Thursday, November 1, 2012

Hurricane Sandy batters Virginia while old global warming questions re-emerge


On Monday, most of Virginia saw the worst of the “Frankenstorm,” Hurricane Sandy. In Virginia Beach, 9.21 inches of rain fell, in Newport News 7 inches, and at Norfolk International Airport 5.8 inches, according to the National Weather Service in Wakefield.

During an afternoon briefing on Monday, Gov. Bob McDonnell commented, “You’ve got flooding in Southeast Virginia. You’ve got a blizzard in western and Southwest Virginia. And you got high winds and heavy rains in Northern Virginia. That’s going to be what it looks like now for the next 24 to 36 hours.”[1]

By Tuesday, however, Hurricane Sandy was all but gone and Virginians began to assess the damage that had been wrought across the state. Compared to the damage done to Virginia’s neighbors to the north, the commonwealth came out relatively unscathed.

While global warming and climate change did not necessarily cause Hurricane Sandy, the latter’s destructive potential was unequivocally fed by warmer atmospheric and ocean temperatures.[2]

Climatologist, Kevin Trenberth, noted that “With every degree C [Celsius], the water holding of the atmosphere goes up 7%, and the moisture provides fuel for the tropical storm, increases its intensity, and magnifies the rainfall by double that amount compared to normal conditions.”

In other words, global warming exasperates natural disasters that occur.
While estimates are already beginning to be churned out regarding the destructive costs of Sandy[3], the true costs of this most recent hurricane cannot be quantified in terms of personal loss.

While quantifying tragedy has its purpose, it detracts from the emotional connections that Americans need for true personal empathy. Thus, it sweeps away an important human impetus to push for environmental policies that combat global warming and climate change.

No country, no matter how powerful, can continue receiving hurricanes like Sandy and Irene year after year. As a country, we’ve attempted our first experiment: put greenhouse gases into the air with reckless abandon. 

Now it’s time to move forward with our next experiment: dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions emitted into the atmosphere.

Virginia, this includes you as well!

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