• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Florence's Records Should Be Noted

ttwtt78650 does have a point: We shouldn't pick two data points in isolation, and cite that as proof that climate change is worse. It can be an indicator, but it is not really proof. I'd also say that North Carolina is far too small of an area to make any definitive conclusions.

So, the real questions are:
1) Are hurricanes overall getting worse?
2) If so, then what's causing it?

The answer to both is yes. They are getting larger; wind speeds are staying higher for longer; they are moving slower, which means they cause more damage; they cause more precipitation, which means more floods; the storm surges are worse.

And yes, climate change causes almost all of this. As the oceans warm, they expand (leading to higher water levels) and put more moisture into the atmosphere (which means more precipitation, larger storms, slower pace). Right before Florence hit, climate scientists used models to calculate that Florence is probably going to produce 50% more rain than if the same storm had started in the pre-industrial era.

Warmer waters and atmosphere means the storms have more energy, which means stronger winds (which is why there is discussion now of adding "category 6" to storms). Storms are probably moving slower, and stalling over land, because of the way climate change is affecting pressure patterns.

So, Florence in isolation, or even compared to an earlier storm, is not definitive proof on its own. However, we can look at Florence, and even make a reasonable estimate how much worse it is because of climate change, and use it as an example of the impact of climate change.
 
calamity said:
NC rainfall amount breaks the previous record by 10", a 40% increase from 1999 record set during Hurricane Floyd.



River flooding exceeds what the gauges can measure.



I wonder if there is some larger climate trend out there which can give us an idea as to what is happening :confused:
Click to expand...

[FONT=&quot][/FONT]
[h=1]Spencer in USATODAY: Hurricane Florence is not climate change or global warming. It’s just the weather.[/h][FONT=&quot]By Dr. Roy W. Spencer Even before Hurricane Florence made landfall somewhere near the border of North and South Carolina, predicted damage from potentially catastrophic flooding from the storm was already being blamed on global warming. Writing for NBC News, Kristina Dahl contended, “With each new storm, we are forced to question whether this is…
[/FONT]
4 days ago September 14, 2018 in Climate News.
 
hanger4 said:
The Gulf Stream around 60 milea wide and 2500 to 4000 ft deep. Tell me more ??
Click to expand...

You probably think the Gulf Stream is really uniformly warm through out don't you? Off of North Carolina the cold Labrador current coming from the north separates it from the coast and they mix.

See you can't just assume weather is that simple. I can assure you it's quite complex with computer models, probabilities etc.
 
Last edited:
EnigmaO01 said:
You probably think the Gulf Stream is really uniformly warm through out don't you? Off of North Carolina the cold Labrador current coming from the north separates it from the coast and they mix.

See you can't just assume weather is that simple. I can assure you it's quite complex with computer models, probabilities etc.
Click to expand...

*See you can't just assume weather is that simple. I can assure you it's quite complex with computer models, probabilities etc.*

No doubt, the computer models are complex and usually wrong.
 
calamity said:
Except record breaking rainfall was exactly what the climate geeks predicted would occur. And, shattering the old record by 140% is pretty significant.
Click to expand...

Did you or the climate geeks take into account that the storm practically stalled when it hit the coast due to a high pressure area?

Did the climates geeks also predict that storms would bang into more high pressure areas in the future resulting in stalls like Florence encountered?
 
Dittohead not! said:
Really?

How many people thought that researching the climate would result in calmer weather?

Since that is totally illogical, they must be Trump supporters.
Click to expand...

Man cannot change the weather. It cannot be done. All modern students of science should underline that fact in their textbooks and blow off anyone claiming otherwise.
 
marke said:
Man cannot change the weather. It cannot be done. All modern students of science should underline that fact in their textbooks and blow off anyone claiming otherwise.
Click to expand...

Incorrect
 
RetiredUSN said:
Did you or the climate geeks take into account that the storm practically stalled when it hit the coast due to a high pressure area?
Click to expand...
Yep.

Climate change is starting to affect pressure systems around the world. This can cause hurricanes to move more slowly (they are 10% slower than in the 1960s), and can also cause pressure systems that pin down big storms.

