back to article Global warming fingered as Superstorm Sandy supersizer

In a caveat-laden article in the current edition of the journal Oceanography, a trio of researchers from Rutgers and Cornell Universities argue that it's an even-money bet whether last October's "Superstorm Sandy" was caused – or at least exacerbated – by disappearing summertime Arctic sea ice. "With the increasing frequency …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Trollface

    The visuals!

    I didn't read a word of the article, but that image is absolutely grand! I even love the little "a" in the top left corner, which leads me to believe images "b" and "c" still had the numbers showing through the paint!

  2. Turtle

    Why not just....

    "the likelihood of greenhouse warming playing a significant role in Sandy's evolution as an extra-tropical superstorm is at least as plausible as the idea that this storm was simply a freak of nature."

    So they're saying that the odd are 50/50. "Maybe yes, maybe no." Why not just toss a coin and build policy on that?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Paris Hilton

      Re: Why not just....

      Because it's not a coin toss situation. They are saying that there is a >=50% chance that a new causative factor is involved.

      If you had a long spike in hurricanes each of which had a probability that climate change increased their severity, the overall probability would increase. If a coin known to be fair came up heads 21 times in a row that would be a one in a million chance. If an unknown coin did it, you would have strong grounds for suspecting a bent coin.

      Paris, because she's known for taking chances.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Why not just....

      Even standing in waist deep water watching your house collapsing into the sea for the fourth time in as many years with a superstore whipping round your ears, the global warming sceptics are still to be heard saying 'well its just a 50/50, toss of the coin chance of having this kind of weather and its got nothing to do with the fact there is no longer any winter sea ice in the Arctic.'

      Scientists will of course remind everyone of probabilities with caveats.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Why not just....

        The sceptics just read all of the propaganda research funded by the oil companies.

        You need to be a climate scientist to really know if they are correct or not. You need to analyse the data, but of course, few people have one of the world largest supercomputers at their disposal.

        If scientists are wrong on this then why have they been so correct on so many other things?

    3. Voland's right hand Silver badge
      Devil

      Re: Why not just....

      You do not toss a coin over the idea that most late season hurricanes will turn west and obliterate the Eastern Seaboard on a regular basis. Even 5% (not 50%) would be pretty much a call for action if this research is correct.

      Now add to that an eruption on Cumbre Vieja and welcome to the day after tomorrow.

    4. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Why not just....

      Sample space = 1

      1. Martin Budden Silver badge
        Boffin

        Re: Why not just....

        "Sample space = 1"

        You don't really understand when sample size might be relevant, do you? This was only ever an investigation of a single event, not an analysis of overall likelihood. Much in the same way that investigation of one particular car crash is not going to provide overall road safety statistics. The investigation of the single event is still a worthwhile exercise.

    5. Chris007
      Flame

      Re: Why not just.... @Turtle

      They did toss on a coin and the result was:-

      Heads I win

      Tails you lose

      Please give all your money to stop something that cannot be stopped, trust us.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    Scientific Terminology

    Note that these hard-core 'scientists' begin by calling Hurricane Sandy "Superstorm Sandy" in line with the freak-out media, then proceed to baldly assert as fact the claim of increased 'extreme weather,' as if that were simple reality rather than unsupported IPCC fear mongering. Need we bother to read further?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Scientific Terminology

      You mean I shouldn't be building a bunker right now! Oh my god! What should I do! Please SAVE ME!

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Scientific Terminology

        "You mean I shouldn't be building a bunker right now! Oh my god! What should I do! Please SAVE ME!"

        You're confusing Global Warming with Nuclear War, a common mistake. For GW you should build a strong tower to escape the rising seas, along with anti-wind hardening for existing structures in higher locations. Make sure you go off-grid and rely on solar cells/batteries, and recycle your brains out. Don't forget to save your 'night soil' for use in the veggie garden. If you're in a flood plain (as so many are these days), just let the flood have its way, it's for the best.

        Lessee, did I forget anything?

        1. Robert Sneddon

          Re: Scientific Terminology

          "Lessee, did I forget anything?"

          Don't buy a house in a development called "The Water Meadows".

