Guest essay by Eric Worrall
CNBC author Helen Zhao claims people are flocking to tourist destinations like the Australian Great Barrier Reef, because they believe this may be their last chance to see the reef in all its glory before it is wiped out global warming.
3 ‘last chance’ destinations drawing travelers worried about climate change
1:42 PM ET Fri, 23 Feb 2018
Some bucket-list trips may be more about anticipating the destination’s demise than yours.
Certain countries susceptible to climate change have seen a spike in travel interest over the past year, according to a new report from travel insurance comparison web site Squaremouth. People may be advancing their plans to see these places in all their current glory, they note.
The report is based on data Squaremouth collects when people input their destination and trip costs into the site to compare policies.
For example, interest in the Maldives — an island chain southwest of India that is fighting rising sea levels — jumped 68 percent from 2016 to 2017. In comparison, Squaremouth’s 20 most-traveled destinations saw an average increase of 15 percent in the same time period.
…
Australia
Travel interest boost: 25 percent
Tourists may be flocking down under to view the famously colorful Great Barrier Reef before it bleaches further due to warming sea temperatures. Last year marked the first year mass bleaching is known to have happened to the 1,400-mile-long habitat two years in a row.
…
In Australia, tourism operators are worried exaggerated claims of damage to the reef might put tourists off.
Barrier Reef not dead from coral bleaching says Queensland Tourism Industry Council
By Isobel Roe, Frances Adcock and Rachel Riga
Updated 29 Apr 2016, 11:15am
Queensland’s peak tourism body has defended the condition of the Great Barrier Reef after reports of severe coral bleaching.
The far northern end of the Great Barrier Reef is undergoing what is thought to be its worst bleaching event on record.
Scientists predict half of the affected corals could die during the phenomenon.
…
The Queensland Tourism Industry Council’s Daniel Gschwind said the reef was not dead.
“Many people around the globe have an interest, have a stake almost in the Great Barrier Reef, so negative publicity like that is clearly not helpful,” he said.
Mr Gschwind said while the environmental impact north of Cairns may be significant, reefs frequented by tourists were in much better condition.
“As long as we keep everybody appropriately informed of the fact that major tourism sites are largely intact and it still is the best reef in the world,” he said.
He said sharing accurate information would ensure tourists still wanted to visit the World Heritage site.
…
The Great Barrier Reef has become a political football in Australia.
In one corner we have the academics, who are screaming they need more funds to investigate the “unprecedented” bleaching of a reef which has survived hundreds of millions of years of mass extinction events and abrupt climate shifts. WUWT readers might remember Professor Peter Ridd, who is fighting grossly disproportionate attempts by James Cook University to sanction and silence him, after he publicly criticised nonsensical claims that the reef is dying.
In the other corner are Australian tourism groups and government bodies, who are worried the exaggerated claims pouring out of academia might poison a major source of income for Northern Queensland.
Helen Zhao’s claim that tourism is up because people want to see the reef before it dies just adds to the comedy.
It is just the continuing alarm to keep the scare fresh in the not so fertile minds of the believers and to keep the ‘scar funds’ on the conveyor belt; or, it could be just a tourist ploy.
New ingenious plots must be developed to replace the worn out tires.
‘scare funds’, not scar
Could be ‘scar funds’ to in the Hands of Alarmists too.
So, any scientists up for a study on how the increased tourism within the “Endangered” ecosystem will negatively affect the reef?
Certainly an over stressed coral reef would be negatively affected by the damages created from the increased tourism.
I volunteer to go on an all-expenses paid vacation – I mean, expedition! – to go “document” how the reef is in even worse shape than anyone thought.
What a conundrum they have. They have to claim that over 85% of the reef is bleached to support their agenda and attack any scientists who disagree, but then no one will come as tourists. So, the people living off tourism have to counter their claims with claims that are exactly opposite. Cool. It’s the tourists that will see which side is correct.
The BBC is ramping up the Great Barrier Reef scare this week.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09snj90
Bolshevik Broadcasting Commissariat.
