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(Un)natural Disasters.... Is Mother Nature Trying to tell us something?
Shoshin1
Sentient BeingOceania Veteran
Well around the world, storm after storm, quake after quake, flooding after flooding, heatwave after heatwave, fire after fire...Is Mother Nature trying to tell us something....Enough is Enough...
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Comments
It’s just the news I think, hyping these things up. Otherwise you would think, it is only the weather, being a little unusual.
It takes an agonizingly long time for society at large to recognize these trends. Almost four decades ago I was studying molecular biology/biochemistry and the professors were stridently warning about the coming impacts of increasing atmospheric CO2 from energy use. What they were saying then is only now widely recognized, and there are still significant proportions of climate deniers. Rachel Carson published Silent Spring in 1962.
Astute we are not. Interestingly, the prescient warnings came remarkably early, though sadly (perhaps disastrously) unheeded.
Your catastrophic flooding, our (North America) bomb cyclones, African famines, were all predicted by science long, long ago.
Railing against the weather often seems as useful as our railing against the effects of birth, old age disease and death. Few things disturb as surely as our inevitable experience of the underlying entropy of all of existence. Here, natural and un-natural disasters get imagined to be some intruding chaos breaking through some wider potential calm of a normal existence. What imagines such a thing?
Here, are we not Mayflies dreaming of the possibility of another day of life?
Is such a view not just the limit of a self?
Like a questioning of whether its best to grab a poisonous snake in the wild by the head or the tail, when such a question only obfuscates all the alternative options of how to possibly act in the presence of a harmful snake.
With the greatest respect @how
We railed, we acted, then this: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/09/ozone-layer-healed-within-decades-un-report
?
We only know about such things because of the speed of technology and the swiftness of news travelling. Unfortunately, while understandable focus is aimed at the victims of such disasters, it's worth noting that there are countless hundreds of good people at the rockface actually working hard to save and rescue those victims.
These people are heroic, but garner a cursory mentions. 'Rescuers dug to find survivors' is usually the extent of the praise they receive from reporting correspondents.
Whenever there is a disaster, there are good people. Remember those people. They are more numerous than is ever indicated. But good news don't sell.
This is the diet we are fed, which leads us to believe we are fighting insurmountable odds.
We are not.
But when it comes to newsworthiness, "Good guys finish last".
This is what cyclone Gabrielle looks like as it heads towards Aotearoa
Sadly many people struggled with depression and anxiety during the pandemic, and now cyclone Gabrielle will be the third major storm to hit Aotearoa in the space of a month...People are still recovering from the last two big storms, the emergency services crews are exhausted ...
It's amazing how resilient humans are....and we need this resilience because more extreme weather patterns like these are yet to come...
I was well-prepared and battle-tested, a case of that zen-story "we shall see...", having suffered previously from depression and anxiety and not being much socially engaged at the time. Should have opened up a consulting service!
Tropical cyclones becoming fewer as climate warms
But they’re still getting more intense.
Hmm so according to researchers, we will be seeing less tropical cyclones, but the ones we do see will pack a greater punch...
...'fewer'
In spite of my current preoccupations, my fernickety obsession with correct grammar is flourishing, as ever.
I just didn't want to let you down, folks...reputation is important, as is constancy....
I was just making sure you weren't sleeping on the job @federica 😇😊
What I like about this article is that it's based on objective data, and the authors take care to point out what conclusions they can draw, and what potential conclusions for which they lack data. Brief and well written. Of course, total rainfall in a storm, for which they don't have an analysis in this study, is a very significant contributor to soil saturation and dangerous mudslides, especially with storms in close succession.
Shoshin, check in when you can. I'm following on the news and looks seriously scary. Hope you're OK!
Thanks @Steve_B
The cyclone has passed the upper North island now and starting to weaken as it heads out at sea, however some parts of the bottom of the North island and upper South island are still feeling its impact ...
It was a bit unnerving the last couple of nights watching the gum trees bending and swaying as if they were going to snap any minute...It is back to a sunny warm summers day now, however the power is still out where I live, it's been out for three days now....... Sadly it did leave a lot of destruction in its path...flooding, slips, trees toppling over onto houses and blocking roads... There have been some fatalities but not sure how many...
https://youtube.com/shorts/9925T45GJ5Y?feature=share
One bonus...today is my birthday and it's warm and sunny...:Oh and my dental appointment in the city was cancelled
Well March is meant to be the beginning of cyclone season, however Mother Nature has decided to bring it forward a month, more heavy rain to come tomorrow bringing flash floods, also there is a strong possibility of other cyclones developing in the tropics ...
A view from the island across to Coromandel on my way home this afternoon...it's covered by the cloud...
There are a lot of anxious Kiwis, especially those who are still trying to clean up from the last three extreme weather events...
I can only wish them well and may they find some peace of mind in their time of need🙏🙏🙏
Well the heavy rains have arrived and the power went off, I heard a bang from up the road and all the birds on the property started to squawk... Not sure when the power will be back on, the weather forecast was for heavy rain possible thunderstorms and flash flooding ( which is already happening) but no strong wind warning ...
I'm sitting at my laptop with a battery powered lantern and a torch...the laptop is tethered to my phone's wifi which only works in one or two spots....
I heard fire engines so I guess they are off to help those whose properties have been flooded 'again' and I guess some newly flooded properties too...
Parts of Auckland, the Gt Barrier Island and the Coromandel are also flooded again....The heavy rain hit them earlier this afternoon...
The rain has eased off for now but will no doubt pick up the pace again, it's meant to ease off in the early hours of the morning...
Oops the heavy rain has started again...I guess I'll have an early night...
Be well @shoshin1 … I always enjoy the sound of rain, its the bounty of the sky falling on the earth.
Well the day after the storm (taken from my office window) , I came into the office to charge my laptop, phone and my neighbour's phone and to boil some water for my hot water flask... And for the most part the sun is shinning, the village is full of people, shops are open, it's business as usual..
My neighbour said she went outside just after 11pm last night and saw the water gushing down the recently cleared drains running by our building, which drain into the large pond close by, she was fearful that it would overflow she mentioned that the heavy downpour continued virtually non stop for what seemed like hours...
I was fortunate in that I slept through most of it ...The sound of rain on the corrugated roof does have a somewhat soothing sound...
When I went for my jolk this morning, the landlord's brother had secured a dingy to one of the trees close to one of the manmade pond (the largest one) no doubt concerned that it would overflow and swamp the property and we would have to be evacuated...
The landlord has just purchased a generator which he will use to keep the large freezer operating, so was can put all our frozen food into it, when we have power cuts...which on the island is quite common... However the landlord mentioned that it was the power company who turn off the power yesterday evening fearing that one of the large trees on the road just outside the property might topple onto the powerlines below it... This morning an arborist was going to come and remove the tree...