[ExI] ian came home

[spike at rainier66.com]

The eye of Ian is right over top where I cheerfully squandered my tragically
misspent youth.  My mother I already know is OK because of the elevation of
her house and the trees were just trimmed last summer.  By brother is at
elevation 8 ft, so he might have some flooding.  We have heard from John
Clark: he is OK, just a lotta rain.  I have a lotta friends in that area but
no word from them yet because the power is out.  It is now a tropical storm,
so the damage is unlikely to be severe: a lot of rain, which is actually a
good thing if it doesn't wreck stuff.

 

Notice something interesting: politicians are using this storm as proof that
global warming is causing increasing amounts of damage from storms.  But
just the opposite is true.  2022 is still a lower than average storm year.
If there is increasing dollar damage, it isn't because of more storms and
more severe storms, it is because of where the storms land, which is not a
function of global warming.  Note the chart, just updated minutes ago:

 

 



 

http://tropical.atmos.colostate.edu/Realtime/index.php?loc=northatlantic

 

I was cheering for 2022 to catch up to at least average, but it probably
will not.  Reasoning: Ian is now contributing almost nothing to this metric,
the ACE, accumulated cyclone energy, because it is down to a tropical storm
after crossing over land.  Hermine fizzled after one day, aaaand. there is
nothing out there currently.  One very minor tropical elation, but it is
very plausible we could finish the season with an ACE in the paltry 70s.  

 

However. 2022 will be remembered as a horrifying storm year anyway, because
Ian crossed a lot of highly populated areas, and more importantly, it made
landfall near Naples, where there is a lot of money and a lot of yachts and
a lot of private planes and a lot of dignity to be offended by proles
driving around in their internal combustion jalopies.

 

By objective measures however. 2022 is still likely to be a mild storm year,
so it fails to support the popular theories and popular proposed solutions.
The problem isn't the storms, it is our building expensive stuff with
insufficient storm protection, with the one thing that never fails to amaze
me: why in the heeeellllll do see photos of wrecked airplanes?  AIRPLANES!
Those things are fast!  Hurricanes are slow!  You just hafta get your ass
down to the local airport, load up your dog and your favorite children, get
on outta Dodge, and noooo problem, yet every time, eeeevery damn time, we
see photos of wrecked planes.

 

  Then it occurred to me: a prole can buy insurance against weather damage
to her aircraft.  Now a storm becomes an opportunity to get out from under
this particular "asset."

 

Conclusion: we are fooling ourselves.  Conclusion 2: not all of us are
fooled.

 

spike

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