    2. Eric Olson

      Re: Scientific Terminology

      While the media do certainly get a bit excitable when things like this happen, the facts are that the storm lost its tropical characteristics before landfall, which was later confirmed in post-event analysis. The National Weather Service, in fact, has been called to task for not only keeping its Hurricane and Tropical Storm Warnings active when the storm was in fact no longer tropical in nature, but also for confusing the subject by trying to explain in the text of those warnings that it wasn't in fact a tropical storm. According to the NWS, they didn't want to mislead the public into thinking that the phenomenon associated with tropical storms (storm surge, tornadoes, squall lines, hurricane-force winds, etc.) no longer were present just because the storm had transitioned from from tropical to extra-tropical.

      It doesn't help that many homeowners policies for the coastal United States have extremely specific clauses regarding hurricane, tropical storm, nor'easter, and other storms that come off the ocean as opposed to from the land, which makes classification even more important from a legal standpoint, as usually if it's classified as a Hurricane, insurance moves from a replacement policy to a shared or large deductible (I think 10 to 15% of the insured value of the home) policy. That's quite different from a $500 deductible when your home is worth $150,000.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Scientific Terminology

      So, you're discounting the authors' argument entirely, merely because they used the commonly referred-to moniker for that storm, "Superstorm Sandy"? And then you dismiss the overwhelming preponderance of climate scientists' research and consensus as "unsupported IPCC fear mongering"?

      If so, sir, may I propose that you are a thoroughgoing moron who prefers to counter reasonable argument with mere ad hominem attacks (as, admittedly, I just did myself, in a spirit of comradely parallelism), then add to them -- to use your unsupported term -- with unsupported assertions?

      Ah, denialists... You folks would be an interesting, isolated cohort for a sociologist's grant-supportable PhD study of self-affirming religionists if you weren't so dangerous to reason, scientific argument, and thoughtful response to the inarguable warming of the planet.

      And, yes, it is inarguable and human activity is causing it. As xkcd so aptly put it, "Science. It works, bitches."

      1. Steve Crook

        Re: Scientific Terminology

        It would be odd if the changes in Arctic ice didn't have an effect on climate. The interesting thing is why the ice is disappearing. There are three factors, AGW, natural variation, and soot pollution. There's good body of peer reviewed evidence showing man made effects are the dominant cause, but recent work indicates that soot may be playing a much larger role in summer melt than had been previously assumed.

        If soot is a significant factor it's a problem that is a piece of piss to fix compared with trying to prevent more CO2 getting into the atmosphere.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Scientific Terminology

          What's your proposal? Ask the Chinese and the US to put their economies on hold while they clean up their coal power stations, or send loads of squaddies to paint the snow white?

        2. Dodgy Geezer Silver badge
          Boffin

          Re: Scientific Terminology

          "...There are three factors, AGW, natural variation, and soot pollution...."

          A very perceptive post.

          There may actually be more factors - it would be sensible not to commit the enormous faux pas which IPCC made by saying that because we can't (won't?) think of any more reasons, therefore there aren't any.

          It's worth pointing out here that Arctic ice cover has dipped somewhat in the last 10 years, though it seems to be recovering now. When it started dipping, it was noticed that warmer currents of water were making their way further north than usual, and that particularly strong winds were breaking up the ice surface. These seem to have been that major reasons for the ice-cover dip.

          The problem with current 'peer-reviewed' climate science is that it is often fraudulent. An obvious example is the latest Marcott et al paper reviving the hockey-stick, which has just been shown to have passed peer-review as a PhD thesis without the hockey-stick graph ending, and then had that added later for publication.

          With this sort of thing going on, 'peer-reviewed' has become a byword for deception.

          1. NomNomNom

            Re: Scientific Terminology

            "It's worth pointing out here that Arctic ice cover has dipped somewhat in the last 10 years, though it seems to be recovering now."

            What a load of shit. You guys are shameless aren't you. How the fuck do you conclude it's "recovering now"? It only just broke a NEW record last September and now you guys are carping on about it recovering, just as you did after it broke it's last record in 2007.

            You clowns will still be bullshitting about the ice recovering even when it's gone. Which at the current rate is going to be quite soon.

          2. John Hughes
            WTF?

            Re: Scientific Terminology

            "It's worth pointing out here that Arctic ice cover has dipped somewhat in the last 10 years, though it seems to be recovering now."

