Reporting from New York — An estimated 80,000 Americans died of flu and its complications last winter — the disease’s highest death toll in at least four decades.
The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr. Robert Redfield, revealed the total in an interview Tuesday night with the Associated Press.
Flu experts knew it was a very bad season, but at least one found the size of the estimate surprising.
“That’s huge,” said Dr. William Schaffner, a Vanderbilt University vaccine expert. The tally was nearly twice as much as what health officials previously considered a bad year, he said.
In recent years, flu-related deaths have ranged from about 12,000 to 56,000, according to the CDC.
Last fall and winter, the U.S. went through one of the most severe flu seasons in recent memory. It was driven by a kind of flu that tends to put more people in the hospital and cause more deaths, particularly among young children and the elderly.
The season peaked in early February and was mostly over by the end of March.
Making a bad year worse, the flu vaccine didn’t work very well. Experts nevertheless say vaccination is still worth it because it makes illnesses less severe and saves lives.
“I’d like to see more people get vaccinated,” Redfield said. “We lost 80,000 people last year to the flu.”
CDC officials do not have exact counts of how many people die from flu each year. Flu is so common that not all flu cases are reported, and flu is not always listed on death certificates. So the CDC uses statistical models, which are periodically revised, to make estimates.
Fatal complications from the flu can include pneumonia, stroke and heart attack.
CDC officials called the 80,000 figure preliminary, and said it may still be revised. But they said it is not expected to go down.
The figure eclipses the estimates for every flu season going back to the winter of 1976-77. Estimates for many earlier seasons were not readily available.
Last winter was not the worst flu season on record. The 1918 flu pandemic, which lasted nearly two years, killed more than 500,000 Americans, historians estimate.
It’s not easy to compare flu seasons through history, partly because the nation’s population is changing. There are more Americans — and more elderly Americans — today than in decades past, noted Dr. Daniel Jernigan, a CDC flu expert.
U.S. health officials on Thursday are scheduled to hold a media event in Washington to stress the importance of vaccinations to protect against whatever flu circulates this winter.
And how bad is it going to be? So far, the flu that’s been detected is a milder strain, and early signs are that the vaccine is shaping up to be a good match, Jernigan said.
The makeup of the vaccine has been changed this year to try to better protect against expected strains.
MEANWHILE, the weather back in the NH winter season of 2017/18 …
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IT certainly was a brutal 2017/18 winter in the U.S. and globally:
COLDEST US TEMPS ON RECORD
NEW YORK, NY – DECEMBER 27: Two women take a selfie photo in front of a frozen fountain in Bryant Park on a frigid day in Manhattan on December 27, 2017 in New York City. Dangerously low temperatures and wind chills the central and eastern United States are making outdoor activity difficult for many Americans. Little relief from the below normal temperatures is expected the first week of the New Year. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
Temperatures plummet to -37C as US is hit by record Arctic freeze
Temperatures have plummeted to -37C as the US Midwest and Northeast is hit by a record Arctic blast.
Cold weather records were set from Arkansas to Maine on Thursday and the freezing air is expected to last through the weekend and reach as far south as Texas and the Florida Panhandle.
In New Hampshire, the cold set a record for the day of -37C on Mount Washington.
An investigation has been launched by the humane society after a dog was found “frozen solid” on the porch of a home in Toledo, Ohio.
It’s so cold in the US that sharks are freezing to death
In Massachusetts, the Atlantic White Shark Conservancy found three thresher sharks washed up in Cape Cod, “stranded due to cold shock,” which can cause cardiac arrest in animals.
The conservancy collected tissue samples from the sharks that will be examined “once they thaw.”
“We hauled the shark off the beach and it is currently thawing at NOAA Fisheries Service to be dissected later,” the group wrote on Facebook about the latest shark discovery. “A true sharkcicle!”
Visitors take photographs at the brink of the Horseshoe Falls in Niagara Falls, Ontario, as cold weather continues through much of the province on Friday, Dec. 29, 2017. (Aaron Lynett/The Canadian Press via AP)
A couple looks out over the partially frozen American side of the Niagara Falls during sub-freezing temperatures in Niagara Falls, Ontario March 3, 2014. REUTERS/Mark Blinch (CANADA – Tags: ENVIRONMENT TRAVEL SOCIETY) ORG XMIT: MDB14
SNOWFALL will become “A very rare and exciting event…
Children just aren’t going to know what snow is.” Dr David Viner – Senior scientist, climatic research unit (CRU)
“Winters with strong frosts and lots of snow like we had 20 years ago will no longer exist at our latitudes.” – Professor Mojib Latif (2000)
WE all associate snowstorms with cold weather. But, the effects of snow on our climate and weather last long after the storm has passed. Due to snows reflective properties, its presence or absence influences patterns of heating and cooling over Earth’s surface more than any other single land surface feature.
Climate models from the 1970s have consistently predicted that CO2-induced global warming climate change should be causing a significant decline in total snow cover. However, Global snow cover has actually increased since at least the start of the record (Connolly et al, 2019), leading to some scepticism within the scientific community about the validity of the climate models.
