Guardian/Observer: "Is global warming to blame for Rita?"

[highplainsdem]

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1577911,00.html


Is global warming to blame for Rita?

Robin McKie
Sunday September 25, 2005
The Observer


The devastation sweeping America's southern coast is a 'wake-up call' to the world about the dangers of global warming. This was the stark warning made yesterday by the UN emergency relief co-ordinator, Jan Egeland.

Egeland said Hurricane Katrina, which led to the flooding of New Orleans last month, and Hurricane Rita, now battering Texas, are the result of climate change.

'It is a wake-up call for everybody. You have two of the worst hurricanes ever hitting the US within weeks of each other,' he said. 'There is no doubt the climate is changing.'

His remarks are the most specific yet made by a senior official in linking Hurricanes Katrina and Rita to increasing carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere and rising global temperatures.

-snip-

[eleny]

1. I really don't know BUT even so - "Why risk making make it worse?" I ask!

That's going to be my response to anyone who says we're nuts to think global warming is to blame - Why the hell would we risk making it worse?

[RepublicanElephant]

2. money...

...and greed.

[Coastie for Truth]

3. I have started doing some reading and some computer "gaming"

* "Meteorology Today With Infotrac: An Introduction to Weather, Climate, and the Environment" By: C. Donald Ahrens
* "Meteorology for Scientists and Engineers: A Technical Companion Book to C. Donald Ahrens' Meteorology Today" By: Roland B. Stull
* "Workbook/Study Guide Meteorology Today: An Introduction to Weather, Climate and the Environment" By: Donald D. Ahrens
* "An Introduction to Dynamic Meteorology" By: James R. Holton

Includes lots of MatLab and C++ scripts

* "Companion Software for "Introduction to Dynamic Meteorology""
* "Divine Wind: The History And Science Of Hurricanes" by Kerry Emanuel

Meteorology is not my bag (Boy Scout Merit badge many, many years ago - Coast Guard Officer Candidate School almost as long ago - plus "I stayed in a Holiday Inn Express") engineering and cs is my bag --BUT I am convinced by the weight of the scientific, non-political, non-theological evidence that the increasing intensity of tropical storms is "most likely" due to "global warming" and the "global warming" is "most likely" due to human activity.