            Strange. I don't see that:

            http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/nsidc-seaice-n/compress:12/plot/nsidc-seaice-n/trend/plot/none

          3. Burb

            Re: Scientific Terminology

            "The problem with current 'peer-reviewed' climate science is that it is often fraudulent. An obvious example is the latest Marcott et al paper reviving the hockey-stick, which has just been shown to have passed peer-review as a PhD thesis without the hockey-stick graph ending, and then had that added later for publication."

            Interesting. Where has this been shown?

      2. Dodgy Geezer Silver badge
        Stop

        Re: Scientific Terminology

        ...And, yes, it is inarguable and human activity is causing it. As xkcd so aptly put it, "Science. It works, bitches."..

        Aha... so the Earth's temperature is continuing to rise as the climate scientists predicted, is it?

        Unfortunately, it isn't. And the scam artists have been revealed to be aware of this, but are still trying to scam us. "We can't account for the lack of warming - it's a travesty.."

        So, if it's science, it works. This DOESN'T work. Still think it's science?

      3. Grogan Silver badge

        Re: Scientific Terminology

        Folks who think they talk to the dead are inarguably sure of it too.

        There is no doubt that the Earth's climate is shifting (again), but that it's man made is bollocks.

        Believe what you want, and suffer and sacrifice, but the rest of us are going to carry on with modern conveniences, cheap sources of energy and ignore the likes of you.

        Also, the words of these scientists are full of climate change buzzwords and bullshit and it does have a discrediting effect.

      4. Chris007
        Mushroom

        Re: Scientific Terminology @ AC 0702 GMT

        And you have the temerity to say to denialists "Ah, denialists... You folks would be an interesting, isolated cohort for a sociologist's grant-supportable PhD study of self-affirming religionists". Et Tu Brutus

        Methinks you should be looking closer to home for the "self-affirming" after you said :- "And, yes, it is inarguable and human activity is causing it"

        usually, only a religious zealout says something that is NOT conclusively proven is inarguable - go figure on your comment...

    4. hayseed

      Re: Scientific Terminology

      It was a superstorm, because it no longer met the technical definition of a hurricane (it was too cold!).

  4. This post has been deleted by its author

  5. Thought About IT
    Childcatcher

    The politics of it

    Climate change is due to greenhouse gas emissions, say the scientists ...

    ... because that conclusion fits their data.

    No it isn't, say the neoliberals ...

    ... because that's incompatible with deregulation and unconstrained growth.

    Hence we are bombarded with propaganda to cast doubt on the science and the scientists - and jolly effective it is too!

    1. Steve Crook

      Re: The politics of it

      It's the monomania with CO2 and feedback effects that's the problem.

      Land use change also has a significant impact on on climate. You can't just build thousands of 100sq mile conurbations and cut down trees to grow crops that require irrigation without seeing changes in climate. The focus on CO2 has distracted effort in trying to gauge the significance of these effects. Consider the increased rain run-off from cities and towns, it goes to the sea when much might have been absorbed into the ground. How much contribution to sea level rise does that make? Recent papers have shown irrigation run-off as a significant player in sea level rise.

      Ever wonder why we don't hear much about Kilimanjaro's shrinking glaciers any more? It's because all the evidence points to man made deforestation being the cause, not temperature rise.

      The real debate is over the scale of these effects compare to that projected for CO2 from models. Remember, on it's own, doubling CO2 will give around a 1c rise in temps and everything else is feedback from that rise. Recent papers have pointed at a significantly reduced climate sensitivity.

      The science isn't settled.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: The politics of it

      "Hence we are bombarded with propaganda to cast doubt on the science and the scientists - and jolly effective it is too!"

      Except nobody is paying the pro-global-warming scientists for their opinions !

      1. stiv
        Paris Hilton

        Re: The politics of it

        so they're working for free?

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: The politics of it

        "Except nobody is paying the pro-global-warming scientists for their opinions !"

        A rather lopsided percentage of global government research grant money is now going to climate research, far more than just a few years ago. The only reasonable explanation for this change is fear of a warmer world that will cause expensive trouble down the road.

        Logically, if that fear dissipates, so will the new grant monies. Therefore, there is a strong incentive for those receiving those grants to maintain the fear of warming.. er, "climate change."

        Maybe those scientists aren't being paid directly to lie, but the conflict of interest is huge.