In my humble opinion, the snow that keeps on falling, bolstered by the increased frequency and reliability of the solar-driven Polar Vortex, will be key determinants in the eventual and inevitable death of the Global Warming cult.
The public can touch, see and feel the white fluffy stuff that needs cold air to proliferate. And, being a substance that they can interact with, it makes it far harder to “disappear”.
They will then become overtly suspicious of the increasingly shrill “Hottest Year Evahh” cries, yelled at every heat wave by climate luvvies.
What does the science say, versus observed reality?
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WHAT THE ‘VAST BODY ‘ OF SCIENTIFIC ‘EXPERTS’ ASSURED US ABOUT SNOW
CRU :
IN 2000, climate expert Dr David Viner of the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit (CRU) assured us that :
Snowfall will become “A very rare and exciting event… Children just aren’t going to know what snow is.” Dr David Viner – Senior scientist, climatic research unit (CRU)
IN 2001, the UN IPCC predicted diminished snowfalls as human CO2 increased, claiming that “milder winter temperatures will decrease heavy snowstorms” due to the activities of mankindpersonkind…
By 2020, the average annual duration of snow-cover decreases by between five and 48 days; maximum snow depths are reduced and tend to occur earlier in the year; and the total area covered in snow shrinks by 10-40%
“Snow has become so rare that when it does fall – often just for a few hours – everything grinds to a halt. In early 2003 a ‘mighty’ five-centimetre snowfall in southeast England caused such severe traffic jams that many motorists had to stay in their cars overnight. Today’s kids are missing out . . . Many of these changes are already underway, but have been accelerating over the last two decades. Termites have already moved into southern England. Garden centres are beginning to stock exotic sub-tropical species, which only a few years ago would have been killed off by winter…” – Mark Lynas
Winter is no longer the great grey longing of my childhood. The freezes this country suffered in 1982 and 1963 are – unless the Gulf Stream stops – unlikely to recur. Our summers will be long and warm. Across most of the upper northern hemisphere, climate change, so far, has been kind to us…
“Yesterday’s snow… Because temperatures in the Alps are rising quickly, there will be more precipitation in many places. But because it will rain more often than it snows, this will be bad news for tourists. For many ski lifts this means the end of business.”
2006 : The Independent‘s somber editorial admonished us that the lack of snow was evidence of a “dangerous seasonal disorder”…
The countryside is looking rather peculiar this winter. It seems we have a number of unexpected guests for Christmas. Dragonflies, bumblebees and red admiral butterflies, which would normally be killed off by the frost, can still be seen in some parts of the country . . . Some might be tempted to welcome this late blossoming of the natural world as a delightful diversion from the bleakness of this time of year. But these fluctuations should be cause for concern because it is overwhelmingly likely that they are a consequence of global warming . . . all this is also evidence that global warming is occurring at a faster rate than many imagined…
“Ice, snow, and frost will disappear, i.e. milder winters” … “Unusually warm winters without snow and ice are now being viewed by many as signs of climate change.”
2007 : Western Mail (Wales Online) … article, entititled “Snowless Winters Forecast for Wales as World Warms Up” quotes one of the global warming movement’s key figures, Sir John Houghton, former head of the IPCC and former head of the UK Met Office…
Former head of the Met Office Sir John Houghton, who is one of the UK’s leading authorities on climate change, said all the indicators suggest snowy winters will become increasingly rare He said, “Snowlines are going up in altitude all over the world. The idea that we will get less snow is absolutely in line with what we expect from global warming.”
A study of snowfall spanning 60 years has indicated that the Alps’s entire winter sports industry could grind to a halt through lack of snow. It found a dramatic “step-like” drop in snowfall at the end of the 1980s which has never recovered, New Scientist magazine reported…. In some years the amount that fell was 60 per cent lower than was typical in the early 1980s, said Christoph Marty, from the Swiss Federal Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research in Davos, who analysed the records. “I don’t believe we will see the kind of snow conditions we have experienced in past decades,” he said.
Griffith associate professor Catherine Pickering says snow is rapidly disappearing because of global warming and by 2020 Australia may not have any left.
“We’ve predicted by 2020 to lose something like 60 per cent of the snow cover of the Australian Alps,” Professor Pickering, from the Griffith School of Environment, said.
“Unfortunately because our current emissions and our current rises in temperatures are at the high end of the predictions, it’s definitely coming to us sooner and faster.”
A low-pressure system will bring snow during Friday through Saturday, mostly above 1400m, but possibly reaching 1200m, followed by another cold surge and more snow during Sunday into Monday. All up we can expect 20-40cm across all resorts…
This season has already passed expectations… The latest reading from Spencer’s Creek a week ago was up at 228.8cm, which puts us well above average. But looking lower down at Deep Creek (1620m) and Three Mile Dam (1460m), snow depths are fairly average.
2014: the global warming theory-obsessed New York Times touted “The End of Snow?”…
“The truth is, it is too late for all of that. Greening the ski industry is commendable, but it isn’t nearly enough. Nothing besides a national policy shift on how we create and consume energy will keep our mountains white in the winter — and slow global warming to a safe level.
