LibertyBell

First time since the 90s? I remember you posted earlier that the previous 40s in Sept was back in 1997? Does that include JFK?

we're going to have Gamma before the night is over. a record double digit number of storms in September, headed to at least 30 this season.

JFK 48

And negative again in May.

I wanted to post more on nuclear and how much better it is than any fossil fuel. Right now we get about 20% of our energy from nuclear, 10% from green energy and 70% from fossil fuels. If we could get that 20% nuclear up to 50% or more by 2030, we would be well on our way to achieving our goals of a sustainable future. Not only is nuclear less of a threat to human health and longevity than fossil fuels, burning coal actually releases more radiation than a nuclear power plant does. Two academic sources follow below: http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2016/reconsidering-risks-nuclear-power/ Fossil fuels have a host of problems themselves. Thebyproducts from burning fossil fuels are toxic pollutants that produce ozone, toxic organic aerosols, particulate matter, and heavy metals. The World Health Organization has stated the urban air pollution, which is a mixture of all of the chemicals just described, causes 7 million deaths annually or about 1 in 8 of total deaths. Furthermore, coal power plants release more radioactive material per kWh into the environment in the form of coal ash than does waste from a nuclear power plant under standard shielding protocols. This means that, under normal operations, the radioactive waste problem associated with one of the most mainstream energy sources in use actually exceeds that from nuclear energy. In fact, on a per kWh of energy produced basis, both the European Union and the Paul Scherrer Institute, the largest Swiss national research institute, found an interesting trend regarding the fatalities attributable to each energy source. Remarkably, nuclear power is the benchmark to beat, outranking coal, oil, gas, and even wind by a slight margin as the least deadly major energy resource in application (see Figure 3). https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/coal-ash-is-more-radioactive-than-nuclear-waste/ Over the past few decades, however, a series of studies has called these stereotypes into question. Among the surprising conclusions: the waste produced by coal plants is actually more radioactive than that generated by their nuclear counterparts. In fact, the fly ash emitted by a power plant—a by-product from burning coal for electricity—carries into the surrounding environment 100 times more radiation than a nuclear power plant producing the same amount of energy.

It's interesting that 1979 was one of our latest minimum ice extents, especially considering that 1979 was one of our coldest winters, almost historic in terms of how widespread the cold was in winter 1979-80! edit that was 1978-79 not 1979-80 lol...I do remember that there was an anomalous early season snow event in the Mid Atlantic in October 1979 though....the area from DC to Philly got around 2-4" of snow? Either way a 9/20 or later min ice extent day seems to be about a once a decade occurrence, except for the notable exception of 1989 and 1990, when it happened in back to back years, the height of our famous snow drought (high solar influence back then?)

Nature mimicking the inequalities of human society on all levels we are seeing now.

We've seen the rapid rise in total annual precip here that you mentioned, as well as rapidly rising dewpoints and a much higher frequency of big 3" rainfall events.

I can tell you this though, the chances of us remaining below the 2C limit set by the IPCC for "irreversible damaging consequences" is probably 10% or lower. That isn't just because of US politics, but because of global politics. We should have made a bigger switch to nuclear years ago and then we could have completely eliminated fossil fuel consumption by 2030. That isn't going to happen and I have big doubts about 2050 also, because of the corrupt political influence of the cartel. It will only happen when people have to start moving away from the coast and avoid living near forested areas and the cost of billion dollar disasters is so high that our economy becomes crippled. That time is coming soon. All the trends are pointed in that direction. And if it takes for the climate to cripple our economy, then the sooner it happens the better. Bill Gates was right in saying that the climate change problem makes the pandemic look like child's play. History is going to look back at this time period as full of cowards who didn't have the guts to do what needed to be done. If there is anyone left to look back lol.

It seems like the average minimum is around the first day of fall now?

ha that's true, but I only took a video no images sorry and will post it when I get it up on youtube. I opted for video because the birds looked so adorable splashing around in the water and fighting with each other for room lol.

But we saw it in early August with Isaias. Either way, I think we aren't done with EC TC. The next one we get will most likely be from the Greek alphabet lol.

a college friend of mine was visiting when Floyd hit, he had never experienced a TC before and he asked me...so this is it? It's nothing more than a boring old rainstorm! He wasn't around for Irene or Sandy lol. Speaking of which, wasn't the 1903 Hurricane similar to Sandy with its track?

lol DSLR are ancient history, mirrorless cameras with fully electronic shutters are the new thing. I ditched all my DSLR a few years ago.

Saw an excellent doc on PBS that showed how the Starfish is one of those very important keystone species that indicates the health of the overall environment- and based on that, it isn't looking so good.

It looks like there was a 49 low on 9-2-2017?

best to be safe, air pollution is the number 1 cause of a shorter lifespan (2.0 yrs), even more than tobacco smoke (1.5 yrs)

121 mph wind gust reported on AL barrier island and rainfall of 30" + near Pensacola

the TCs in the Atlantic are sucking in the smoke from the west

I knew that massive high to our northeast would come into play sooner or later. This may not be the last time this year either.

It seems to be a lot more this year, this morning I had hundreds of birds mobbing around my backyard pond, of various different species. It was a sight to behold! They were bathing, eating and fighting amongst themselves.

Fire seasons have been getting more and more active over the past 20 years and on a global scale. Furthermore the Siberian heatwave isn't something one would expect to occur naturally because of its extremely long duration as well as the extremity of its anomalies. About hurricanes, we were specifically talking about those rapidly strengthening as they approach the coast in Gulf waters, where the waters are abnormally warm, as well as forward speed slowing down- both have been happening more frequently for a few years now.

well we have had several mass extinction events; we are in the middle of one right now.

Isn't the Starfish one of those key biomarkers that is undergoing a massive die off?

TCs rapidly strengthening as they approach land (and slowing down) in the Gulf has been a pretty strong signal over the last 5 years or so, and can be connected to the abnormally warm waters there.