Duped by “Derecho” – NJ Press Corps and Policymakers Remain AWOL on Climate Change
Extreme Weather ~~~ Climate Change
Once again, NJ is hit by extreme weather and the NJ press corps is AWOL.
Whether it was the severe south jersey storms, or the Monmouth County water line collapse, or the record heat wave, the press failed to report the underlying story, preferring to write politically safe, superficial, descriptive puff pieces.
This time, they had to try hard NOT to write the story, which is so blatantly obvious and happening right before their eyes.
So the media failure is no accident.
At this point, given the overwhelming evidence, it is obvious that they simply just do not want to connect the dots and report the real story.
And the State Climatologist is either too timid or too inept in communicating the science.
The latest tactic in the long running and irresponsible game was to explain away the severely devastating south jersey storms with a shiny new complex word: “derecho”.
That term was allowed to replace La Nina, El Nino, the jet stream, and Bermuda highs as the cause of extreme weather.
As we wrote at the time, even the Washington Post story linked the “derecho” to climate change and a record heat wave. I wrote:
The NJ State Climatologist and NJ Press corps remain in denial (read story). They claim that “derecho” (a kind of severe thunder storm) was the cause, but that is merely a description of the type of storm, not the cause of it! Again, reporters fail to connect the dots to the record setting heat wave (109) that provided the energy that drove the storm. Eventhe Washington Post story acknowledged a link.
The WaPo story said:
“On Friday, a historic, record-setting heat wave covered a sprawling region from the Midwest to the Southeast. All-time high temperatures records of 109 were established in Nashville and Columbia, South, Carolina and tied in Raleigh and Charlotte which hit 105 and 104. Here in Washington, D.C., the mercury climbed to an astonishing 104 degrees (breaking the previous record set in 1874 and 2011 by two degrees),our hottest June day in 142 years of records.
As the intensity of the heat wave, without reservation, was a key factor in the destructiveness of this derecho event – it raises the question about the possible role of manmade climate warming (from elevated greenhouse concentrations). It’s a complicated, controversial question, but one that scientists will surely grapple with in case studies of this rare, extraordinary event.”
So today, thank goodness the Associated Press confirms exactly what we’ve been saying for some time and wrote regarding the “derecho” that hit south jersey.
The Associated Press reports – a huge national story that still has not been picked up by head in the sand Star Ledger editors – : This US summer is ‘what global warming looks like’
“What we’re seeing really is a window into what global warming really looks like,” said Princeton University geosciences and international affairs professor Michael Oppenheimer. “It looks like heat. It looks like fires. It looks like this kind of environmental disasters.”
Oppenheimer said that on Thursday. That was before the East Coast was hit with triple-digit temperatures and before a derecho — an unusually strong, long-lived and large straight-line wind storm — blew through Chicago to Washington. The storm and its aftermath killed more than 20 people and left millions without electricity.Experts say it had energy readings five times that of normal thunderstorms.
Fueled by the record high heat, this was one of the most powerful of this type of storm in the region in recent history, said research meteorologist Harold Brooks of the National Severe Storm Laboratory in Norman, Okla. Scientists expect “non-tornadic wind events” like this one and other thunderstorms to increase with climate change because of the heat and instability, he said
Calling State Climatologist Robinson – ball in your court.