This is no longer a scientific debate. It is scientific fact. The greatest fear of most climate scientists is continued complacency that leads to a series of natural climatic feedbacks…”
Australia’s ski resorts face the prospect of a long downhill run as a warming climate reduces snow depth, cover and duration. The industry’s ability to create artificial snow will also be challenged, scientists say.
THE SNOW THEY TOLD YOU WOULD “DISAPPEAR” KEEPS ON FALLING
CONTRARY to dire ‘expert’ prognostications and climate models to the contrary, global snowfall continues to fall in abundance, aided by ‘record-breaking cold temperatures’…
A premature onset of winter was troubling millions of Spaniards . In the northern half of the country, large parts of the country were covered with a thick and large white blanket early in the morning after heavy snowfall during the night. Snowfall fell to 700 meters in some regions. More than 80 roads, including major highways and highways, were closed or were nearly impassable for normal cars, the media said, citing the authorities.
SNOW ⋅ In Samedan in the Upper Engadine and in Santa Maria in the Münstertal, in November never so much snow has fallen as this year.The snow depth in the two Grisons municipalities was 77 and 71 centimetres respectively on Sunday afternoon.
In Grisons, there was fresh snow up to 71 centimeters during the night on Sunday. That’s a record in November. It also snowed far into the lowlands.
In Grisons, there was fresh snow up to 71 centimeters during the night on Sunday. That’s a record in November.It also snowed far into the lowlands – Saas-Fee mit Auto nicht erreichbar – News Panorama: Vermischtes – tagesanzeiger.ch
The image is an animation of IMS Snow and Ice charts for NH, starting October 1 to November 12, 2019 in weekly increments. Note how the white area was sparce to begin and then grew from a weekly area of 9M km2 to 23.5M km2 through the month of October. As shown in the graph from Rutgers Global Snow Lab (GSL), the October 2019 monthly average of 22.3 M km2 is the fifth highest in their record.
nh-october2019-snow-cover
October 2019 was 4.7M km2 above the mean October area of 17.5 M km2. That ranks fifth out of 52 years; along with 2014 and 2016 making three of the highest snow cover years out of the last six! (OMG.) As Dr. Judah Cohen has observed, Siberian October coverage is a significant factor in forecasting coming winter conditions.
NB// Spring snowpack globally shows a decline across all global regions. But, if we are to identify “declining” snow as a result of mankind’s CO2 emissions, then two seasons are increasing snowpack, versus the other, indicating an overall increase per season.
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NH TOTAL SNOW MASS
Finnish Meteorological Institute data for total snow mass for the Northern Hemisphere, excluding the mountains, indicates snowpack has been consistently above the 30 year average (1982-2012) in both the 2018/19 season and even more significantly in the current 2019/20 season :
NOW, of course, climate ‘scientists’ are trying to dig themselves out of snow that’s kept falling …
Looking back at 65 years’ worth of statistics, Environment Canada’s senior climatologist David Phillips noted that since 1948, winter temperatures in the prairie regions have increased by an average of four degrees Celsius… Ironically, warmer weather can mean greater snowfall. “As we warm up, we may see more moisture, we may see more moist air masses, and therefore we could very well see more snow rather than less snow, because the air masses are going to be more moist and so therefore you’re going to be able to wring out more snow than you would be if it was dry air,” Phillips said.
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UNFORTUNATELY for CO2-centric climatologists like David Phillips, attempting to ‘dig’ themselves out of their “end of snow” predictions, abundant snow requires cold air to proliferate …
“The reality is cooling, not warming, increases snowfall.”
“Interestingly, some scientists have stated that increasing snow is consistent with climate change because warmer air holds more moisture, more water vapor and this can result in more storms with heavy precipitation. The trick, of course, is having sufficient cold air to produce that snow. But note that 93% of the years with more than 60″ of snow in Boston were colder than average years. The reality is cooling, not warming, increases snowfall.”
The polar vortex is a large area of low pressure and cold air surrounding the Earth’s North and South poles. The term vortex refers to the counter-clockwise flow of air that helps keep the colder air close to the poles (left globe). Often during winter in the Northern Hemisphere, the polar vortex will become less stable and expand, sending cold Arctic air southward over the United States with the jet stream (right globe). The polar vortex is nothing new – in fact, it’s thought that the term first appeared in an 1853 issue of E. Littell’s Living Age.
THE Polar Vortex is a direct threat to anyone in its path, promising life-threatening low temperatures that can shatter records and plunge regions into a deep freeze.
DUE to its increased frequency over the past decade, the Polar Vortex not only threatens business and affected communities, but also directly threatens the climate ‘science’ cabal and sycophant mainstream media whose “Hottest Year Evahh” PR campaign is being drowned out by the increased frequency of abnormally cold and deadly, fall and winter conditions.
HOT = COLD! SHUT UP AND OBEY!!
FULLY aware that the ‘inconvenient’ Polar Vortex cannot be told to politely ‘go away’, climate scientists have decided to write off the generationally-cold conditions as a result of a ‘warming’ planet.
