As the dangerous hurricane made landfall and crossed Florida, a strange conspiracy theory emerged linking this meteorological event to the November election.
Hurricanes remind humanity of the uncontrollable and chaotic power of Earth’s climate. beach Florida BayIn these storm-torn days, it is facing a hurricane that even reached category 5, but it fell to category 1 on Thursday.
The eye of Hurricane Milton reached Tampa, which had not been directly affected by a storm, on Wednesday as workers scrambled to clear debris left behind by Helene two weeks ago and roads were clogged with people fleeing the storm. The biggest hurricane in more than a century.
Scientists warned that it would weaken before reaching land. Passing from Florida towards the Atlantic Ocean. This will at least prevent much of the damage caused by Helene killing. 230 people Passing through Florida and the Carolinas.
While evacuation orders were given, meteorologists warned of a possible incident Swelling waves of 2 to 3 meters In Tampa Bay. According to National Hurricane Center spokeswoman Maria Torres, highest level ever estimated for the region, nearly double the levels reached two weeks ago during Hurricane Helene.
It also brings a storm widespread flooding: Between 13 and 25 centimeters of rain are expected in mainland Florida and the Keys, with up to 38 centimeters expected in some places. Population of the Tampa metropolitan area More than 3.3 million population.
“This is a very large population. It’s very exposed, it’s very inexperienced, and that’s dangerous,” says the Massachusetts Institute of Technology meteorology professor. Kerry Emmanuel. “I always thought Tampa would be the city I would be most worried about.”
Conspiracy theories
Just days after Helene devastated much of the southeastern United States, Milton’s strong move toward Florida caused some residents in the region to wonder whether they were under attack.
In some corners of the internet Helene has already exposed conspiracy theories and disinformation suggesting that the government somehow diverted the hurricane to the region. Republican voters.
In addition to ignoring common sense, these theories also ignore meteorological history; This shows that: hurricanes hit many of the same areas It’s something they’ve been doing for centuries. They also assume the ability of humans to rapidly change the climate, well beyond relatively small efforts such as cloud seeding.
“If meteorologists could stop hurricanes, we would stop them too,” he says Kristen CorbosieroProfessor of Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences at the University at Albany. “If we could control the weather“We don’t want the kind of death and destruction that occurred.” Let’s look at what humans can and cannot do when it comes to climate.
The strength of hurricanes increased with climate change
A hurricane in full development releases heat energy equivalent to a tornado. 10 megaton nuclear bombThat’s more than all the energy used by humanity at any given time, according to the chief of tropical analysis. National Hurricane Center, Chris Landsea.
Scientists are now discovering many ways to do this. climate change hurricanes are getting worse warmer oceans Director Chris Field says this adds energy and more water to the atmosphere, where it heats up and falls as rain. Instituto Woods de Stanford For the environment.
“The amount of energy a hurricane produces is crazy,” says hurricane researcher Phil Klotzbach. Colorado State University. He says it is the height of human arrogance to think that people have the power to change themselves. But that hasn’t stopped people from trying, or at least considering trying.
Efforts to control hurricanes have failed
Studied Jim Fleming at Colby College historical attempts to control climate and he believes that humankind does not even have the practical technology to achieve this. Describes an attempt in 1947 General Electric was associated with US Army Dropping dry ice from Air Force planes into the path of a hurricane in an attempt to weaken it. It didn’t work.
“Typical science is about understanding, predicting, and then possibly controlling,” Fleming says. the atmosphere is much stronger and more complex than most proposals to control it. “He’s going back there greek mythology To think that you can control the powers of the heavens is also a failed idea.
ADVERTThe federal government briefly tested it in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. Project STORMFURY. The idea was to seed a hurricane to replace the eyewall with a larger hurricane, which would cause the storm to be larger in size but weaker in intensity.
The tests were inconclusive, and researchers realized that if they made the storm larger, there might be people uninjured by the storm.They would now be in danger. As the project director once said, this represents a question of ethics and responsibility.
Recommended for decades National Hurricane Center and its parent company, ANational Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the probability of a hurricane nuking. But Corbosiero says the bombs are not powerful enough and would increase the problem of radioactive fallout.
Climate change raises many questions
Failed attempts to control hurricanes are a bit different from some scientists’ futuristic ideas for combating climate change and extreme weather events. Instead of focusing on specific weather events, modern geoengineers They would act on a larger scale, Considering how to reverse the large-scale damage humans have caused to the global climate by emitting greenhouse gases.
ADVERTAccording to scientists, solar geoengineering is one of the most promising ideas based on computer models. The method would involve shooting aerosol particles into the upper atmosphere to bounce small amounts of sunlight back into space and slightly cool the planet.
Its supporters are aware of the risks and challenges. But it could also “provide huge benefits, especially for the world’s poorest,” he says. David Keith, university professor
Two years ago, the largest group of scientists working on climate issues American Geophysical UnionHe announced that he had developed an ethical framework for “climate intervention”.
Some scientists warn that interfering with the Earth’s atmosphere to solve climate change could create a cascade of new problems. climate scientist Michael Mannat Pennsylvania State University, fears that simply talking about guidelines will make the intervention more likely to occur in the real world. harmful side effects.
ADVERTStanford’s Field agrees that modeling strongly encourages Geoengineering could be effectiveEven to mitigate the worst hurricane threats, although those are decades away. But he emphasizes that this is only part of the best solution, which is to stop climate change by reducing greenhouse gas emissions. “Whatever we do, this should be the core of our activities,” he says.
