(Pop-in-the-mouth Op-Ed Update*) More, epic US tornadoes. Quick look for stories chasing a big picture (ie, it’s climate change)
One, namely I, must concede to wondering in this year when tornadoes are erasing whole towns whether something big and ominous is going on, or merely big and awful but just one of those things that happens in an unpredictable world.
After Joplin, Mo, was run through a deadly mill yesterday, with deaths counted at 89 and much of the town flattened, about a month after a huge outbreak killed many more in the Ohio River valley, it seemed a good time to round up stories from reporters trying to put a scientific perspective on things. The bag is mixed. Some good ones on forecasting such things. Nobody, and this is also sensible, reports that there is a convincing, broad explanation for why so many this year.
Quick Science Stories on Sunday’s Storms:
- ABC World News – Ben Forer: Joplin, Missouri tornado: What’s causing the Rise in Deadly Storms? ; Short answer from some weather service workers: Nobody knows. Deaths are up. Number of tornadoes may be, or not. They are hitting more places with people in them. Global warming cannot be judged as a prime factor with info now at hand. Nice job – the situation is ambiguous, the story doesn’t try to squeeze out anything more.
- Forbes – Kenneth Rapoza: Climate Change Unlikely Factor in US Tornado Spree; A compendium of conclusions from existing reports.
- NPR Morning Edition – Jon Hamilton: The Science of Predicting Tornadoes ;
- LiveScience – Andrea Mustain: Tornado Grew with Rare Speed on Way to Joplin;
- Christian Science Monitor – Patrik Jonnson:Joplin, Missouri, tornado: Warnings pale in season of violent twisters ;
- Slate – Brian Palmer: Are Tornadoes Environmental Disasters? ; No, he says. Awful. Terrifying. But too tiny to rank high on enviro threats. Nothing like big hurricanes, it says here. One question: are there many who say tornadoes are, collectively, an environmental disaster?
*Pop-in-the-mouth Op-Ed Update ; ie, somebody’s not afraid to say exactly what he thinks:
- Washington Post – Bill McKibben: A link between climate change and Joplin tornadoes? Never! ; McKibben, we know, has been fretting about climate change for many years. So have many of us. One thinks he speaks here for a broad range of semi-activists, hard-core organizers, and officially disinterested climate scientists in this sarcasm-laden diatribe that is aimed at the reality-respecting base – and will only prompt any delusionary contrarians who read it to dig in their heels.
-Charlie Petit