Hmmmm.
Maybe the relevance escapes me.
Auto
…..”not so fertile minds of the believers,” When minds are chock full of unadulterated B. S. don’t you reckon those are, at a minimum, ‘fertilized’ minds?
Composted buffalo chips are excellent fertilizer.
Sadly, the influx of tourism will have a deleterious effect on the reef. There isn’t much worse than to have a herd of bumbling buffaloes tromping about a sensitive system.
So, let me get this right. People worried about AGW are flocking to the GBR to see it before it is destroyed by AGW by using the very technology that is, apparently, causing AGW? Too funny, side splitting, girdle wearing funny!
“Too funny, side splitting, girdle wearing funny!”
We at CliScep thought so too when our models predicted it. In fact we were almost too embarrassed—on behalf of the human race—to publish the results. I’m glad we did, though, now that it’s come to pass (three years ahead of schedule and latitudinally flipped):
2021: The Carbon Dioxide Bubble
Carbon [sic] concentrations officially hit 499 parts per million [ppm]. The tourism industry enjoys the biggest boom in history as it dawns on Generation Gore that that round-the-world wine-tasting odyssey is a matter of now or never. For travel agencies the pitch practically writes itself:
Book your dream holiday now, before CO2 levels make air travel unethical!
Flights to Europe start at just $1199 return.
No; the coral is certainly dead. They did autopsies before placing them on the funeral pyre. 😉
Yes, the reef may be dead, but so is human hair.
The real question is: is it healthy?
As long as you’ve got you health, a little bit of death isn’t going to kill you.
Coral or hair never were alive, to begin with, so “dead” seems inappropriate.
Coral are alive, at least to begin with. They are colonial animals. Sheesh Where did you think they came from?
But both coral and hair can be bleached apparently so the analogy has that going for it.
paqfelyc,
I have to disagree with your biology there. The shaft of a hair (the distal part, visible outside the epidermis) is made of keratinized, dead cells that were alive from the moment they first divided from their siblings in the follicle root, right up until their apoptosis (programmed cell death or “suicide”).
You might have a point about the coral though, provided that “coral” refers to an acellular, inanimate exoskeleton secreted by (living) coelenterates which are themselves referred to as “corals” sometimes. But I don’t know enough about the exoskeletal formation process to evaluate this premise.
The Great Barrier Reef is 2,300 kilometres long and up to 240 kilometres wide. There is every chance that at any given time, something will be going wrong somewhere along it. There is also an equal chance that somewhere along it things will be totally normal. The Alarmists will be naturally attracted to the former, while the tourists can swarm over the latter. The chances that it will be destroyed anytime soon are zero. Water temperatures vary from 24-30 C degrees along it during the year, so it can handle quite a lot before going out of business
Rather like a well-known cat in a box – alive and dead at the same time, with just as much conjecture about which state it is in at any one moment.
The “the Great Barrier Reef is dying” theme probably raised a fair amount of money for the green blob, but has anyone measured if tourism of the GBR is down because of the scare stories. CNBC states some people on one website are visiting because of the “imminent death” of the reef, but that is probably only a small fraction of potential tourists.
Tom, Scuba diving operators in the not so distant past, had many cancellations. They were a bit pissed as the reef in their areas were fine.
Can they unite in a class action against the alarmist academics and politicians to recover lost earnings?
All they have to do, to win the case perhaps, is to fit the judge up with scuba gear
mighta had something to do with a series of deaths while diving?
and present yr tourisms up because…commonwealth games on gold coast
Notice that the site did not actually ASK the people why they were going to visit? Sounds like they took a note from a lot of “scientific” papers: X is happening, and we like Y as a reason, therefore Y is definitely the explanation and we won’t bother checking for Z.
There’s a green sucker born every minute.
Cheap airfares and mass tourism are probably the biggest risk to the reef…
……and people are rushing to the funerals. They should all stay home and watch their environment; it will dry out or be flooded or blown away or burn……. (for sure)……..
for sure? Sounds like Andre has spent far too much time with a bible and a flashlight in some dark room.
you needed a /sarc tag? really?
