Black Sunday, April 14, 1935, Dodge City, Kansas -- Dust Bowl History
Even more stark ...
Dust Bowl 2: Drought detective predicts drier future for American Southwest
by Seth Shulman, grist.org -- Aug 12 2010
[...] The Southwest is as dry as it is because the local atmospheric flow tends to export far more moisture than storms can carry into the region. This is the case in other parts of the so-called subtropics, those areas directly north and south of the equatorial tropics. But as earth's atmosphere becomes laden with heat-trapping greenhouse gases, it will be able to retain even more moisture. That means more evaporation from lakes and rivers, more moisture loss from plants, and drier soil.
A critical player in this drying cycle is the planetary-scale circulation system known as the "Hadley cell." This vast atmospheric system links rising air near the Equator with descending air in the subtropics, giving rise to the subtropical jet streams.
[...]
The Hadley cell is growing. Its expansion above a larger swath of the American Southwest, along with a shifting of the jet stream and many storms northward, is a worrisome trend, says Seager. It means there is little chance that the Southwest can avoid becoming drier in the coming decades. In fact, when Seager's team analyzed some 49 computer projections of the region's likely future climate, using 19 major climate models, all but 3 scenarios agreed: drought ahead.
[ That's the message from Richard Seager, a climate scientist at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory. The American Southwest, says Seager, is soon likely to experience a "permanent drought" condition on par with the Dust Bowl of the 1930s.]
"Permanent drought" otherwise known as "the New Normal".
Welcome to the 21st Century people.
Sinking air -- is usually "drying air" ... as anyone who has experienced "Santa Ana Winds" can attest. It's just Physics ...
The Hadley Cell, is also known by its more common names: The Trade Winds, the Horse Latitudes. They have a very dramatic and often desperate history, in the tales of sailing lore ...
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The Hadley Cell is growing -- that Creator of Deserts, that driver of the Horse Latitudes ... but it's NOT the only Climate-driver changing its non-beneficial behavior of late ...
Texas Drought Now Far, Far Worse Than When Gov. Rick Perry Issued Proclamation Calling on All Texans to Pray for Rain
by Joe Romm, thinkprogress.org -- Jul 15, 2011
Minnesota temperatures next week will be "extreme out-of-the-ordinary" -- just like Bachmann and Pawlenty
CNN reports today:
[...]
The month of June was the hottest recorded for Texas since 1895, according to the National Weather Service.
I [writer] know it is just a coincidence, but Minnesota is going to get a taste over the next several days of a Tea Party future (as will much of the rest of the country).
[...]
National Weather Service:
"The stage is being set for a massive heat wave to develop into next week as a large area of high pressure is anticipated to circulate hot and humid air over much of the central and eastern U.S. Maximum heat index values of at least 100°F are likely across much of this area by the middle of next week, with heat index values in excess of 110°F possible over portions of these areas."
[the Heat Wave of 2011: ]
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[...] the 'adaptation' strategy of Gov. Rick Perry of Texas has been to designate 3 "days of prayer for rain" while cutting the budget of agency battling record wildfires.
Well there IS another more Reality-based approach, rather than appealing to the gods of the winds and the rain ... and preforming 'slash and burn' fiscal rituals ...
Exclusive: Al Gore On His 'Climate Reality Project' Launch: "It's Urgent To Rendezvous With Reality To Save The Future Of Civilization As We Know It."
by Joe Romm, thinkprogress.org --- Jul 12, 2011
Today, Former Vice President Gore launched The Climate Reality Project "to broadcast the reality of the climate crisis and mobilize citizens to help solve it."
Al Gore:
[...] This crisis is very threatening, very urgent. We know the solutions require broad changes and we know it’s a fight that won’t be won overnight. And the politics, the campaigns, the media cycle, will all ebb and flow on this issue. But the reality of the crisis marches on. If we keep focusing on that reality, it is only a matter of time before we reach a tipping point with the public, beyond which inaction is no longer an option.
24 Hours of Reality
ClimateReality
http://www.youtube.com/...
[Al Gore:]
It's been called the 'New Normal' -- but there's nothing 'Normal' about.
[...]
Big Oil and Big Coal are spending Big Money -- to spread Doubt about Climate Change, they've been able to do so quietly. But not anymore [...]
Together we have something they don't -- Reality.
... and Time ... Marches on. (on CurrentTV, no less.)
Those who do not learn from history, are doomed to repeat it.
--
George Santayana
Lesson number one: ... the gods of the winds and the rain get their 'Marching Orders' from Physics and Thermodynamics -- Not from Governor Perry's "permanent pleas" for for rain ...
Lesson number two: ... Progress is related to the application of Science ... as a History of very real civilized Results, clearly shows ... It's just Physics, afterall ...
The Dust Bowl Years
written by Dorothy Creigh -- 2011, Adams County Nebraska Historical Society.
[...] It was darkness at noon-impenetrable clouds of red, or yellow, or brown gritty dust swirling across the countryside, carrying with it topsoil, seed, and the hope of the Great Plains farmers. It was inescapable heat in mid-summer; it was parching drought, furnace-like winds. It was the Dust Bowl of the 1930's. Whereas the Great Depression of the early 1930's affected almost all Americans in one way or another, the Dust Bowl years that followed were the affliction of the Great Plains, a phenomenon peculiar to that geographic area. That the people were able to survive the twin calamities of the Depression, then the Dust Bowl, is a measure of their vigor, tenacity, and strength.
Question is:
Will we, the modern wired generation, find the same tenacity, and strength of spirit, to adapt and survive to the Climate-Crazy years ahead?
Once again ... Time ... will tell. If only we had leaders, showing the way ...
If only we were "enlightened enough" to listen ... and act. To Progress ... using the brains, that the gods or the fates, gave us.
(Migrant mother, aged thirty-two with seven hungry children, Nipomo, CA)
Courtesy of Library of Congress
California Odyssey: Dust Bowl Migration Archives