The country is freezing in an unprecedented fashion, and global warming is to blame. Sound crazy? The cold snap that North America is experiencing east of the rocky mountains, with temperatures at Arctic-like levels, is real, but it’s only part of the story. Simultaneously, there are record warm temperatures happening in other parts of the world, from Australia to the actual Arctic.
While a small but vocal minority of people might use the faulty logic of, “it’s cold where I am, therefore global warming isn’t real,” even schoolchildren know that weather isn’t climate. But these extreme cold snaps have gotten more severe in recent years, due to a combination of global warming and a phenomenon you’ve likely heard of: the polar vortex. Here’s the science of how it works, and why global warming is paradoxically playing a major role in today’s record-low temperatures.
Some scientists think, though, that the frequency and intensity of these kinds of cold interludes may be changing as the planet warms, as counterintuitive as that might sound.
“This Arctic outbreak is connected to the behavior of the jet stream and the polar vortex,” says Judah Cohen, an atmospheric scientist at MIT. And those, in turn, are affected by a changing climate—mostly by intense warming in the high Arctic.
The topic is controversial in the atmospheric science community, but some think they see a connection between a warmer planet and cold blasts of weather like the one North America is experiencing right now.
FORTY years ago, the New York Times blamed the Polar Vortex on global cooling and increasing Arctic ice. Now they say the exact opposite – the Polar Vortex is caused by global warming and decreasing Arctic ice!
“A gradual increase in area of the northern circumpolar vortex, the massive flow of frigid air around the Arctic, has been recorded by Drs. Angell and Korshover.”
SCIENCE has known about the Polar Vortex for decades. But, because it contradicts the current ‘global warming’ theory, it’s conveniently forgotten …
Science Mag – 1975
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THE Polar Vortex used to be evidence of “Another Ice Age” setting in …
Another Ice Age?
Time Magazine Monday, Jun 24, 1974
Scientists have found other indications of global cooling. For one thing there has been a noticeable expansion of the great belt of dry, high-altitude polar winds —the so-called circumpolar vortex
ANY student of history can look back and discover that all of history’s mass-murdering socialists — from Hitler to Stalin to Mao — have manufactured audacious lies and scapegoats as a means to consolidate power into a malevolent Central Authority.
THE global warming climate change scare, with its draconian, green centrally planned agenda and underlying misanthropic ideology, is no different. A grandiose con used by globalist elites in their never-ending lust for power and control.
• “Arctic summers ice-free by 2013” (BBC 2007) • “Could all Arctic ice be gone by 2012?” (AP 2007) • “Arctic Sea Ice Gone in Summer Within Five Years?” (National Geographic 2007) • “Imagine yourself in a world five years from now, where there is no more ice over the Arctic” – Tim Flannery (2008) • “North Pole could be ice-free in 2008” – Mark Serreze (New Scientist 2008) • “Gore: Polar ice cap may disappear by summer 2014” (USA Today 2009) • “Arctic expert predicts final collapse of sea ice within 4 years” (Guardian 2012) • “Say Goodbye to Arctic Summer Ice” (Live Science 2013) • “Ice-free Arctic in two years heralds methane catastrophe – scientist” (The Guardian 2013) • “Why Arctic sea ice will vanish in 2013” (Sierra Club 2013) • “Next year or the year after, the Arctic will be free of ice’” – Peter Wadhams (The Guardian 2016)
DIRE predictions of an “ice-free” Arctic have remained popular on the climate change, fear-mongering circuit for many years now.
BUT, how ‘bad’ really are Arctic sea-ice conditions, in mid-summer, circa 2019?
ACCORDING to this latest piece of anecdotal (real-world) evidence, Arctic “Death Spiral” enthusiasts would be understandably disappointed!
“…what we saw was indeed really impressive sea ice. In fact, the sea ice we encountered was thick enough that reaching our destination—the geographic North Pole—took roughly 1.5 days longer than we’d expected.”
In late June, one of the most powerful icebreakers in the world encountered such extraordinarily thick ice on-route to the North Pole (with a polar bear specialist and deep-pocketed, Attenborough-class tourists onboard) that it took a day and a half longer than expected to get there. A few weeks later, in mid-July, a Norwegian icebreaker also bound for the North Pole (with scientific researchers on board) was forced to turn back north of Svalbard when it unexpectedly encountered impenetrable pack ice.
A polar bear on hummocked sea ice in Franz Josef Land. Photo by Michael Hambrey, date not specified but estimated based on tour dates to be 22 or 23 June 2019.
Apparently, the ice charts the Norwegian captain consulted showed ‘first year ice‘ – ice that formed the previous fall, defined as less than 2 m thick (6.6 ft) – which is often much broken…
“I am a skeptic…Global warming has become a new religion.” – Nobel Prize Winner for Physics, Ivar Giaever.
Warming fears are the “worst scientific scandal in the history…When people come to know what the truth is, they will feel deceived by science and scientists.” – UN IPCC Japanese Scientist Dr. Kiminori Itoh, an award-winning PhD environmental physical chemist.
