Superstorm Sandy’s climate change connection

[marmar]

from Grist:



Superstorm Sandy’s climate change connection
By Susie Cagle


It’s been a banner year for extreme weather conditions, from the drought that held the country hostage this summer to superstorm Sandy. But then, last year was a banner year for extreme weather too. And the years before that …



Scientists are mostly agreed that climate change has had a hand in crafting the Frankenstorm. But how, exactly? From Boing Boing:

When the clouds have passed and everybody is done sleeping in airports, people are going to want answers. Was this an unavoidable act of nature? Or was this something caused directly by changes to Earth’s climate that have happened because we burn fossil fuels which increase the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere?

Well, both. There are multiple factors that came together to whip up Sandy, and no one causal judgment, however attractive, is fair. But given the evidence, it’s likely that no matter how Sandy came in to this world, climate change has helped this storm grow bigger, go faster, and head farther than it might have in earlier times and cooler seas.



In chalking up Sandy to climate change, we should remember all the damage we’ve already done that hasn’t manifested in the form of an apocalyptic storm system nearly the size of Mexico. All that stuff plays into how Sandy acts now, from ocean temperatures and levels to our new general, um, moistness. ...................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://grist.org/news/superstorm-sandys-climate-change-connection/

[Jim__]

1. Here's more linking Sandy with Climate change.

This article contains a link to a paper in Science - but you need a login to read the science article. An excerpt:

Where I sit in New Jersey, we are preparing for a direct hit from a record-setting hurricane. We all know that no one event can be blamed on climate change. But this freak storm certainly seems to match the warnings we've gotten over the past decade. Let's consider what exactly makes Hurricane Sandy so "freak", and whether this freakiness may be a harbinger of the new normal. There are at least three factors making Hurricane Sandy such a threat: 1) Warm sea surface temperatures, 2) A "blocking pattern" shoving the storm back on shore, 3) A merger with a winter storm.

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