Our World and Everything in It

The Northwest is getting beat up by the weather again this winter season. I started to write a blog on Dec. 22 last year about El Nino, but didn’t actually publish it until April. It talked about El Nino but did not mention that when El Nino leaves La Nina arrives and that is what beats up the northwest. The east coast got beat up by a noreaster in the spring, and this summer the southeast dried up. We’re in for more of the same with the arrival of La Nina.
 
This is all confusing to me also. But some of the predicted hurricanes didn’t appear in 2006 and 2007 because of El Nino’s sudden reappearance. La Nina usually follows El Nino where cooler water surface temperatures kick up hurricanes to the gulf, and where La Nina may last up to 3 years. It looks like global warming is certainly causing a rise in more El Ninos. We’ve not had any big hurricanes because of El Nino’s reappearance.  

Predictions that are made within proper predictions for both El Nino and La Nina are still true to form. But global warming is having an impact on the occurrence of both. I read my blog that related the predictions of the scorching dryness in the southeast we had this summer. La Nina brings about drenching rain and floods and wind in the northeast, while the southeast dries up. The northeast gets really lousy spring weather. Last year New York flooded with high winds.

Still confused? I listed a couple of good websites with good explanations about El and La, LOL, and my blog from last year. And confused or not, our fellow Americans in Washington and Oregon are going through hell from weather we’re finding quite comfortable. Five people have died, and the National Guard and Coastguard have rescued over 160. Those states suffered 100 mph winds, torrential rain (compliments of La Nina), mudslides and flooding. People evacuated to hotels and then got stranded in those hotels. A four-lane highway in Washington, I-5, is under 10 feet of water in places. There is a 20-mile closure and detours across half the state. 

The good news is all the rivers have peaked, and the rain has stopped as the system moves on to the Midwest where it’s turned to snow. N. Dakota may get 9 inches. That’s a pretty strong system that just holds on, keeps moving and changing.   

http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/sn_arc99/10_30_99/fob5.htm

http://www.globalcomsatphone.com/articles/el_nino.html

http://www.blogsmonroe.com/world/?p=53

Now we’re finally getting solid documentation that man is indeed having a great impact on the environment. The NOAA, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, found that humans caused nearly ½ of the bad weather we experienced last year. This is not a U.N. conspiracy like some like to call environmentalism. This is that voice on the weather band on your car audio: “This is NOAA weather and hazard” at least that’s what it sounds like. This is our national weather service that did the study spanning 1998 to 2006.

The NOAA ran 42 different tests using data of weather conditions relative to human activity and El Nino’s. The article I read on MSN went into detail how they did it, why it took awhile, and the not so surprising results. At least a growing majority of us are seeing and believing. It’s a pretty good weather page from MSN.

Look at some of the weather reports on there for just this past week:

A cyclone hit the coast of Bangladesh with winds up to 155 mph.  At least 425 people were killed, 1000 fishermen, and hundreds more are unaccounted for. The summer floods there just killed 1000 people.

Vietnam flooded last weekend. 100,000 people have no food. They lost it all, 190,000 houses are submerged. The flooding has been going on for a month with over 250 dead.

A major 7.7 earthquake in Chile “crushed cars, damaged thousands of houses, blocked roads and terrified people for hundreds of miles around Wednesday. Chilean authorities reported at least two deaths and more than 150 injuries.

The quake, which struck at 12:40 p.m., shook the Chilean capital 780 miles to the south of the epicenter, and was felt as far away as the other side of the continent — in Sao Paulo, Brazil, 1,400 miles to the east.”

The next day the northern part of Chile was hit with huge aftershocks of 6.2 and 6.8 injuring about 100 people and killing 2.

Atlanta’s out of water.

This is a wake up call. The longer we wait for policy, the more it’s not going to be pretty. On the NOAA weather site they have listed the major catastrophic weather events going back to 1990. I did the same about 2 years ago, and wouldn’t have now that I see how nicely they’ve compiled it!  I went back to 1990 and printed a list of all catastrophic events per page for each year to 2001. 1990 barely filled a quarter of a page. 2001 was 2 ½ pages printed no double spacing. I don’t think I used NOAA, but another International Weather Service that had the events by year but not in a neat little list.

Check out the NOAA website yourself and scan the climate events. There are many recently and as you scan down to 1990 it dwindles to about 2 or 3 events. That’s a scannable eye opener. Every line scanned represents a catastrophe somewhere in the world where someone died.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20481186/wid/18298287/.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/hazards/index.php.
 

My Christmas message was about God’s emphasis on the earth.  The word “earth” is in the bible almost 700 times. It is IMPORTANT! 

I woke up this morning to news of more horrible weather again. Christmas meant disaster for many people. The message is clear to me that the earth, our environment, is in distress. The distress isn’t some cosmic happening out of our control. We cause the earth’s strain by pollution we’ve failed to control.

We watched as Colorado was hit by the worst storm they’ve had in years. 4000 people were stranded. The fifth busiest airport in the country shut down for 2 days, compliments of El Nino. El Nino’s are more frequent because of global warming.

This morning there was news that 6 tornadoes ripped through Florida. People lost their homes on Christmas due to nature, an El Nino season. No one was injured. There were plenty of warninings. The tornadoes themselves are warnings, don’t you think?

On the other side of the world Taiwan was hit with a 7.2 earthquake that generated a small tsunami. So many more earthquakes are happening, volcanoes too. Volcanoes have recently been associated with global warming. It’s evident that warming air that affects the top layers of water to produce more El Ninos also affects landmasses in adverse ways. Land is affected where it is most vulnerable along fault lines, and volcanic areas. And we already know big events like earthquakes, trigger other horrible events elsewhere. The tsunami from Taiwan’s earthquake is supposed to hit the Philippines soon.

The weather patterns are getting worse, and closer together. These patterns are not a normal course, as some would suggest. Weather patterns are spiking in the extreme. I wanted to see for myself. A couple of years ago, I researched a World Climate Center website for data. I looked for extreme weather events only. I printed out ¼ of a page for 1990. I printed 2 1/2 pages solid by 2001.

We’ve been lucky in Michigan so far. But luck is a gamble and gambling has its place. I don’t think we should gamble our clean air, water, and earth, especially our water. If we lose, we’ll be oh so sorry after the fact. Think green as much as possible. Our current administration  is coming around to recognize global warming and are offering incentives for thinking green at tax return time.

Beginning this year, if you improve your home to be more energy efficient, such as  installing new windows, insulation, new energy star appliances, solar panels, etc., you can deduct as much as $500 from your tax bill.

THE BIGGEST DEDUCTION IS FOR BUYING A HYBRID CAR. Depending on the car, as much as $2600 can be deducted from your tax bill.

Hopefully, 2007 will be a year of increased awareness for the environment by Michigan residents. We’ve been spared bad weather so far. We should give thanks by doing our best to keep it that way.