By Jen Hayden | 2 August 2019
Daily Kos
Mother Nature is sounding the alarm on climate change. Images of Greenland’s historic ice melt are going viral after Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Laurie Garrett shared video on Twitter of flooding waters in Greenland, where extreme high temperatures are being recorded this summer.
Watch this video after the fold below, and see what climate scientists are saying about the severe climate change happening before our very eyes.
I’m no scientist, but this seems alarming. Oh wait, I forgot I am actually a scientist.
— 🍺HereHoldMyBeer🍺 (@flyaway_k) August 2, 2019
Climate scientist and glaciologist Ruth Mottram, who studies Greenland and the Arctic, noted Greenland has lost 11 gigatonnes of ice. That is 24,250,848,840,336, or 24 quadrillion pounds of ice.
The #Greenland #icesheet starts August as it ended July – 11 Gigatonnes lost on 1st: highest daily total of the #melt season so far
Melt season should ramp down over the month but forecast shows warm period continuing next few dayshttps://t.co/R2dc4Kkjgl pic.twitter.com/D1g7gD1kVx
— Ruth Mottram (@ruth_mottram) August 2, 2019
Just how much water is that? Here’s climate scientist and Arctic permafrost expert Martin Stendel with the terrifying figures.
Ongoing extreme melt event in #Greenland. The amount of ice that melted from the surface of the ice sheet just during the last two days would be enough to cover #Florida with almost five inches of water. pic.twitter.com/c4zeD8YNCT
— Martin Stendel (@MartinStendel) August 2, 2019
ENOUGH WATER HAS MELTED IN TWO DAYS TO ENTIRELY COVER FLORIDA IN FIVE INCHES OF WATER. Meanwhile, in Florida today:
It’s not raining on Miami Beach, but it’s high tide in a King Tide stretch. Water is coming up from the sidewalk at 31st and Collins Avenue pic.twitter.com/dEa9R1LuzO
— Doug Hanks (@doug_hanks) August 2, 2019
Climate scientist Robert Rohde lays out how serious the situation is historically, given that two of these historic records have come in the last seven years.
On July 31st, the highest point on Greenland’s ice sheet experienced melting for only the ninth time in 2000 years. Here are all the years that has happened, including twice in the last decade.
Directly observed
2019
2012Seen in ice cores
1889
1192
1094
992
758
753
244— Robert Rohde (@RARohde) August 2, 2019
And it appears it will only get worse, as conditions are just right to accelerate the melt.
Rep. Ilhan Omar spoke out after viewing the video, saying, “The climate crisis is an existential threat to humanity. It is time for us to mobilize accordingly.” And she’s right. This isn’t just an environmental threat; it is a matter of national security. Look at the chaos and disruption brought about by Hurricane Katrina, when the city of New Orleans had to be evacuated, and many people were permanently displaced. What happens if the unthinkable becomes a reality and large numbers of Florida residents are driven out of their homes? Or residents of New York City and other large coastal cities? Already the beaches of Florida are eroding at historic rates due to storms that are more frequent and devastating due to climate change. That means that climate change is an economic threat as well. Florida’s tourism industry generates $67 billion a year.
We have ideas to fix this, and we must immediately get started. Those who mock the Green New Deal and stand in the way of saving the world must be driven out of office as fast as we can do it. The time to act was yesterday. As Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said, “We don’t have time to argue. We need to act—on a massive scale.”
This is what sea level rise looks like.
Those who argue that a #GreenNewDeal is too ambitious don’t see that glacial melt isn’t waiting – in fact, it’s happening at a much faster rate than predicted.
We don’t have time to argue. We need to act – on a massive scale. 🌎 https://t.co/VbpT1sCudq
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) August 2, 2019
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