Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Climate scientists have expressed their dismay that Aussie politicians are not treating this year’s awful bushfire season as a wakeup call for climate action.
Leading scientists condemn political inaction on climate change as Australia ‘literally burns’
Climate experts ‘bewildered’ by government ‘burying their heads in the sand’, and say bushfires on Australia’s east coast should be a ‘wake-up call’
Lisa Cox
Sat 7 Dec 2019 06.00 AEDT
Last modified on Sat 7 Dec 2019 06.03 AEDTLeading scientists have expressed concern about the lack of focus on the climate crisis as bushfires rage across New South Wales and Queensland, saying it should be a “wake-up call” for the government.
Climate experts who spoke to Guardian Australia said they were “bewildered” the emergency had grabbed little attention during the final parliamentary sitting week for the year, which was instead taken up by the repeal of medevac laws, a restructure of the public service, and energy minister Angus Taylor’s run-in with the American author Naomi Wolf.
…
Sarah Perkins-Kirkpatrick, a climate scientist with the University of NSW’s Climate Change Research Centre, said she was “surprised, bewildered, concerned” that the emergency had prompted little discussion from political leaders this week.
“Here we are in the worst bushfire season we’ve ever seen, the biggest drought we’ve ever had, Sydney surrounded by smoke, and we’ve not heard boo out of a politician addressing climate change,” she said.
“They dismissed it from the outset and haven’t come back to it since.
“They’re burying their heads in the sand while the world is literally burning around them and that’s the scary thing. It’s only going to get worse.”
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/dec/07/leading-scientists-condemn-political-inaction-on-climate-change-as-australia-literally-burns
The reason, of course, is just like in the USA the Aussie bushfires are a forest mismanagement issue, not a climate change issue.
Government hostility towards back burning and harsh treatment of farmers who try to manage fire risk has led to a catastrophic buildup of fuel load in the Aussie bush, and now that accumulated fuel load is burning. Big surprise.
In my opinion Climate scientists who try to take advantage of a problem which is obviously not climate related are simply exposing their activism and lack of objectivity.
Leading scientists have expressed concern about the lack of focus on the climate crisis
Who are they ‘leading’? Likely not those scientists interested in inquiry and rational analysis of observations. More likely, the celebrity worshippers in the ‘news’ media who do their best to steer public opinion.
I did a search of the NY Times digital archive aka TimesMachine. I used the terms fires Australia and drought Australia 1920-1980. I got 3000 hits for the former and 2000 for the latter. BTW if do drought California you get almost 11000 hits
Climate Scientists Bewildered
Climate/Skeptics/Realists Amused
Film at 11.
I would like to see a live demonstration by Loydo and the climate scientists of climate change starting a fire. A video of the demonstration would be helpful. that way we would have an eye witness report for the media.
The bogeyman global average temperature has gone up, what, a few hundredths of a degree, in the last 20 years.
So how in heck could this suddenly cause massive fires?
Bewildered? Here, I can help with that. Try unplugging your perpetual-grant machine and get out more.
Not even wrong, hey Mosh.
Former PM Malcolm Turnbull while FLYING into Sydney tweeted that ‘the bushfire smoke shrouding Sydney reinforces the need to move towards zero emissions.’ Meanwhile, the PM he knifed, Tony Abbott, was in the midst of the Gospers Mt. fire in his capacity as a volunteer fire-fighter.
Saying this like that while flying, not in coach class, is why is he FORMER PM. He doesn’t get it.
If only politicians would listen to the scientists:
Trump Science Advisor Will Happer Says Global Warming Is a ‘Scam’
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2019/12/07/trump-science-advisor-will-happer-global-warming-is-a-scam/
Stupidity and mismanagement are the major contributors to fire severity and drought. I did hear that the greens were preventing the water bombers from filling up locally causing longer flight times and considerably greater cost.
Seeing that the current conditions are quite like the Federation Drought of 1895-1903 it’s not entirely surprising that pollies aren’t listening.
The Federation Drought, after all, occurred even before Al Gore did his movie. Maybe he needs to back date his book to 1885 using a Tesla pickup and a 1.81 GW flux capacitor.
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3040738/chinas-deep-sea-prospectors-may-find-key-marine-heatwaves
Undersea volcano off Madagascar May cause drought in Australia.
Tax-funded TV presenter badgers politician to agree there is a direct link between Climate Change and the bush-fires. The politician sensibly declines.
https://twitter.com/BreakfastNews/status/1204495361961680896