  6. Liam Thom
    WTF?

    60mph

    The only reason why a 60mph wind had any publicity is because it landed over a very populated part of the USA. There is nothing exceptional about a force 11 hitting land just the reaction to it in the media.

    1. Liam Thom

      Re: 60mph

      Apologies - force 10.

      1. Chris Miller

        Re: 60mph

        And coincided with a spring high tide as well. Rather like Katrina, which was unexceptional as a storm, gaining its deadly effects from its location and timing.

    2. PyLETS

      Re: 60mph

      89 MPH recorded, and > 80MPH recorded across a wide area according to this article:

      http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2012/10/sandy_wind_speed_map_see_how_s.html

    3. hayseed

      Re: 60mph

      What was exceptional was the size of the storm and thus the storm surge, which did the most damage.

      1. hayseed

        Re: 60mph

        Also I should point out that size of storm surge != size of waves. A surge is how much the water is piled up due to the storm, and is a rise in the base water level, like a tsunami. Waves are on top of this, like in an ordinary storm.

    4. Ben Trabetere

      Re: 60mph

      The ONLY reason? By nearly every measure Hurricane/Post-tropical Cyclone Sandy was an exceptional storm. For starters it was big - the storm bands extended roughly 500 miles from the center, and the effects were felt as far west as Michigan and Wisconsin.

      Also, it was a slow-moving storm, with some of the affected areas experienced hurricane conditions for two or three days.

      The wind speed is only part of the destructive equation of a hurricane - the more destructive part of the equation is water. Rain, storm surge, and in the case of Sandy ... snow. And Sandy offered up too much of all three. Most areas experienced at least 5-inches of rain, and the extra-high tides at the time made for an unusually high storm surge.

      1. hayseed

        Re: 60mph

        Shoddy construction (houses on slabs on sand too close to the waterline) did play a factor. Note for someone who had a note about building in "stone" - apartments build on slabs too close to the waterline were also undermined and destroyed, but the substitution of particle board for plywood and 2x4s which no longer are mean that traditional wood construction is also far weaker than in the past.

      2. hayseed

        Re: 60mph

        I don't know if anyone is reading anymore, but for posterity:

        I live in southeast Virginia. We got hurricane-force winds both when it skirted the North Carolina-Virginia coast, and when it turned. - maybe 24 hours. Also, it was some nearby regions that got 12 inches We got near-record flooding in some areas (a couple of hurricanes in recent memory, most notably Isabel (sp?), also lingered and set the record - washing away a highway bridge in Chesapeake, I believe. The Outer Banks also got hit harder than it had in a long time by a surge. Some areas of Vermont were hit hard by rain flooding. BUT - I guess one can't always separate surges from estuarine flooding in the Chesapeake Bay, but river peaks occurred well after the surge, because much of the rain was dumped later (unlike Isabel). Google Earth gives a crow-flies distance of over 400 miles from Hatteras to NYC. Not all of these areas were as hard-hit by the surge, but it was huge in VA, and huge in NC (just ask folks in Manteo - houses were flooded and wrecked there), and NY as local records go. I measure the length of Great Britain's main island as under 600 miles. Thus, this is the equivalent of hitting over 2/3 of that coastline with an enormous storm surge.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Every weather disaster is caused by global warming

    Typical new age science based on unsubstantiate opinion meaning it's pretty much a 50/50 chance of being wrong or worse.

  8. david 63

    Whatever the cause...

    ... it looks like an accident waiting to happen

    http://www.nyc.gov/html/oem/html/hazards/storms_hurricanehistory.shtml

    The 1938 hurricane would have had a bigger impact had it hit the Boroughs. And there are a lot more waterfront properties than there were then.

    One thing is for sure sides of the argument will seize on this as using selective quotes to prove that is was/was not CO2 that caused it.

    Note that I did not say climate change. The climate changes and it is definitely affected by people. The question in my mind is how the changes can be attributed to CO2 and the cost of the precautionary principle.

  9. Boris the Cockroach Silver badge
    IT Angle

    The 1987

    storm that hit southern Britain had roughly the same cause, a blocking high to the north forcing the jet stream way further south than it usually runs in mid october, driving a mass of cold air into a warm low pressure area that usually haunts these isles at that time of year.