“The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd; indeed in view of the silliness of the majority of mankind, a widespread belief is more likely to be foolish than sensible.” – Bertrand Russel
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ANTHROPOGENIC global warming theory implies that mankind’s gasses, primarily, carbon dioxide (deceptively known as “carbon pollution” for politics and shock value) is supposed to be warming the lower troposphere – the first 10 kilometres of Earth’s atmosphere.
WHILE the fingerprint for Carbon Dioxide forcing exists in computer simulations, it is yet to be found in the physical world:
THE MISSING ‘HOT SPOT’
One of the most important pieces of the climate change debate rarely cited … the missing ‘Hot-Spot’ | The Missing Hot Spot | Climatism
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WHILE debate rages about the causes of global warming, most of the public and our policy makers are not aware of the most basic salient facts:
1. The greenhouse signature is missing. We have been looking and measuring for years, and cannot find it.
Each possible cause of global warming has a different pattern of where in the planet the warming occurs first and the most. The signature of an increased greenhouse effect is a hot spot about 10km up in the atmosphere over the tropics. We have been measuring the atmosphere for decades using radiosondes: weather balloons with thermometers that radio back the temperature as the balloon ascends through the atmosphere. They show no hot spot. Whatsoever.
If there is no hot spot then an increased greenhouse effect is not the cause of global warming. So we know for sure that carbon emissions are not a significant cause of the global warming. If we had found the greenhouse signature then I would be an alarmist again.
Dr David Evans, former consultant to the Australian Greenhouse Office from 1999 to 2005
BESIDES precipitation, the most important element required for snow to form is cold air. Yesterday’s winter blast set a new (interim) record cold temperature for the 50th state of -12°F or -11.1°C.
Just after midnight on Monday, a number of sensors atop Mauna Kea dipped below 12 degrees Fahrenheit, according to the Mauna Kea Weather Center, a facility supporting a number of telescopes atop the 13,770-foot volcano on the Big Island of Hawaii.
If those temperatures are deemed accurate, at least four of those sensors would exceed the official all-time state record low in Hawaii of 12 degrees (-11.1 degrees Celsius) also set atop Mauna Kea on May 17, 1979.
SNOW is not unheard of in mountainous parts of the tropical island chain, but officials say the coating at 6,200 feet (1,900 meters) at Polipoli State Park on Maui could mark the lowest-elevation snowfall ever recorded in the state.
GLOBAL Warming alarmists have already been quick to denounce this as just a weather event, which it is. “You’re confusing weather with climate!” they insist on my twitter account. As they themselves aggressively look for the next heatwave, flood, drought or forest fire to blame on “CLIMATE CHANGE!”.
REMEMBER that rule: Cold = Weather, Hot = Climate.
YES, this is just a weather event. However, it’s worth keeping in mind that such “weather” including the record cold and snow experienced in the current NH winter was not expected in the era of the “HOTTEST XXX EVAHH”, so gleefully marketed by the global warming theory obsessed mainstream media.
IN FACT, according to the ‘97% consensus’ of ‘climate experts’ and sycophant mainstream media, “Snowfalls are now just a thing of the past“. And, “a very rare and exciting event [where] children just aren’t going to know what snow is.”
SEE for yourself what climate ‘experts’ predicted about snow…
IN 2000, climate expert Dr David Viner of the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit (CRU) assured us that :
Snowfall will become “A very rare and exciting event… Children just aren’t going to know what snow is.” Dr David Viner – Senior scientist, climatic research unit (CRU)
IN 2001, the UN IPCC predicted diminished snowfalls as human CO2 increased, claiming that “milder winter temperatures will decrease heavy snowstorms” due to human activity…
“Snow has become so rare that when it does fall – often just for a few hours – everything grinds to a halt. In early 2003 a ‘mighty’ five-centimetre snowfall in southeast England caused such severe traffic jams that many motorists had to stay in their cars overnight. Today’s kids are missing out . . . Many of these changes are already underway, but have been accelerating over the last two decades. Termites have already moved into southern England. Garden centres are beginning to stock exotic sub-tropical species, which only a few years ago would have been killed off by winter…” – Mark Lynas
Winter is no longer the great grey longing of my childhood. The freezes this country suffered in 1982 and 1963 are – unless the Gulf Stream stops – unlikely to recur. Our summers will be long and warm. Across most of the upper northern hemisphere, climate change, so far, has been kind to us…
2006 : Daniela Jacob of Max Planck Institute for Meterology, Hamburg …
“Yesterday’s snow… Because temperatures in the Alps are rising quickly, there will be more precipitation in many places. But because it will rain more often than it snows, this will be bad news for tourists. For many ski lifts this means the end of business.”
2006 : The Independent‘s somber editorial admonished us that the lack of snow was evidence of a “dangerous seasonal disorder”…
The countryside is looking rather peculiar this winter. It seems we have a number of unexpected guests for Christmas. Dragonflies, bumblebees and red admiral butterflies, which would normally be killed off by the frost, can still be seen in some parts of the country . . . Some might be tempted to welcome this late blossoming of the natural world as a delightful diversion from the bleakness of this time of year. But these fluctuations should be cause for concern because it is overwhelmingly likely that they are a consequence of global warming . . . all this is also evidence that global warming is occurring at a faster rate than many imagined…
“Ice, snow, and frost will disappear, i.e. milder winters” … “Unusually warm winters without snow and ice are now being viewed by many as signs of climate change.”
