While attending a rally with Al Gore in Florida today, weather became climate.
Here is the video (h/t to WUWT commenter Alan Robertson)
Hillary Clinton later made the statement on Twitter:
We've always had destructive hurricanes, but Hurricane Matthew was likely more destructive because of climate change.
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) October 11, 2016
Followed by Al Gore saying:
“from a tropical storm to a Category 5 hurricane in just 36 hours, that’s extremely unusual”
Maybe, as I don’t have stats on that, but Matthew only spent 6 hours as a category 5 storm, the record was the “Cuba” hurricane in 1932 with 78 hours as a Cat5.
IMHO, @HillaryClinton is the right choice in this election if we care about solving the climate crisis. https://t.co/4Dkw0RKDfi
— Al Gore (@algore) October 11, 2016
What crisis? The worst hurricane ever to hit the USA was The Great Galveston Hurricane in 1900, which killed up to 6000 people, long before CO2 ever became an issue.
Today, we have an 11 year hurricane drought of Cat3 or greater failing to make landfall on the USA.
We have hurricane damage losses which are down:
We have hurricane and tropical storm frequency which is flat to slightly down.
And Tornado deaths are down too
Pardon my french, but WHAT CLIMATE CRISIS as they view it in weather terms? Their pitch of a load of bollocks!
Today’s Weather Is Hardly Unique
By Patrick J. Michaels
A recent study out of Princeton shows that whether people feel global warming is making hurricanes worse is more related to political predilections than reality, while global trends show no change. But what about global temperatures, Louisiana’s disastrous flood and California’s incandescent fire season?
Since satellites began measuring lower-atmosphere temperatures in 1979, the observed warming has been only one-third of what would have been forecast by today’s computer models, and the rate of surface warming has even slowed since the late 1990s, according to the new “homogenized” temperature history from the Commerce Department.
Glib attributions of recent weather (as opposed to ‘climate’) phenomena are more wishful than reality.
Make no mistake, though, carbon dioxide concentrations have increased and surface temperatures are high, compared with the last 150 years, and the three-dimensional patterns of change (latitude, longitude and altitude) are partially consistent with that increase. So, when there is a natural warming event, like the recent El Niño, it superimposes upon already warm temperatures and results in a record, globally and sometimes locally.
That’s hard to dispute. But glib attributions of recent weather (as opposed to “climate”) phenomena are more wishful than reality. Last month, Commerce Department scientists showed rain data vary so much that “no evidence was found for changes in extreme precipitation attributable to climate change in the available observed record.” What’s good for the U.S. is also good for Louisiana.
Another group of researchers, some with the same department, showed that California’s strong recent warming, which raises the likelihood of drought and enhanced wildfires, is best explained by oceanic temperature patterns from which any carbon dioxide signal had been removed.
And, are today’s high temperatures unique in human history? There’s strong evidence that the Arctic Ocean could have experienced long periods of ice-free summers for approximately four millennia after the end of the last ice age (6,000-10,000 years ago) and some evidence it was globally warmer 1,000 years ago, too.
That’s science, and not what we fear may be true based upon our personal philosophy.
And then there’s this: Why it seems that severe weather is “getting worse” when the data shows otherwise – a historical perspective
One reason the California fire season seems to be worse is that a policy of fire management has been adopted for certain fires. Managed fires are not extinguished but instead the perimeters are managed to guide the fire through areas that someone has decided need to be burned. Managed fires are kept away from property. Any property that might be affected by the fire is aggressively protected.
The Soberness Fire near Big Sur was a prime example of a managed fire. Started by an illegal camp fire in July, it soon became a managed fire and continued to expand until just recently. There was no additional property loss after the initial out of control phase. The long duration of this fire is not because the fire fighters couldn’t control the fire, but instead shows how good they are at controlling fires. They were a able to keep it burning just where they wanted it to burn for 3 months.
The news media seems to be unaware that this policy exists. They broadcast story after story about how hard the fire fighters are working to put out the fire when that’s not the case at all. Managed fires have become a full time summer job for thousands of fire fighters when there’s no other big fires to fight.
With the giant air tankers now in use to drop retardant they can put out any fire they want in a week or so. Property loss is typically limited to the first day or so before they can get the upper hand and get structure protection crews in place.
Take a look at the Blue Cut fire a few months ago. Initially reported to have the most extreme fire behavior anyone had ever seen with over a 100 structures lost in the first day, the fire was nearly 100% contained in a week with little additional property loss.
Another fire that had a management phase was the Chimney Fire. Widely reported for a time to be threatening Hearst’s Castle, there was not a chance that the castle would burn and it didn’t even come close. That made for a good news story though.
The Soberness Fire has now been reported to be the most expensive fire to fight ever. That’s only because it was a managed fire and allowed to burn for 3 months. The next time you hear about giant fires in California that burn for weeks or months keep in mind that they are likely managed fires.
How about Al’s 1000 year flood in Houston: The guy is Unbearable. The worst Flood on the San Jac was in 1993. The population of Harris County has increased from 850,000 in 1950 to 4,450,000 in 2015; not counting the huge pop increases in the surrounding counties. How many roofs, drive ways, streets and etc. have been covered with asphalt and concrete since 1950? The water that used to stand in the heavy undergrowth throughout the County has now become rapid run off. A point on a creek or bayou that used to take 12 to 24 hours to reach its peak stage now only requires a few hours to reach the same stage at the same point and then continue into flood stage. Many storm drainage facilities now carry many times the water volume at peak flow with an equal amount of rain fall!
Why not address the real causes of the many weather related problems.
Back in the late 50’s when I lived in Chesapeake Va. I would take the kids to the beach and camping around Kitty Hawk. Today it is all homes, cars and people like grand central station in the 40’s. Google it: The Wright’s could never do their tests today, too many trees. I have nothing against building on the beach but no government insurance strictly public Ins. Co’s.
I remember when Al Gore was accused of attempted rape here in Portland – the woman was a 50-year old masseuse (as in someone who massages your back – not the kind Al was after), and not only was the story buried locally, and completely whitewashed by the local authorities, she was told by her ‘friends’ in the community that she had to stay silent so Gore could save us all from Global Warming – and the mainstream press was so responsible about it, they sat on the story for a period of years until it was actually broken by the for-God’s-sake ENQUIERER.
THAT was the point when Tipper walked.
I’m sure the irony of Hillary bringing this sack of @ur momisugly#$# on board her campaign is not lost on anyone here.
Eric Holthaus was tweeting something about “lets not judge Matthew by wind speeds cos it was a “weird” Hurricane”.
yep, when the category fails to deliver, lets call it weird.
Then went on to claim “record moisture” from the event was a “fingerprint of climate change”.
Mind you he swore he’d have no kids, then had a kid. ROFL
Add that to “Pat” in the Pacific (a Cat 5 that did very minimal damage), and it seems that AGW makes a bunch of impotent hurricanes. The proof of the weirding of the weather.
One could cut the desperation for a cat5 disaster on Florida by the alarmist with a knife, personally I found that sick.. it’s a mental illness