    It was only the fact that it ran through southern england at 45-50mph that saved us from even worse damage than it did

    Btw Sandy was barely a cat 2 storm when it landed, katrina was a strong 3

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    meh

    Here in Orkney in Dec. 2011 we had sustained winds of 83mph and a maximum gust of 122mph.

    That was recorded by the anemometer atop the 900kW turbine that is a mile from my house so it should be accurate.

    Anything that could be blown away had already done so years before, most houses here are built of stone.

    Down in London they think that the world will end if the wind exceeds 60mph.

    Last year the "pinching" of the jet stream resulted in us getting anti-cyclones one after another. We are lucky if we get three sunny days in a row, Summer just does not happen like it did in our youth.

  11. Dropper
    Go

    One Beeellion Dollars

    "Sandy did something never observed before in records going back to 1851 – it took a sharp turn to the west and headed toward the most populated area along the eastern seaboard."

    I see Dr. Evil's hurrican magnets are working as expected, even if the accompanying surge failed to deposit the promised sharks with laser beams on shore.

  12. MondoMan

    Columbo* time, folks!

    Just the facts, please.

    1) ""With the increasing frequency of extreme weather events serving as a backdrop, ..."

    Sir, I can't find any record of such an alibi. Could you be more specific?

    2) "...the recent record-breaking losses of Arctic sea ice ..."

    Ma'am, are you referring to the *satellite* record, which only goes back 30 years? My wife tells me it was warm up there about 90 years ago, which predates the claimed period of human influence on global temperatures. Have you looked at Arctic ice extent back then?

    *Beloved fictional TV detective played by Peter Falk.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Columbo* time, folks!

      I congratulate your wife on her excellent memory.

  13. John Deeb
    Boffin

    puzzling

    The puzzling element for me is the suggested link between melting summer ice and increase of overall temperatures at the Arctic (or decrease of gradient between Arctic and middle latitudes) in terms of cause and effect. We're talking about a significant warming around the globe within quite a broad strip in a time where most global measurements report a stabilizing or even slight cooling around the globe. Maybe this is just a matter of energy distribution and local absorption but I'm hesitant to just assume "excess heat" would simply bounce back like that. I'd suggest going over historical records and check if in periods of similar global temperatures and (therefore) melting summer ice the weather patterns indeed changed in similar ways in terms of storms and local cooling. These type of experiment do not fit in labs so unless one has a reliable computer model (and there isn't) the past record looks like the only way to verify these connections.

  14. Steve Briggs

    Had the storm been of the same magnitude as the famous "Long Island Express" hurricane of 1938, way more damage would have been seen. That hurricane moved northward at 70 mph vs. the slow meandering @ 30 mph of Sandy. Had it occurred at spring tide, it would have also caused more damage. If we continue to build in flood prone areas, we'll have more damage to structures when flood hit.

    CAGW doesn't exist, at least like it's portrayed.

    1. Urban heat islands exist, but that's land use, not global warming. Most of the meteorological sites fail quality tests for measurement. Rural sites show no significant temperature change, while urban sites show increasing temperatures.

    2. The sea level is creeping up at ~3mm/yr, or falling, depending where you take the measurements. Sties with subsidence show greater rates of sea level rise - surprise.

    3. The Arctic Ocean is melting more, but it's done so in the past too - see the early 20th Century. Mariners have sailed between the Atlantic and Pacific for centuries, and documented it in ships logs.

    4. The Antarctic ice is increasing, and the icebergs breaking off are already floating before they break off - note glaciers retreat, not advance, as temperatures rise, so that's not the cause of the icebergs.

    5. ENSO drives our climate strongly and the oscillations correlate well with our climate changes.

    6. The Pacific Decadal Oscillation drives the Arctic Ocean melt, as does changes in the AMO, Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation.

    7. None of the ARGO floats even remotely hint at the "missing heat" in the ocean.

    8. It's been a lot warmer in the past 10,000 years than it is now - despite the attempts at using manipulated proxie graphs to try to show sudden change.

    If you want to see the unmaniplulated data and make up your own mind, visit the dataset pages of WUWT. You don't have to read the blog, just use the data pages, they're on the lower righthand side of the column. Sea Ice, ENSO, TSI, etc. There, and with the raw data for inquiring minds. Some of the datasets are large, you might want to bone up on R for processing them.

