There’s a cyclone off WA just hanging round waiting to say hi to everyone. The fact that it’s in an area where cyclones don’t normally reach; or that it’s hard on the heels of the previous cyclone are all just little blips in the system, surely.
seroja
on the west coast one cyclone is about to eat the residue of the previous one
……………………………… wild air is flexing its muscles ……………………………….. ready to tear through homes lives ……………………………. power grids whatever gets in its way
……………………………… crazy rain & rare dangerous …………………………..wind are lining up to greet the coast ……………………..& the ocean’s keen to explore as far as she can
…………………………………all in an area where such things have been fairly rare …………………………………but where they’re going to become all too common
not your friend. (projected climate change impacts in a 4°C world)
global warming is not neat. global warming’s effects will not be shared out equally. global warming will not be equitably distributed around the globe like a benevolent office Santa giving cheap gifts to the staff’s kids. global warming is not your friend.
global warming does not “get” averages. a 4 degree warmer world does not mean everywhere just gets 4 degrees hotter. some places may increase by 6, 8, even 10 degrees Celsius.
yep that’s right in this whizz -bang new high-octane (so not your friend) global warming induced
climate dystopian hot mess we’re wilfully ushering in the coolest months of the future will most likely be warmer than the warmest months of twenty years ago
i’ll say that again but softer in case you were sleeping & so those at the back can hear.
the winters of the future will be warmer than the summers of twenty years ago
Tonight was CFS (Country Fire Service) training & so I took the opportunity to pick a few of the old firies brains.
fire alarm
at training tonight there’s the usual banter & the familar stories the old hands tell about wild jobs they’ve been on
dead end gullies their captains tried to order them into
walls of flame leapfrogging roads rivers almost bare dirt to resume again in forest canopies impossible distances away
sitting in the truck reflectors down breathing apparatus on under blankets waiting for the fire to burn over hoping like hell the halo holds up* likewise hoping their sphincters do
i don’t know if climate change is the cause but i do know fire season is starting earlier lasting longer & each one feels more of a bitch than the one before
I began the day working on what I thought would be a suite of short poems under the title “10 common myths about climate change”
I thought it would be quick & easy to offer a witty one or two line rebuttal. It wasn’t. It was hard hard hard. & I’m not sure how much poetry they contain. The tough thing is so many answers require nuance (so much so, I’ve considered it as a possible title of a future poem) which i) takes time to explain & ii) deniers don’t seem to really want to know about.
So what you’re getting is 5 mythpomes. The other 5 might appear sometime in the future (or not). If they do, perhaps I can choose the best 2-3 to be the actual poem. However, having essentially written 5 pomes today, I wonder if I can have the next 4 days off.
Finally, to borrow from one of the articles I read: “the myths in this list have been studied thoroughly by climate scientists and repeatedly debunked. Yet they persist, often as a result of an organized disinformation campaign waged by special interests whose goal is to raise doubts among the public and delay action on human-caused climate change.”
5 common myths about climate change
Myth #1: It’s the sun.
Sure , the sun’s changed intensity in the past causing profound climate modifications often ice ages which form over thousands of years not the few hundreds scientists are studying — that said : solar irradiance is actually down a shade from a post-war peak : so , no
Myth #2: Scientists disagree on the cause of climate change.
No , they don’t . Not climate scientists at least . Sure maybe there’s some botanists, paleontologists, seismologists & epidemiologists who aren’t convinced — but do you go to a dentist for a heart transplant ; or a podiatrist to have that weird looking growth on your back removed .
Myth #3: The climate has always changed. It’s natural.
Correct . Always has . Always will .
But . What the deniers willfully overlook is the unprecedented pace of change . Temperatures have risen 10 times faster than during the last mass extinction 56 million years ago .
Myth #4: It’s cold out. What happened to global warming?
Facepalm . This one should be easy . Weather is not climate . The end .
Surely it’s obvious that Down Under summer days can be over 40 degrees Celsius for a weeks at a time while snow falls in Cornwall .
Nor do these two diverse weather patterns preclude broad temperature shifts across the entire Earth over the course of months , years , and decades.
Myth #5: Carbon dioxide levels are tiny. They can’t make a difference.
i. True , carbon dioxide (aka CO2) comprises a minute fraction of our atmosphere less than tenth of a percent . but that doesn’t mean it’s not great at its job — ie , trapping heat ; CO2 punches above its molecular weight . For most of the past million years carbon dioxide has been below 280 parts per million yet since the revolution of industry started levels are now 415 parts per — 35% increase in a century & a half . tiny you say ?
For comparison — at 1.3 parts per million sarin gas irritates mucus membranes ; pulmonary issues begin when exposures exceed 15 parts per million ; & you’re dead in thirty min if the concentration tops 430 P.P.Ms .
it’s not the fraction that matters but the effect it has
ii. also true , CO2 is only one of many ironically water vapour is the greenhouse gas with the biggest impact ; nitrous oxide & others play their role too (however , that’s a poem for another day)
gareth roi poet boi 