The Global Warming thread.

[O Really]

Yo GoCubsGo - you ok with all the dust storm? Should we expect to see lines of Okie-looking Joads with IL plates on their piles high Lexi coming out to take jobs away from the immigrants?

[GoCubsGo]

Yo GoCubsGo - you ok with all the dust storm? Should we expect to see lines of Okie-looking Joads with IL plates on their piles high Lexi coming out to take jobs away from the immigrants?

It actually missed me, but it was windy as all get out.

Makes me a little skeered bout the future.

At least we will get cool hats.

This was the first time NWS Chicago issued a Dust Storm Warning that included the Chicago metropolitan area.
The only other time our office has issued Dust Storm Warnings was on May 7, 2023 (2 were issued during that event).
Dust storms are uncommon, but not unprecedented, in the Midwest region. However, it is very rare for a Dust Storm to impact Chicago.
The last time a dust storm impacted Chicago was on May 31, 1985. According to newspaper accounts, visibility in downtown Chicago got down to 4 miles. Visibility outside of Chicago was worse, and lead to a deadly pile-up on I-90 near Marengo (between Rockford and Chicago).
The last time a dust storm of this magnitude impacted Chicago was during the Dust Bowl in the early 1930s. Records from that time period are difficult to verify, though a dust storm on May 10, 1934 appears to be the closest analog to this event.
Other dust storms to impact Chicago during the Dust Bowl include April 12, 1935, April 24, 1934, and November 13, 1933.
https://www.weather.gov/lot/2025_05_16_DustStorm

[O Really]

Saw a documentary some time ago about the Dust Bowl. Terrifying fershure.

[Vrede too]

Saw a documentary some time ago about the Dust Bowl. Terrifying fershure.

Hopefully can't get that bad again. It wasn't just the drought and winds. It was also poor farming practices. The feds play a role - research, education and paying farmers to keep some of their fields fallow. Not sure what DOGE will do to all this.

[GoCubsGo]

Hey Jasmine,

Do you have anything local?


Hawaii's once-vivid coral reefs are "all bleached white"

[Vrede too]

Hey Jasmine,

Do you have anything local?


Hawaii's once-vivid coral reefs are "all bleached white"

I snorkeled the Big Island 10 year or so ago. That's sad.

[Vrede too]

Scientists issue warning over crisis that will force millions from their homes: 'We're starting to see some of the worst-case scenarios play out'

Sea level rise has long been seen as a distant consequence of our planet's overheating. But new research reveals it's accelerating faster than expected — and we may be approaching a point where even our best efforts won't be enough to hold back the tide....

Crap. So many models were too conservative.

[Vrede too]

It has begun. AGW and the melting Greenland ice cap are affecting ocean currents.

A Mysterious Blob of Cold Water Defies Ocean Heat – Now We Know Why

[Vrede too]

Ut-oh.

The ‘Great Dying’ wiped out 90% of life, then came 5 million years of lethal heat. New fossils explain why

Around 252 million years ago, life on Earth suffered its most catastrophic blow to date: a mass extinction event known as the “Great Dying” that wiped out around 90% of life.

What followed has long puzzled scientists. The planet became lethally hot and remained so for 5 million years.

A team of international researchers say they have now figured out why using a vast trove of fossils — and it all revolves around tropical forests.

Their findings, published Wednesday in the journal Nature Communications, may help solve a mystery, but they also spell out a dire warning for the future as humans continue to heat up the planet by burning fossil fuels....

It has been attributed to a period of volcanic activity in a region known as the Siberian Traps, which released huge amounts of carbon and other planet-heating gases into the atmosphere, causing intense global warming. Enormous numbers of marine and land-based plants and animals died, ecosystems collapsed and oceans acidified....

The Great Dying extinction event is unique “because it’s the only one in which the plants all die off,” said Benjamin Mills, a study author and a professor of Earth system evolution at the University of Leeds....

The results confirmed their hypothesis, showing that the loss of vegetation during the mass extinction event significantly reduced the planet’s ability to store carbon, meaning very high levels remained in the atmosphere....

Michael Benton, a professor of paleontology at the University of Bristol, who was not involved in the study, said the research shows “the absence of forests really impacts the regular oxygen-carbon cycles and suppresses carbon burial and so high levels of CO2 remain in the atmosphere over prolonged periods,” he told CNN....

This is a key takeaway from the study, Mills said. It shows what might happen if rapid global warming causes the planet’s rainforests to collapse in the future — a tipping point scientists are very concerned about.

Even if humans stop pumping out planet-heating pollution altogether, the Earth may not cool. In fact, warming could accelerate, he said.

There is a sliver of hope: The rainforests that currently carpet the tropics may be more resilient to high temperatures than those that existed before the Great Dying. This is the question the scientists are tackling next.

This study is still a warning, Mills said. “There is a tipping point there. If you warm tropical forests too much, then we have a very good record of what happens. And it’s extremely bad.”

Yikes. What have we done?