    1. NomNomNom

      1. Even if you only use the best meteorological stations that pass quality tests you see warming. Even if you use rural stations you see warming (significant warming). Heck even if you only use ocean data you see warming. Or use satellite data. The idea that global warming is just urban heat islands, or bad station siting was an idea discredited over a decade ago.

      2. The 3mm/year sea level rise is the global average measured by satellite. It isn't due to subsidence.

      3. The evidence from ice boundaries as recorded by shipping logs is that the Arctic now has less ice than any point in the 20th century. While there was a period of lower ice in the 30s, that's been exceeded by the decline in the last decade. Now even unreinforced boats are making the passage.

      4. The Antarctic is melting. Satellite measurements show the continent to be losing mass and contributing to sea level rise.

      5. ENSO is an oscillation and has a longterm trend of zero. It cannot explain any of the warming over the past 100 years because it just goes back and forth.

      6. There's no evidence the PDO or AMO drive Arctic melt. There's now even good evidence the PDO doesn't drive Arctic melt, as it switched a few years back and yet Arctic melt has continued.

      7. The ARGO floats show a gain in heat in the top 2000m of the ocean:

      http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M_HEAT_CONTENT/

      8. Scientists expect the last 10,000 years to begin with a warm period, because the Earth's tilt back then favored more sunlight in NH summers. The NH being mostly land warms up faster than the SH being mostly ocean. So a warmer NH and slightly warmer globe is expected. However what isn't expected, and cannot be explained except by manmade climate change, is that temperatures in the past 100 years have shot up and the world is now warmer than most of the past 10,000 years and is approaching the peak.

      1. Thought About IT
        Childcatcher

        Facts

        Facts, facts, facts. Don't bore me with facts. Facts are just a minor inconvenience to AGW deniers. All they have to do is sow doubts about them and they make it politically impossible to take action to curb greenhouse gas emissions. After all, it wouldn't do to leave all those valuable fossil fuels unexploited.

  15. General Pance
    Megaphone

    Australia's already fixed the weather by bringing in a Carbon Tax. As soon as you get off the plane you can feel the weather is exactly right, the way God (the one worshipped by Kevin Rudd) intended it.

    I hope this is good news to all of you who are terrified by the drumbeat of articles like this.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I can prove that global warming has nothing to do with these storms. In 2345 BCE there was a great flood. Man wasn't using the fossil fuels we are today and the earth would have been far cooler and more arctic ice would have existed. I'm pretty sure the great flood was far worse than "super storm Sandy" could ever have been.

    The worst Altantic hurricane happened in 1780 followed my Mitch in 1998. The fact is, Sandy didn't even register on the scale of one of the worst hurricanes on record. If global warming was playing a pivotal role, then each year the storms would be worse and worse and easily be worse than the storms of hundreds of years ago.

    If global warming is man made, how did we ever get out of the ice age? Man wasn't around to pollute the earth and yet it warmed. Scientists have also proved that the earth goes through warming and cooling phases.

    If man is the source of global warming, we do what. Quit using fossil fuels so we dump electricity, automobiles, kill the cows and live in the dark ages? The fact is, even green energy causing issues, like wind turbines. The use of them slows the air current and thus the cooling effect it provides.

    If we need to stop what we are doing, then I say those that are in favor take first steps and live in the dark ages. Once they prove it works, then the rest of the world could adopt it. All the tree huggers do is talk about what to do but they don't actually follow through with it themselves. Take Al Gore; he pollutes more than most non-green people do. I don't have a private jet and go all over the world in it. Sure he can plant trees to do carbon offsets but the fact is, he is polluting. His home is a huge polluter, so he wants others to conserve while he does not.

    http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/house.asp

    1. Naughtyhorse

      In 2345 BCE there was a great flood.

      rly

      noah

      get the fuck out of here superstitious fuckwit

    2. fmaxwell

      Please stop posting outdated BS as current (re. Gore's house)

      Ignoring your absurd AGW denial comments, I'll take you apart on your claims about Gore's home being a "huge polluter."