If you really wanted to insult us believers you should have said “with a candle”.
If the USA’s wall with Mexico had solar panels on the south side and streaming images from OZ’s GBR on the north side there would be win win win win things — solar power, shorter travel distances to see the GBR from the U.S., solar panel makers get a boost, OLE big TV screen makers profit, and so on.
Okay, the tour boats now heading out with passengers might see their income drop a bit but they could be paid a fee for the streaming rights.
Over time, the comedic material provided by these xyz’ers posing as concerned humans is priceless.
We need clones of George Carlin.
His material was educative and stimulates logical thinking.
Come one, come all!
This way to The Egress!
The result of kicking “footballs” of this size is very sore feet. Probably as sore as treading on Crown of Thorns starfish which were predicted to completely destroy the reef 40 and more years ago and which resurface (no pun intended) as a dire calamity every decade or so.
Sigh!
Last chance to see snow…..
WOW that really looks bad…snow has all but disappeared in northern Africa
And Egypt appears to be in denial.
This is really getting Syrias
Was just looking at some of the wild temps in parts of Europe. The coldest spots high in the Alps have been hitting -20 F. That is some serious cold. Here is a 14 day temp record for a spot in the Italian Alps, …http://www.intellicast.com/Local/ObservationsSummary.aspx?location=ITTA1570
and here is St Moritz Switzerland with – 20 F temps, …http://www.intellicast.com/Local/ObservationsSummary.aspx?location=SZXX0041
Wasn’t the Great Barrier Reef high and dry 13,000 years ago? It is a product of rising seas. (Damn those Neanderthals).
To be a humorless pedant, Neanderthals were gone by about 30,000 years ago.
“Tom Halla February 25, 2018 at 6:12 pm”
I think you will find some in Washington DC, the Beehive in Wellington NZ, 10 Downing St, London, UK and Canberra here in Australia.
You libel Homo neanderthalensis.
I thought folks of European and Asiatic extraction had something like 2% Neanderthal DNA, on average? Or am I thinking Cro-Magnon DNA?
If I have the accounts right, Asians and Europeans, that is everyone but some sub-Saharan Africans, have some percentage of Neandertal or Denisovan ancestry. It was the strain that looks like Neaderthals in skeletal remains, not that they died out without issue.
Neanderthals were gone by about 30,000 years ago? See, another proof it is worse than we thought: tens of millennia after there dismissal (for sure because of there climate crime. It was climate crime to establish flint manufactures, and we know they did ), they still affected climate. And they only used a few fire; just imagine how long GaIa will take to recover from our crimes?
Neanderthals (and Denisovans) lost the game because they had all linebackers and slow fullbacks with no quarterbacks or wide receivers.
As sea levels gradually change the various species of corals just grow at the depth most suitable for them. Never look at a reef as a static unmoving object. Reefs are massive conglomerations of organisms constantly evolving and migrating through reproduction as conditions dictate.
Reef Salvation Industry:
– State Government funding.
– Federal Government funding.
– Corporate funding.
– University funding.
– Grants; any type we don’t discriminate.
We have a donation page where ‘reef scientists’ can make a donation to their own work.
Actually sorry we don’t have that . . .
.
Hurricane scares following Katrina paid well to Buffet and friends. Insurance rates “skyrocketed”. Tourist scares probably pay well to these blokes too; after all they do sell travel insurance. Rates to the GBR and Maldives would be high. They are a long way from most tourists, so stays probably will be longer. Do I remember that several new hotels were being built in the Maldives?
You remember correctly. Several billion bucks were spent building sea level resorts there, concurrently with their pleas to the UN that they were about to be inundated.
You wouldn’t want to go there now, however, because they are under martial law due to “political unrest.”
That and human rights violations.
Once upon a time there was 2 lands called Sahul Land and Sunda Land when the Great Barrier Reef was a coastal plain, Tasmania and PNG were part of continental Australia and the Malaysian Peninsula was joined to Indonesia.
http://sahultime.monash.edu.au/explore.html
Yup, yup, roll right up people!
