By Paul Bledsoe
Last week, on the 16th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Ida unleashed 150 mile-an-hour winds and slammed into New Orleans, super-fueled to huge size and rain-making power by the Gulf of Mexico whose temperatures are 3 to 5 degrees higher than the average just 30 years ago. In its wake, more than a million people in Louisiana and neighboring states have been left without water, power or air conditioning amid stifling hundred-degree heat. Then the remnants of Hurricane Ida delivered torrential rain and flooding in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York so intense it killed at least 40 people across the region while paralyzing New York City. Even before the Northeast flooding, economic costs from Ida were estimated to be $80 billion.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the country, another devastating year of fire fueled by climate change-exacerbated drought and high temperatures keeps getting worse. The massive Caldor fire, already more than 200,000 acres, has been roaring through the Lake Tahoe area, sending tens of thousands of citizens fleeing in chaos. Caldor was only the second fire in history to begin on the western slope of the Sierra Nevada mountains and cross to the eastern side. Last year alone, five of the ten largest fires in California history occurred, burning over 4.2 million acres, killing 30 people, and shockingly becoming the new normal.