      Al Gore completed numerous improvements in 2007, including installation of solar panels, a rainwater-collection system and geothermal heating. He also replaced all incandescent lights with compact fluorescent or light-emitting diode bulbs to make the home more energy efficient. "Short of tearing it down and staring anew, I don't know how it could have been rated any higher," said Kim Shinn of the U.S. Green Building Council, which gave the house its second-highest rating for sustainable design. Bet you didn't want people to know about that, did you? So you linked to something that was written before the improvements had been made.

      By your logic, pedophilia is not a problem, because several vocal opponents of it were found to be pedophiles themselves. For example, U.S. congressman Mark Foley (R-FL) crusaded for tough laws against those who used the Internet for sexual exploitation of children. Then it was discovered that the congressman used the Internet to engage in "cybersex" and send explicit images to underage boys. So, by your logic, you shouldn't stop sexually preying on children because Mark Foley, a vocal opponent of child predators, was found to a child predator himself.

  17. Eric Olson

    Stay with me here...

    Storms move along steep pressure gradients, typically caused by thermal differences. High pressure moves into areas of low pressure. A low-pressure system won't move west, east, north, or south without something pulling it along. If an increase in air temp throughout a given column of air above the polar regions reduces such gradients, blocking highs will become the norm. Such blocking highs would continue to cause continued buckling of the atmospheric flows, resulting in energy being shunted off in directions normally not seen.

    Taken together, this is why the whole idea of "extreme" instead of "warm" weather is predicted by most climate models. With more energy in the system, it takes an even greater push to move highs along their merry way. This allows diversions of upper-air winds to carry tropical or polar air further into the temperate regions. Tropical air tends to carry moisture, polar air tends to be dry. In general, that means a pattern is formed and harder to break. That's not to say such things did not occur in the past. But should we just accept that by adding more energy to the system in a way the creates more equilibrium than before (polar areas are warming much more than tropical areas) is a good thing? It just creates a more sluggish climate that responds only to gross changes in energy, such as the changing from summer to winter, rather than smaller energy fluctuations. The climate works on a system of equalization, tropical to polar. Reducing that difference reduces variability and cements patterns. That's not a good thing.

    1. david 63

      Re: Stay with me here...

      Look into my eyes and repeat after me "Warm weather was not predicted by the climate models"

  18. johnwerneken
    Mushroom

    super storm my rear end

    The number of storms with lower pressures higher winds greater surges and wider reaches is considerable. The 'super' thing about this one consists mostly of the fact that it hit the City, the planetary capital, and secondly that it did so at high tide, so that the City's transit system was put out of action plus a good deal of the electricity distribution.

    Whether the weather can be expected to be more energetic, as seems likely to me, or just the same old weather, people are ever more numerous and ever more interdependent, and ever more hostage to anything, including weather, that disrupts our systems. Redundant systems and accepting the risks as well as the rewards of interdependency probably have a lot more to do with our future, than trying to manage our impacts on climate, let alone the climate per se.

    1. hayseed

      Re: super storm my rear end

      Umm, check again the scale and the pressure of the storm, apparently you are clueless with regard to those factors. Certainly it was not that strong in terms of winds. Some of the most powerful storms in terms of wind have been small storms like HugoYes, it's destructiveness is a function of where it hit with what effects. Storm surges are also not just a simple function of wind speed. Greater surges in more limited locations (most notably Galveston) have often occurred, of course. Scale and topography have an effect there also, not just wind speeds. This covered a very wide area, and there were areas with 12" rain totals (not in NYC).

  19. Gravis Ultrasound

    wow, false alarm level of .5 is the treshold for getting published in the field of 'climate change'

  20. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    So...

    We are basing this on 1 hurricane. 1 is not a statistic. A trend of 1 is irrelevant. 1 is not a pattern.

    Even better we are basing this on 1 freak hurricane on record!!! Going all the way back to the ancient year of 1851. Looking at the tsunami in japan which occurs roughly each 100 yrs (as the argument that they should have been prepared). So this could be a regular occurrence but we dont have the records.

    So we have the possibility of a freak occurrence of non-freak events or as they say "A Series of Unfortunate Events". Something we all know if we have a really bad day. Or it could be the norm but with the complete lack of information to work with we dont know.

    So I guess there could be a possible relation to a theory if said theory can be proven to scientific accuracy. But even if it could then it is just another possibility. And as a possibility it is not probable unless a few more happen to provide any trend data.

