The further to the left or the right you move, the more your lens on life distorts.

Wednesday, August 09, 2023

Hunga-Tonga

Even the Wall Street Journal news section—decidedly more left-leaning than its editorial section—has embraced climate hysteria, telling us:

July was Earth’s hottest month on record, surpassing the global monthly average temperature record set in July 2019, according to data from the Copernicus Climate Change Service, a European Union-funded scientific agency. The heat blanketed parts of North America, Asia and Europe as wildfires blazed in Greece and Canada, hitting economies. Water shortages and high humidity affected parts of the Middle East. Residents in China contended with both extreme flooding and a heat wave as the country set a new national temperature record. All this came on the heels of the world’s hottest June on record.

This message has been the drumbeat of the propaganda media for the entire summer. We're supposed to believe a hot summer is a harbinger of the apocalypse, must like COVID would kill us all unless we hid in our basements, wore masks, locked down businesses, took ineffective injections, closed schools, and otherwise expressed irrational fear as a form of virtue signalling.

Ever heard of Hunga-Tonga, an underwater volcano that erupted in the South Pacific last year? Probably not. It didn't get much coverage from the propaganda media ... because ... connecting a few dots might explain why this summer has been so hot. Hunga Tonga produced 40 trillion gallons (!!) of high altitude water vapor that climate scientists believe may warm the northern hemisphere of our planet for the next few years.

In a pre-publication version of a paper by scientists in Australia, we encounter the following comment:

Volcanic eruptions typically cool the Earth’s surface by releasing aerosols which reflect sunlight. However, a recent eruption released a significant amount of water vapor—a strong greenhouse gas — into the stratosphere with unknown consequences. This study examines the aftermath of the eruption and reveals that surface temperatures across large regions of the world increase by over 1.5 degrees C for several years, although some areas experience cooling close to 1 degree C. Additionally, the research suggests a potential connection between the eruption and sea surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific, which warrants further investigation . . .

They further conclude that this affect could last through 2029!

Hmmm. Climate alarmists try mightily to attach CO2 emissions to any adverse natural event (e,g., drought or hurricanes), and it's no fun for them to blame a volcanic eruption for temperature variability. They'd prefer their authoritarian mandates, condemning SUVs or industrial farming for what the UN calls, "an era of global boiling.

Then again, as idiotic as that UN statement was, there may be some truth in it. After all, last I checked, volcanos do come to a "boil." 

UPDATE:

My goodness, the parallels with Covid hysteria are mind-boggling. Right on schedule, we get this:

Anything that conflicts with the approved narrative (no matter how wrong the narrative might be) is "disinformation."

Anyone who suggests that it's "disinformation" to ask questions about the effects of climate change or to propose alternative explanations for, say, "historic temperatures" during a given month in a given year is ignorant of how science works. Pathetic.