Weather Fatalities

Figure 1: Weather Fatalities from 1940 to 2011
Figure Source: http://www.statschat.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/weatherfatalities1.jpg
This figure shows weather related fatalities over the past century. As you can see there has been start increases over the past few decades relating to heat and hurricane related natural disasters. With climate change comes an increase in extreme weather. Global warming and climate change are on the rise, and it is likely that we will experience more extreme natural disasters such as flooding, hurricanes, tornadoes, and extreme heat. With these disasters comes increased risk of death. I think that over the next few decades (and probably longer) we will see spikes in deaths, such as is illustrated on this graph.

Frozen Niagara Falls

As you might imagine, the freezing of this massive amount of water doesn't happen often! With that much force, it would take a lot of cold. Since we've been experiencing a polar vortex, cold is not something the Northeast is lacking. To see more photos and a video about the more current freezing click here!

Figure 1: Niagara Falls in 1911
Image Source: http://static.panoramio.com/photos/large/45313585.jpg
This image shows Niagara Falls in 1911, when it became partially frozen due to the extreme cold temperatures.

Figure 2: Niagara Falls in 2014

Image Source: http://s1.ibtimes.com/sites/www.ibtimes.com/files/styles/v2_article_large/public/2014/01/09/niagara-falls_3.jpg

This image shows the Falls, this past January, 2014, when it partially froze. 

Chickadee Distribution Affected by Climate Change

Click here to watch a 2 minute video done by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. It briefly describes how within the past 10 years, as a result of changing temperature, some of the common breeds of Chickadee are being affected.

Global Warming and Weather

If I were to answer the question, “what are the connections between climate change and the extreme weather we’ve been having?” I would have to use Kevin Trenberth for help. Kevin Trenberth is a scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research. He’s spent a lot of time studying climate variability. More recently he studies the global water cycle and how it’s responding to climate change. He has written many scientific reports as well as currently leading a world climate research program. In his talk at the 2013 Seattle Science Festival he explained that because of the increase in temperature over the past century the water cycle is actually speeding up. Water is evaporating more quickly and forming into clouds which become more dense more quickly, causing intense rain. This is also the reason for drought in many places; water has evaporated quickly with higher temperatures, so if there is no moisture in that area the drought is more intense. He continued to explain that because there is more evaporation there is more moisture in the atmosphere, meaning heavier rains, which is what is happening recently. Furthermore as Richard Keer stated in his article in Science Magazine “In the Hot Seat”, that, “global warming has increased the chance of extreme events” but there is not one event in particular that can be directly linked with global warming alone.

I think an excellent but simple analogy to help explain this is one that Trenberth used during his talk in Seattle. He related the Earth and global warming to a person taking a hike in the Summer. If that person fails to bring water with them, they will only be sweating and not taking in any moisture, which could lead to a heat stroke. If the Earth quickly evaporates without rain, we see extreme droughts. Another analogy that was mentioned in Dan Satterfield’s article “Welcome to the New Climate” relates the weather and climate to a baseball player taking steroids. He explains, “Can you say that he hit a home run because of the steroids? No, he likely hit quite a few before he was on steroids. The steroids just made it more likely he would knock the ball out of the park. Increasing greenhouse gases make it more likely that we will see heat waves like this.”

If you'd like to watch all of Kevin Trenberth's talk at the Seattle Science Festival click here!