Come and see our Great Barrier Reef while it lasts! Bribg tbose tourist dollars too!
Come again for as long as you like, the GBR isn’t going anywhere (but we’ll sell you the same line next time, don’t worry!)
Tourism will become a rare and exciting event.
Locals are not going to know what tourism is.
Quite the contrary. Australia is on the way to become a cheap tourist destination.
“Curious George February 25, 2018 at 6:38 pm”
Not for locals it’s not. If I wanted to go skiing this winter in Thredbo it would be cheaper to fly to Queenstown in New Zealand. And it’s better skiing too.
I love it! Capitalism at it’s best.
This looks JUST LIKE the run on guns we are seeing this week as Washington mulls more restrictions….
Who said that only politicians can profit from political B.S.?
After the worst mass shooting in Australia, Port Arthur in 1996, where 35 people were shot, Howard imposed very heavy gun laws and restrictions on gun ownership. Since then there has been more gun related crime in Australia.
The thing is, and a lot of people who support gun restrictions don’t get, laws won’t stop gun related crime. Criminals operate outside the law. More people die from alcohol, smoking, poor diet or even driving a car than from guns.
No mass shootings in Australia since the 1997 auto/semi-auto buy back.
Career criminals don’t do mass shootings.
Mentally ill people do.
Crims still have their semi-auto weapons here but they primarily use them on each other.
You can be selective with stats (and so can we) and you failed to mention your claim relates to absolute numbers not per-capita numbers and you know Australia’s population has greatly increased since 1996.
Anyway Australia’s current murder rate is the lowest in 25-years (and it’s one-fifth of the USA).
But still it has nothing to do with guns does it; here’s a list:
Which should be available to the general public; all or none?
1 FN FAL
2 M2HB 50-Caliber
3 Stoner AR-15
4 HK416 Assault
5 XM307 ACSW Advanced Heavy
6 F2000 Assault
7 Accuracy International AS50 Sniper
8 Thompson M1921 Submachine
9 Koch and Heckler HK MG4 MG 43
10 Kalashnikov AK-47 Assault
(Interesting but waaaay off topic) MOD
There has been no mass shootings in Australia since those laws were enforced .In New Zealand we have strict laws gun laws but there are still nutters who want to shoot up innocent people but at least there is a lot less guns in circulation and the semi automatics that the killers use in the USA are very hard to obtain .The last shooting was in Ashburton at a welfare office and now all WINZ that is welfare offices have security guards on the door .I don’t know how long the population will stomach mass killings in the USA before the general public calls for your laws to be changed .A country wide petition to your senate or a ballot paper for or against tougher gun laws when you have your general elections ,After all you pride your selves on being a democracy in the USA.
Silly argument. As the rate was so low to start with, none is not significantly different than one.. New Zealand does have a similar population mix, a similar crime rate, and different gun laws.
I am not an American. I am a British and New Zealand citizen living in Australia. I never said there were mass shootings after the 1996 event. I said there has been more gun crime, in fact there is more now than before the laws were introduced.
Patrick the mods have my earlier response in ‘moderation’ but I have to say you’re likely being intellectually dishonest with your claim.
Australia’s population is far greater than in 1996 so any discussion should be per-capita.
Right now Australia’s murder rate is the lowest in 25-years.
Mass killings using auto/semi-auto guns are (as you know) non existent.
Crims have as many guns as ever (perhaps more now).
The point is mentally ill people don’t have easy access to machine guns.
Make the semi-autos hard to get for the crackers and what was the result gwan? They started mowing down pedestrians on the footpaths with cars and it didn’t stop a couple of gangland executions to spoil the ambience of the coffee scene in Melbourne recently. How’s the barriers and bollards brigade doing?
As for the US if the FBI stopped working on how the Russians rolled their girl Hillary for a moment(the ghost of Joe McCarthy still walks) and concentrated on cracker intel coming in perhaps they’d have as much success as they did after 9/11 and our spooks are having with the Muslim brand of crackers. It’s what intelligent people do rather than thinking about banning cars that kill people.