2007 : Western Mail (Wales Online) … article, entititled “Snowless Winters Forecast for Wales as World Warms Up” quotes one of the global warming movement’s key figures, Sir John Houghton, former head of the IPCC and former head of the UK Met Office…
Former head of the Met Office Sir John Houghton, who is one of the UK’s leading authorities on climate change, said all the indicators suggest snowy winters will become increasingly rare He said, “Snowlines are going up in altitude all over the world. The idea that we will get less snow is absolutely in line with what we expect from global warming.”
A study of snowfall spanning 60 years has indicated that the Alps’s entire winter sports industry could grind to a halt through lack of snow…. In some years the amount that fell was 60 per cent lower than was typical in the early 1980s, said Christoph Marty, from the Swiss Federal Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research in Davos, who analysed the records. ”I don’t believe we will see the kind of snow conditions we have experienced in past decades,” he said.
2014: the global warming theory-obsessed New York Times touted “The End of Snow?” Reassuring their readers that “This is no longer a scientific debate. It is scientific fact.”
“The truth is, it is too late for all of that. Greening the ski industry is commendable, but it isn’t nearly enough. Nothing besides a national policy shift on how we create and consume energy will keep our mountains white in the winter — and slow global warming to a safe level.
This is no longer a scientific debate. It is scientific fact. The greatest fear of most climate scientists is continued complacency that leads to a series of natural climatic feedbacks…”
Australia’s ski resorts face the prospect of a long downhill run as a warming climate reduces snow depth, cover and duration. The industry’s ability to create artificial snow will also be challenged, scientists say.
DOES the CSIRO and ‘97% of all experts’ still stand by their predictions of “no-snow”? Or is their alarmist sophistry simply more global warming climate change fear-mongering designed to push their socialist agenda based not on evidence but on political dogma, ideology and overheated UN IPCC / CSIRO climate models?
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SNOW EXTENT DATA
WINTER snow extent is increasing globally as CO2 emissions rise…
NOW, of course, climate scientists are trying to dig themselves out of snow that’s kept falling…
Looking back at 65 years’ worth of statistics, Environment Canada’s senior climatologist David Phillips noted that since 1948, winter temperatures in the prairie regions have increased by an average of four degrees Celsius… Ironically, warmer weather can mean greater snowfall. “As we warm up, we may see more moisture, we may see more moist air masses, and therefore we could very well see more snow rather than less snow, because the air masses are going to be more moist and so therefore you’re going to be able to wring out more snow than you would be if it was dry air,” Phillips said.
NB//
“Interestingly, some scientists have stated that increasing snow is consistent with climate change because warmer air holds more moisture, more water vapor and this can result in more storms with heavy precipitation. The trick, of course, is having sufficient cold air to produce that snow. But note that 93% of the years with more than 60″ of snow in Boston were colder than average years. The reality is cooling, not warming, increases snowfall.” – Veteran Meteorologist Barry Burbank
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CONCLUSION
LISTEN to what the ‘experts’ promised you back then. Because, if they got it wrong then, how can you trust what they are foretelling today or tomorrow? The answer is you cannot, because they have no idea what long-range conditions Mother Nature is going to serve up in such a “chaotic” and complex system as our climate.
BUT, one thing is a “97%” certainty within the current and scary world of post-modern climate ‘science’ – whatever scenario suits and supports the political and ideological position of man-made ‘climate change’ will be predicted, promoted and spread like a hurricane within the compliant mainstream media, throughout our most ‘esteemed’ scientific institutions, our schools and of course throughout academia – DAMN the data and real-world evidence!
“Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities.”
– Voltaire
“Blind trust in authority is the greatest enemy of the truth.”
– Albert Einstein
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THE $2,000,000,000,000 US per year (2 Trillion)Climate Crisis Industry is not unlike the Washington “swamp”. When its orthodoxy and authority is threatened, questioned or challenged, major stakeholders launch a swift and coordinated defence to maintain the status quo.
ANY real-world evidence that contradicts the anthropogenic global warming theory (AGW) is viciously refuted with eye-popping examples of reverse logic and shameless shifting of goal-posts. However implausible, a clear and consistent message will follow nonetheless, carefully coordinated and synced between ‘scientific’ bodies and compliant mainstream media to add plausibility, authenticity and believability.
A priceless example was one by The Guardian’s resident climate catastrophist, George Monbiot, who claimed that the widespread and prolonged snowfalls of the 2017/18 Northern Hemisphere winter were caused by, yep, ‘global warming’!
FAST forward only 10 months and the climate cult has been in crisis management mode dealing with the current Polar Vortex that has ravaged the US and Europe with historic low temperatures.
WITH the mercury in Milwaukee plunging as low as -65°F (wind chill) and Indianapolis -40°F, comparisons have been made to temperatures as cold as Mt Everest, Siberia and Mars!
Sol 2302 (2019-01-27), high -7C/19F, low -73C/-99F, pressure at 8.15 hPa, daylight 06:47-18:54 pic.twitter.com/UGTRSsulhx
CHICAGO hit -25°F (actual) which was -2°F shy of the all time record cold set in 1985. Temperatures fell early Wednesday to -19°F making it the coldest Jan. 30 in Chicago on record. It beat the last record daily low of -15°F set on Jan. 30, 1966, according to the National Weather Service.
THE New York Times dubbed this years Arctic blast the “coldest weather in a generation”:
CHICAGO — Two of the most dreaded words in a Midwestern weather forecast — “polar vortex” — returned this week, promising life-threatening low temperatures that could shatter records and plunge much of the region into its deepest freeze in decades.
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“The vortex, a brutal mass of cold air within strong bands of circulating winds, has spread southward from its normal location near the North Pole in recent weeks, bringing arctic weather to the middle of the United States. Such weather events have become more common in recent years; scientists are not sure why, but some suspect a link to climate change.”
NOTE the Times’ urgency to blame “climate change”, even as “scientistsare not sure why”.
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TRUMP TROLLS THE WARMISTS
NO politician or President has ever been able to unnerve the mainstream media and expose their true colours and extreme Leftist/Socialist ideologies like Trump. Like or loath him, he dares to question orthodoxy and the preferred wisdom of the day, disrupting the status quo.
HIS tweet on the extreme cold weather sent the global warming theory-obsessed mainstream media into a literal meltdown:
In the beautiful Midwest, windchill temperatures are reaching minus 60 degrees, the coldest ever recorded. In coming days, expected to get even colder. People can’t last outside even for minutes. What the hell is going on with Global Waming? Please come back fast, we need you!
TONY HELLER (Steve Goddard) quick to correct the warmist NOAA’s flawed, reactionary argument:
This is complete nonsense. The record cold air has an extremely low dew point, meaning it contains very small amounts of moisture. It is sad that government agencies like @NOAA continue to misinform the public.
NEW YORK Times Climate – making sure you believe that both extreme cold and extreme heat are a direct byproduct of your gasses and excesses.
NOTE the goal-posts being shifted to accomodate any weather event :
Welcome to the age of extremes: In preparing for how climate change affects the weather, “we have to be prepared for a wider range of possibilities.” https://t.co/crwyGC0vnC
I noted in a past Climatism post detailing the latest IPCC report on “Extreme Weather” that the mainstream media would wilfully dismiss its ‘inconvenient’ findings:
EXTREME WEATHER, the Climate Crisis Industries favoured weapon of mass hysteria has been scuttled, once again, by their very own authority, the UN IPCC!
THE latest report finding that there is “little basis or evidence” for claiming that drought, floods, hurricanes and cyclones have increased due to greenhouse gases. Tornadoes were not even mentioned, owing to the record lack of.
BUT, alas! Just as the extreme weather findings from last IPCC report – AR5 (2013) – were conveniently dismissed by the mainstream media and climate crusaders, so too will the latest ‘inconvenient’ findings from the SR15 ‘Special Report’.
THE Grey Lady falling foul of one of the Climate Crisis Industries ten commandments – “YOU’RE CONFUSING CLIMATE WITH WEATHER”, whilst blaming CO2 – the magic molecule – for both hot and cold weather!
“Two sets of air currents determine which parts of North America and Europe get blasted by Arctic air each winter. The stratospheric polar vortex is a smallish patch of low-pressure air that circulates, anti-clockwise, in a ring some 48km (30 miles) above the Arctic. It helps to trap the coldest air near the pole and forms only in winter.
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The problem for America’s Midwest is that the Arctic has warmed unusually fast, a result of more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, and so the polar jet stream is fluctuating more widely. As a result, the stratospheric polar vortex may slow down, and colder air is drawn southwards. A similar sort of shift in the air currents helped to cause the “Beast from the East” that chilled western Europe in 2018.”
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HISTORY ‘DENIERS’
1977 “Global Cooling” Polar Vortex
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FORTY years ago, the New York Times blamed the Polar Vortex on global cooling and increasing Arctic ice. Now they say the exact opposite – the Polar Vortex is caused by global warming and decreasing Arctic ice:
“A gradual increase in area of the northern circumpolar vortex, the massive flow of frigid air around the Arctic, has been recorded by Drs. Angell and Korshover.”
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SCIENCE has known about the Polar Vortex for decades. But, as it contradicts the current ‘global warming’ theory, it’s conveniently forgotten:
Science Mag – 1975
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THE Polar Vortex used to be evidence of “Another Ice Age” setting in:
Another Ice Age?
Time Magazine Monday, Jun 24, 1974
Scientists have found other indications of global cooling. For one thing there has been a noticeable expansion of the great belt of dry, high-altitude polar winds —the so-called circumpolar vortex
While climate change is warming the earth, not all parts of the earth are warming at the same rate; the Arctic is warming at a rate twice as fast as the world average. That warming has led to historically low levels of sea ice in the region. The melting sea ice, particularly in an area near the Barents and Kara Seas off Siberia, may be linked to the changes in the polar vortex.