This also happened with Harvey, and at the time some climate scientists (most prominently Michael Mann -- https://www.ecowatch.com/hurricane-harvey-houston-2479090479.html) suggested that climate change would cause these kinds of changes to pressure systems. I believe the links are still somewhat tentative, but there is no question that climate scientists have noticed that storms move slower, and that pressure systems are changing.


Did the climates geeks also predict that storms would bang into more high pressure areas in the future resulting in stalls like Florence encountered?
Click to expand...
I may be wrong, but I don't believe climate change is not going to have a direct impact on the actual paths of storms. It's unlikely that climate change will cause more hurricanes to hit specific land regions.
 
Visbek said:
Yep.

Climate change is starting to affect pressure systems around the world. This can cause hurricanes to move more slowly (they are 10% slower than in the 1960s), and can also cause pressure systems that pin down big storms.

This also happened with Harvey, and at the time some climate scientists (most prominently Michael Mann -- https://www.ecowatch.com/hurricane-harvey-houston-2479090479.html) suggested that climate change would cause these kinds of changes to pressure systems. I believe the links are still somewhat tentative, but there is no question that climate scientists have noticed that storms move slower, and that pressure systems are changing.



I may be wrong, but I don't believe climate change is not going to have a direct impact on the actual paths of storms. It's unlikely that climate change will cause more hurricanes to hit specific land regions.
Click to expand...

It's a coincidence that Florence ran into a high pressure area..........not predicted science.

There was nothing about Florence that was slow until it hit the high pressure along the coast.
 
marke said:
Man cannot change the weather. It cannot be done. All modern students of science should underline that fact in their textbooks and blow off anyone claiming otherwise.
Click to expand...
If you mean that we can't deliberately cause a lightning storm in a specific area, you are correct.

However, if you mean "human activity cannot have any detectable impact on the global climate," you're dead wrong. Just look at CFCs; there is no doubt that human emissions of CFCs caused a deterioration of ozone in the atmosphere, and we have evidence now that after banning CFCs that the ozone is slowly recovering.

There are all sorts of detectable global impacts of human activity -- warmer oceans; permafrost starting to melt; coral reefs dying; sea levels rising faster than in the recent past; increased water vapor... the list goes on. There is no doubt that human activity impacts the climate, even if we can't cause a snowstorm over Death Valley on command.
 
RetiredUSN said:
It's a coincidence that Florence ran into a high pressure area..........not predicted science.

There was nothing about Florence that was slow until it hit the high pressure along the coast.
Click to expand...
You are partly correct, in that predicting the paths of hurricanes in advance is very difficult, as they are chaotic systems. Slower systems are also apparently harder to predict. In addition, no one could possibly predict the paths of hurricanes before they form.

Florence was quite slow between 9/4 and 9/9, when it was in the middle of the Atlantic. More to the point, and again: Storms are moving more slowly in the past, and this includes Florence. This is happening due to climate change, not coincidence after coincidence after coincidence.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0158-3

And again, as was pointed out in the Mann link that you didn't bother to read, climate change may be affecting the pressure systems which are causing hurricanes to slow and stall.

Keep in mind that hurricanes and tropical storms are highly chaotic, meaning that circa 1990 or 2000, it was not easy to figure out the future impacts of climate change on those types of storms. However, as we gather more data and understand both these storms and the various impacts of climate change, the picture becomes clearer. As a result, a team was able to estimate, before Florence hit, how much worse it was likely to be because of climate change:
https://you.stonybrook.edu/kareed/2...pact-of-climate-change-on-hurricane-florence/

Sorry, but this is not just a "coincidence." It's a pattern, and we are likely to see it happen more and more as the planet continues to warm.
 
marke said:
Man cannot change the weather. It cannot be done. All modern students of science should underline that fact in their textbooks and blow off anyone claiming otherwise.
Click to expand...

But man can, and does, change the climate. Changing climate changes the normal weather.

