1357 replies to this topic

[Nparker]

So if southern Vancouver Island's land mass is rising, doesn't this put the RBCM in less danger of flooding?

[dasmo]

I’m pretty sure your hypothesis won’t get funding

[Nparker]

I’m pretty sure your hypothesis won’t get funding

What if I suggest that rising land masses are a result of colonization?

[dasmo]

Bingo!

[lanforod]

What if I suggest that rising land masses are a result of colonization?

 

too many people on the eastern seaboard. Fulcrum effect, sinking there, raising on the west coast. Makes sense.   

[Nparker]

too many people on the eastern seaboard...

Is the percentage different than in pre-colonial times?

[lanforod]

Actually, precolonial, the vast majority were below the Rio Grande. Like, >90%.

[Nparker]

I was really only thinking pre-European contact on Vancouver Island.

[Victoria Watcher]

B.C. to send emergency text alerts to warn of heat waves


https://www.timescol...t-waves-5449088



British Columbians will first get a heat warning indicating temperatures are rising. If it persists, a broadcast will get beamed out across text message, radio and television.


Almost a year after a deadly heat wave killed nearly 600 people in British Columbia, the provincial government has unveiled a new plan to prepare and warn of incoming extreme heat.





A little late for 600 people, no?

Edited by Victoria Watcher, 06 June 2022 - 03:59 PM.

[Nparker]

What an absolute waste of public resources. 😒

[Victoria Watcher]

Heat wave affects some communities differently

 

Dr. Jatinder Baidwan, chief medical officer, B.C. Coroners Service, said some people face greater risk during extreme heat.

 

Two-thirds of those heat-related deaths were among people aged 70 and older, while more than 80 per cent of those who died were on three or more chronic disease registries, according to the report.

 

Fifty-six per cent of those who died lived alone, while almost every death — 98 per cent — occurred indoors. 

 

"Most of the deceased were older adults with compromised health due to multiple chronic diseases and
who lived alone," the report said.

 

 

 

https://www.cbc.ca/n...eport-1.6480026

Edited by Victoria Watcher, 07 June 2022 - 12:08 PM.

[Nparker]

Heat wave affects some communities differently...

I really do learn something new every day. Thank you CBC for more of your remarkable journalism.

[dasmo]

So no one dies of old age anymore... 

[Victoria Watcher]

Ok. Let’s think this through rationally.



Victoria plans suite of measures to take sting out of extreme heat

The City of Victoria is planning ahead for the next extreme heat event after last year's heat dome caused temperatures to rise to almost 40 C.



Patterson said in extreme cases cooling centres may have to be established where the public can go to get some relief.

She noted local shopping centres and libraries offer air-conditioned spaces, while many senior’s centres offer similar kinds of places.

She said the city will create its own centres in the same way warming centres are established in the winter, by activating facilities to handle an influx of people.

Cooling centres, she said, would ideally be centralized, air-conditioned buildings that would have washing facilities and be pet friendly.


https://www.timescol...me-heat-5395862



Given that well over 99% of the people in the CoV have homes, wouldn’t it just make more sense to just remind people how to cool at home? Surely a shower or bath beats going out to a “mist centre”.

A similar education program can exist for the homeless.

 

 

 

 

 

We can’t prepare for an event that rare

 

Re: “Last year’s heat deaths? Stop blaming the heat,” editorial, June 17.

 

The editorial argues that we should stop blaming the heat for the hundreds of deaths in last June’s heat dome. While there were some failures in planning and policy, the editorial ignores the exceptional nature of this event.

 

Many people, including your editorial writer, still don’t seem to grasp just how extraordinary and rare an event this was. Weather historian Christopher Burt described it as “the most anomalous regional extreme heat event to occur anywhere on Earth since temperature records began” roughly 150 years ago with the beginnings of modern meteorology.

 

Never before have so many all-time temperature records been broken by such a large margin in one region by a single event. According to international weather records researcher Maximiliano Herrera, more all-time heat records were broken by at least 5 degrees C in the June 2021 heat wave than in the previous 84-plus years of worldwide weather record keeping combined.

 

An analysis of the June 2021 heat wave by a team of international climatologists estimated that this was a one-in-1,000-year event for our region, and it could have been as rare as a one-in-10,000-year event. There have been references in the media to these kind of events becoming “the new normal,” but that is simply not the case.

 

While climate change will result in more heat waves in our region and more 30 C-plus days in the summer, events of this magnitude (40 C plus) will still be very rare. The same team of climatologists estimated that, even with the 2 C of warming expected over the next 30 years, an event as extreme as last June’s heat wave can still only be expected to occur once in every 300 or more years in our region.

 

In other words, we are unlikely to see a repeat of this event in any of our lifetimes.

 

Yes, we should plan and prepare for future heat waves, which will gradually become more frequent. However, last June’s heat event was so rare and extraordinary that it is simply not practical or feasible to expect that we should be fully prepared for every such event.

 

Steven Murray
Victoria

 

https://www.timescol...didates-5500827

Edited by Victoria Watcher, 21 June 2022 - 03:30 PM.

[Nparker]

 

 

Yes, we should plan and prepare for future heat waves, which will may gradually become more frequent

Had to correct that.

[freedom_2008]

Had to correct that.

You are making an error, not a correction. 

 

From the US National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine:

“Heat waves have happened in the past, but climate change is making heat waves longer, more extreme , and more frequent.”

 

https://www.national...and-more-common

[Nparker]

No one can say what WILL happen, only what they think will happen. Predictions are not fact.

[dasmo]

If you say it forcefully it becomes more true.

[Mike K.]

And here we go again.

Everyone’s been complaining its been wet and gloomy, now everyone starts complaining it’s too hot.

[Nparker]

To be fair, after months and months of below seasonal temperatures, even a moderate increase is going to feel hot at first.