    Or we can gather everyone around... turn off the lights... move the torch under our chins... turn them on as we say as fast as we can "MMCC co2 theory we all gonna die!!!!! Mwaaaaaahahahahahahahaha"

  21. speedjunky

    None of the climate models are 100% and I have been saying for years now, there is no such thing as man made global warming. What did I see in the Sunday Mail last night, an article with the headline,"Finally proof that there is NO global warming", it went on to state that the global temperatures are NOT rising, showed a nice pretty graph where the temperatures have levelled off for the past 15 years!!

    There is no such thing as global warming, I stand by this and you will see more and more reports saying as much!

    Then the question will be asked, why have we (meaning our governments) wasted billion of pounds and dollars on this rubbish and we continue to pay tax based on carbon!!!

    Alarmists, go home and worry about something else instead of p!$$!ng away everyones tax money!

    1. John Deeb
      Boffin

      Not sure what you mean with "global warming" here. Aren't you ignoring the hard measurement which show medium-long running trends of a warming of both atmosphere and oceans? That is not much in dispute and neither is climate change as a whole. The question is the same with informed alarmists and sceptics alike: do we know all the causes of the current trends and which factors could be *forcing* them beyond natural flux and noise? The problem with dismissing the current major theory of greenhouse gasses is that you need also to supply a better, well researched theory about warming trends including the current interlude. Just waving it away as randomness does not appear scientific nor very wise (what if it's not?). Feel free to demonstrate for example some complex magnetic link between the Sun and upper atmosphere developments and jet stream locations. The world will be thankful. But the science needs to be presented well and not just the "idea". I know some scientists are working on this but by suggesting mainstream science is corrupted of blind sighted, how would you propose to continue from here? Putting all of "them" on the burning pile?

    2. John Hughes
      WTF?

      Poe? Or is the really someone who gets his science news from pretty graphs in the Sunday mail?

      http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah/from:1998/mean:12/plot/uah/from:1998/trend

    3. NomNomNom

      "it went on to state that the global temperatures are NOT rising, showed a nice pretty graph where the temperatures have levelled off for the past 15 years!!"

      A nice pretty graph which I bet they didn't stick apply any uncertainty range to the trend.

      1. Fading
        Meh

        Pot and kettle noms?

        Seems a bit obtuse to insist on uncertainty ranges now. Where were the uncertainties when anthropogenic CO2 was declared the driver of global warming? BTW Bob Tisdale has got a lot to say about the NODCs 0-2000m OHC (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/03/13/nodcs-pentadal-ocean-heat-content-0-to-2000m-creates-warming-that-doesnt-exist-in-the-annual-data-a-lot-of-warming/) so your previous points might need updating.

        1. NomNomNom

          Re: Pot and kettle noms?

          "Where were the uncertainties when anthropogenic CO2 was declared the driver of global warming?"

          Uncertainty in the trend is pretty tight over the longterm. However on the short-term, eg 10 years, it's less tight. Think you'll find the last 10 year trend is consistent with the longterm trend because trend uncertainty in 10 years of data is so wide.

          'bob tisdale', or anyone else will need to publish claims somewhere more reputable so far as experts go before anyone who matters will take it seriously. The NOAA site will always be the current state of the science. Until it shows no warming at 0-2000m I won't accept that point of view.

    4. Burb

      @speedjunky:

      "What did I see in the Sunday Mail last night, an article with the headline,"Finally proof that there is NO global warming", it went on to state that the global temperatures are NOT rising, showed a nice pretty graph where the temperatures have levelled off for the past 15 years!!"

      I'm pretty sure your post is meant to be a parody. Am I right?

  22. Super Fast Jellyfish

    Lots of anonymice here

    Is that because they've trolling or are not convinced of their views?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Lots of anonymice here

      I am sure your real name is super fast jellyfish. Or is that an alias? Anonymous is also an alias isnt it! Maybe we are all as sure as one another, or maybe those not posting as Anonymous somehow believe they are not anonymous?

      1. Super Fast Jellyfish

        Re: Lots of anonymice here

        You are confusing a nom de plume with hiding in a crowd.

        There is only one Super Fast Jellyfish on this site and you can track what I've posted. I can not tell you from any other Anonymous Coward - and you ain't no Spartacus.

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