So, now come back with an absurd statement about controlling the weather.
 
calamity said:
NC rainfall amount breaks the previous record by 10", a 40% increase from 1999 record set during Hurricane Floyd.



River flooding exceeds what the gauges can measure.



I wonder if there is some larger climate trend out there which can give us an idea as to what is happening :confused:
Click to expand...

Why are these arbitrarily selected points in time so special to you compared to all other points in time that you are arbitrarily ignoring?
 
Dittohead not! said:
But man can, and does, change the climate. Changing climate changes the normal weather.

So, now come back with an absurd statement about controlling the weather.
Click to expand...

Define 'climate change' in a way that isn't a circular definition... 'Climate change' is nothing more than a meaningless buzzword.

How do you define 'normal weather'? What exactly is 'normal weather' and what makes it 'normal' as opposed to 'not normal'?
 
gfm7175 said:
Why are these arbitrarily selected points in time so special to you compared to all other points in time that you are arbitrarily ignoring?
Click to expand...

Because the selected points are not arbitrary.
 
calamity said:
NC rainfall amount breaks the previous record by 10", a 40% increase from 1999 record set during Hurricane Floyd.



River flooding exceeds what the gauges can measure.



I wonder if there is some larger climate trend out there which can give us an idea as to what is happening :confused:
Click to expand...

Reccords will always get broken.

Such is the product of measuring detail.
 
gfm7175 said:
Define 'climate change' in a way that isn't a circular definition... 'Climate change' is nothing more than a meaningless buzzword.
Click to expand...
I do not think those words mean what you think they mean.

"Climate change" is not a circular definition. It refers to two distinct concepts -- "climate" and "change." It refers to the ways that *cough* climate is changing over time. It can mean cooling, it can mean warming, it can refer to oceans expanding, glaciers growing or retreating, it can refer to the effects of volcanoes....

There is no question that the term "climate change" has very specific and useful meanings.


How do you define 'normal weather'? What exactly is 'normal weather' and what makes it 'normal' as opposed to 'not normal'?
Click to expand...
At the risk of speaking for someone else: "Normal" refers to climate and weather in pre-industrial eras, before humans put the whammy on the environment with GHG emissions and other impacts.

So... Even though we cannot specifically cause a tornado in the middle of an enemy encampment, there is no doubt that humans can and do have a significant impact on the climate.
 
gfm7175 said:
Define 'climate change' in a way that isn't a circular definition... 'Climate change' is nothing more than a meaningless buzzword.

How do you define 'normal weather'? What exactly is 'normal weather' and what makes it 'normal' as opposed to 'not normal'?
Click to expand...

Climate: the average weather worldwide.
Change: becoming different in some way.
Climate change: The Earth is getting warmer on average, and the warming is changing local climates, some in predictable ways, others in not so predictable ways.

Normal generally refers to the average over a period of time.
 
Dittohead not! said:
Climate: the average weather worldwide.
Change: becoming different in some way.
Climate change: The Earth is getting warmer on average, and the warming is changing local climates, some in predictable ways, others in not so predictable ways.

Normal generally refers to the average over a period of time.
Click to expand...

Except now it's cooling.
 
Dittohead not! said:
The first decade of the 21st. century was the hottest on record.
Well, unless of course you want to go back to the Carboniferous age or something.
Click to expand...

Yes. Warming virtually stopped in 1998. The focus on "warmest years" in the early part of the 21st century is a way to draw attention away from the fact that warming stopped. Warming -> Stasis -> Cooling.
 
Jack Hays said:
Yes. Warming virtually stopped in 1998. The focus on "warmest years" in the early part of the 21st century is a way to draw attention away from the fact that warming stopped. Warming -> Stasis -> Cooling.
Click to expand...

You are completely deluded. Warming did not stop in 1998. There is no graph of global temperature in existence for which the trend from 1998 to today is not clearly positive.
 
Surface Detail said:
You are completely deluded. Warming did not stop in 1998. There is no graph of global temperature in existence for which the trend from 1998 to today is not clearly positive.
Click to expand...


UAH_LT_1979_thru_August_2018_v6-550x317.jpg
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom