitter.com/DgE16FhG4W — Colin McCarthy (@US_Stormwatch) September 8, 2023

x Torrential rain deluged Hong Kong leading to widespread flooding across the densely packed city, submerging streets, shopping malls and metro stations, as authorities shut schools and asked workers to stay at home https://t.co/mZLhvtNOFU pic.twitter.com/5HaSPnbV6S — Reuters (@Reuters) September 8, 2023

x This is a Temple in the Sirmaur district located in India, the "Waterfall" seen in this video was caused by a Flash Flood . #Floods #flooding pic.twitter.com/bHBBXSfXhC — vid.eo (@prateekve_) September 7, 2023

x Sobering scenes continue to emerge from Thessaly, Greece as the region is experiencing one of its worst flooding events on record. Continuous heavy rainfall have turned the streets of Skiathos into raging rivers. pic.twitter.com/iHumXamWem — Nahel Belgherze (@WxNB_) September 5, 2023

x Brazil....."Father and daughter rescue dog from flooding in Muçum. The city is one of the hardest hit by the Taquari River flood. There are 14 dead and 9 missing in Muçum"#ClimateEmergency pic.twitter.com/fK8Hgk8AAm — Volcaholic 🌋 (@volcaholic1) September 7, 2023

x Severe flash flooding from Samsun on the north coast of Turkey today 🇹🇷



Result of slow-moving heavy downpour since last night.pic.twitter.com/FFWuj94iFU — Scott Duncan (@ScottDuncanWX) September 3, 2023

Since 1980, the U.S. has run up a tab of $2.59 trillion to address the damages caused by climate disasters. In 2022 alone, the bill ran to $165 billion, making it nearly three times as costly as the average year over the past four decades. That’s because the effects of the climate crisis are constantly compounding. Record heat, record moisture, record fires, and record storms are all record costly. And only a fraction of that cost can be measured in dollars.

Sign the petition to President Biden: Declare a climate emergency

[END]
---
[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/9/9/2192208/-The-age-of-fire-water-and-ever-shrinking-ice

Published and (C) by Daily Kos
Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified.

via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/

You are viewing proxied material from magical.fish. The copyright of proxied material belongs to its original authors. Any comments or complaints in relation to proxied material should be directed to the original authors of the content concerned. Please see the disclaimer for more details.