Comment by kulahan
10 hours ago
It's awful to see dozens of people running and knowing they're all gone. It wasn't even close. They were so small compared to that absolute FORCE.
10 hours ago
It's awful to see dozens of people running and knowing they're all gone. It wasn't even close. They were so small compared to that absolute FORCE.
This is true, and, relatedly, is the feeling I have about all of climate change. By the numbers, it won't be close.
Of course, this little preview is itself anthropogenic. This horrific disaster is the thinnest tendril of the monster we have unleashed.
Both figuratively and literally, this experience was the tip of the iceberg. Terrifying. People might think I'm crazy, but I'm choosing my retirement location 100% based on resistance to climate change. Local water, too much humidity for massive fires, too cold for insane heatwaves... you get it.
Pro tip for people moving north; don't buy land in the valleys around Mt. Rainier. This type of flood (also known as a lahar) has occurred there many times. The mudflows reached the harbor of Tacoma in the past. [0] I expect we'll see at least one new one in our lifetime, as the glaciers have been greatly affected by rising temperatures.
[0] https://www.usgs.gov/media/images/mt-rainier-lahar-hazard-ma...
2 replies →
Which places have you found? I'm in Canada and figured most of the places are going to suffer more rain falling in the next decades.
5 replies →
I've seen recommendations for locations near the Great Lakes. Upper peninsula of MI, for example. Plenty of water. A warming climate should actually make the winters there somewhat less harsh.
8 replies →
Honestly there is no safe haven while humans over-consume continue to waste in the chase of excess. We have seen in the last few years all the supposed climate safe areas get hit hard.
https://www.npr.org/2024/10/09/nx-s1-5137024/climate-haven-h...
3 replies →
Deaths from. atrial disasters are the lowest in history: https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/422084/climate-change-nat...
This event has nothing to do with climate change and is pure fear mongering.
This is the same adage used by the Governments with the "think about the children" campaigns, its a distraction. A cop out.
Yeah, the event primarily marked by receding glaciers probably has nothing to do with this glacier that weakened to the point of destroying a village.
This glacier probably melted many times in the past, especially in such a sudden and violent manner.
I'm sure this is in no way anomalous, nor is it something that could predictably result at some point from a warming planet.
1 reply →
I sympathize with the reaction to the hyperbole, but it's not a binary thing. Better to think in terms of marginal increases in occurrence rate, or in a single case marginal increase in progression of an impending event (glaciers were all gonna be gone in a few thousand years anyhow).
Still plenty of room to debate numbers.
I do not know if I would consider stopping the climate change as a solution for all such events.
Watching the video makes you realize how small you are in front of the nature. It feels painful to even watch it but its an eyeopener at the same time. Its a misconception to think that the climate would always remain same, nature is an constantly moving/changing entity. What might be perceived as destruction is also the mechanism how creation of life or life like conditions happened in the first place. Just makes me feel like appreciating the day even more.
Mt St Helens erupted in 1980. The landslide alone was 3.3 billion cubic yards, that traveled 15mi at speeds of up to 155mph, and buried 23 square miles to an average depth of 150ft, and up to 600ft, within 10 minutes.
The blast flattened 230 sq mi of forest in minutes.
540 million tons of ash fell in 9 hours, affecting 22,000 sq mi.
The mudflow (lahar) was this debris mixing with 170 million cubic yards of glacial ice and snow, moving at 80 mph.
People liked to make smart ass comments about people who took photos "and would soon be dead" - "they were miles away, they could have left". For a lot of them? No.
The sheer magnitude of these events is truly unimaginable, even if you "were there" (nearby).
And MSH was barely a 5 on the VEI 0-8 (roughly) logarithmic scale, though you can't map to death toll easily.
Pinatubo in 1991 was a high 6. Krakatoa too. Tambora is the largest we know, in 1815, VEI 7, and is estimated at eighty times more output than MSH, and triggered the "Year Without a Summer" globally (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_Without_a_Summer) that pulled down average -global- temperatures by a full degree over the course of a year. It completely disrupted the monsoon season throughout Asia, leading to flash flooding events like this becoming a very regular occurrence.
I think some of these types of stats are the closest terrestrial things we have at the limits of human comprehensibility (probably only eclipsed by "interstellar distances").
Is it correct to say that the video looks far worse than it actually is ?
As in, the dust/mud particles sprayed & floating in the air do not have the force to do harm beyond vision or breathing impairment, similar to the dust from a collapsing building, or the lead shockwave of a nuclear bomb detonation.
Of course, it looks terrible, and certainly somethingbut its not a reason to perish as long as you can stay away from the following water wall and mud current that does strike sometime after.
No, that's not correct.
The length of time between the spray you mention, and the impact of the water wall, is single digit seconds. It doesn't make a difference.
Just hold your breath, bro, no reason to perish, bro.