But don’t get me started on the dangers that lurk in every shed and kitchen drawer as the mind boggles at the thought of what ride-on mowers are capable of-
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/other/man-81-injured-after-lawnmower-used-in-neighbour-dispute-police/ar-BBJvPZZ
Tom USA murder rate is 5 times that of Australia or New Zealand.
I think this discussion isn’t about crime in general.
Correct me if I’m wrong . . .
No, it is about attribution of a cause. For a point, it was once observed than ethnic Japanese in the US had a similar crime rate to Japanese in Japan.
Tom it’s not about “attribution of a cause”.
It’s about common sense and sensible laws that best protect the public.
There doesn’t have to be stats for something to be deemed unsuitable for ‘public’ ownership.
Why is it illegal for you to own a rocket launcher in the USA?
There have been restrictions on what weapons civilians can possess, which might have been a tactical mistake in reading the Constitution. Currently, explosives such as grenades and other grenade launchers are illegal, with anything full auto very restricted.
For a fairly short (it’s not that short, but it is an involved issue), try reading the US Supreme Court case Chicago v. McDonald. Those following the British system do not actually have an enforceable Constitution, so the notion of civil rights there is closer to the opinions followed by the “progressives” in the US.
“Warren Blair February 25, 2018 at 8:10 pm”
I prefer the Remington LA1A 7.62 SLR myself when I was in REME in the UK in the early 80’s.
http://www.news.com.au/national/crime/scary-trend-in-australian-gun-crime-with-more-than-200-shooting-deaths-a-year/news-story/374b4e55fdbb1718079c36979245d50c
Who to believe?
It’s illegal to defend oneself, family and property with a handgun in Australia. It’s OK though, the police are 10 minutes away!
I also worked for the NSW Police Force.
Anyway, I didn’t mean to derail the thread in to an OT subject.
“Career criminals don’t do mass shootings.”
unless they are Islamist. In which case, they do.
Warren,
With regards to your earlier post, if you’re going to filter out the criminals using guns on each other in Australia or NZ or wherever you’re from, then you need to honest and do the same thing in the U.S. I don’t know for sure, not having dug into it, but my firm belief based on the little reading I’ve done, is that the vast majority of gun homicides here are in a handful of major urban centers and are functionally equivalent to “crims using them on each other.” (i.e. gangs and etc.)
rip
Warren, if you don’t know the difference between a semi-automatic and a machine gun, then you don’t have enough information to form an opinion, much less lecturing others regarding your opinion.
A semi-automatic is pretty much anything that doesn’t have to be reloaded each time you pull the trigger.
If you think gun laws get rid of guns, you must also believe that drug laws have gotten illegal drugs off the street.
Sounds like a way to make money….kind of like a carnival barker imploring guests to “step right up” and come see some amazing sight before the carnival packs up and rolls out of town. Or maybe late night TV ads – you can get not one, but two – for $19.95 – BUT only if you act NOW!
Just another moderately aggressive sales pitch, and one likewise with an urgency that is rooted in deceit.
I just have to wonder if any of these tourists (especially the younger ones) will wake up one day a decade (or more) in the future and realize that they were hoodwinked.
And they all put on sunscreen before they jump into the pristine waters.
Given that the biggest single threat to the Reef is sunscreen…from the bodies of tourists…this is indeed bad news.
Have to visit the Brooklyn bridge before it gets sold. Been to the GBR a number of times in the past , so it is off the bucket list. Might have to visit Ularu before we are not allowed to climb it any more. Or before sea level rise turns it in to a rocky island accessible only by boat.
At least the doomsayers do not predict it will totally drown. Even they are not that dumb, but you never know.
I remember seeing coral in fish tanks for sale in exotic fish shops. The delicate coral needed very specific conditions to thrive. The right amount of light, temperature, salinity, etc. Now imagine covering your arm with sunscreen and sticking it in the tank with the delicate coral. How do you think things will work out?