“When we lose a lot of ice in that particular area in the summer, it absorbs a lot of extra heat from the sun,” Dr. Francis said. This is because the darker open ocean absorbs more heat than reflective ice. “And so we see a very persistent, hot spot there in terms of temperature differences from what they should be.”
Research suggests that the hot spot, along with changes in the jet stream driven by climate change, cause the polar vortex to break down in mid- to late winter.
(Climatism bolds)
WORKING for the New York Times, one would think Kendra would have access to historical (Polar Vortex) articles from her own workplace? Google?
MAYBE delving into the ‘inconvenient’ past simply wrecks her entire narrative. That would be a shame. Pity we had to do it here, for her.
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CONCLUSION
JOHN NOLTE from his great piece in Breitbart on the Polar Vortex fiasco with this to aptly conclude:
Any student of history can look back and discover that all of history’s mass-murdering socialists — from Hitler to Stalin to Mao — have manufactured audacious lies and scapegoats as a means to consolidate power into a malevolent Central Authority.
Freedom is Slavery.
War is Peace.
Ignorance is Strength.
Cooling is Warming.
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CLIMATE IS CYCLICAL
THE science as to what is the predominant driver of climate is far from “settled”. The effect to global temperature per doubling of carbon dioxide is ever-decreasing as “the science” develops. Some estimates are as low as 0.5°C by 2100.
INSIGHTFUL analysis by Roy Spencer of UAH questioning the theory that declining Arctic sea-ice is the cause of the Polar-Vortex.
SPENCER provides an interesting chart from his colleague John Christy of “cold waves” in the US, showing that they are ‘declining’:
“the connection between Eastern U.S. cold waves and Arctic sea ice is speculative, at best. Just like most theories of climate change.” – Roy Spencer PhD
“At a minimum we should demand good observational support for any specific claim. In this case I would say that the connection between Eastern U.S. cold waves and Arctic sea ice is speculative, at best.
BEING careful not to confuse ‘weather’ with ‘climate’, even though our warmist friends have no problem finding a direct link between heatwaves and ‘climate change’, every summer, there’s no escaping the irony of cancelling a snow festival due to extreme cold in the era of the “Hottest Year Evahh“!
THE extreme irony highlighted by a support comment from Christine Muschi of the Montreal Gazette, before the cancellation – “It’s never too cold for Fete des Neige…”!
ORGANISERS disagree with Christine’s optimism and have cancelled the event on Sunday due to extreme cold and snow conditions :
“Although the majority of the Fête’s activities can be held despite difficult winter conditions, blowing snow, freezing cold, wind gusts and dangerous roads are all factors that have influenced our decision,” François Carier, director of marketing, business development and communications at Parc Jean-Drapeau, said in a statement.”
The annual Fête des neiges at Parc Jean-Drapeau is cancelled today due to the extreme cold and winter storm warning.
This is the first time in 10 years that activities for the winter festival have been cancelled due to weather, according to a statement from François Cartier, director of marketing and communications for the Société du parc Jean-Drapeau.
Cartier said that the decision was made in an effort to maintain the safety of the public as well as employees and volunteers who make the festival possible.
The events, which run until Feb. 10, will restart Saturday Jan. 26.
MEANWHILE, Justin Trudeau and environment minister Catherine McKenna campaign for a Carbon Tax to stop ‘Global Warming’ or ‘Climate Change’, or something…
HOW does wrecking your economy with a #CarbonTAX and then redistributing $307 to ‘families’ stop bad weather??
YOU #climate-theory-obsessed buffoons are so dumb. 🤦♂️
Meteorologists and historians believe that this weekend’s baptism by snow could actually have been the coldest snowstorm experienced by Montrealers in a century, reads a montreal.ctvnews.caarticle from Jan 20.
Sunday’s high held below -15C all day and snow accumulation was expected to exceed 25cm.
According to the Twitter account YUL Weather Records, the last time Montreal experienced a similar snowstorm was Jan 16, 1920. On that day, a total of 30.2 cm of snow fell, and the daytime high reached -19.4C.
By 3pm on Sunday it was already Montreal’s 2nd snowiest Jan 20th since records began in 1872:
Coldest snowstorm in more than 100 years expected tomorrow. Temperatures are expected to stay below -15°C with up to 20cm of snow. The last time that happened in #Ottawa was February 8th, 1895 when we received 45.7cm of snow with a daytime high of -17.8°C (0°F). #OttNewspic.twitter.com/0DMFkFgZAf
Environment Canada advised people to postpone “non-essential travel” until conditions improve, which may not be for a couple of days.
“There is another storm that may be heading our way for the middle of the week, so we expect more snow,” warned Michelle Fleury, a meteorologist with Environment Canada.
For the full article from montreal.ctvnews.ca, click here.
THE MAINSTREAM’S “EXPLAIN-AWAY”
A recently published NYTimes article desperately tries to explain-away the brutal cold gripping the Northern Hemisphere this winter with a painfully stupid, logic-lacking argument.
According to the article, we can expect further disruptions to the polar vortex due to Global Warming. Yes, that’s right, a complete tune-change, but Global Warming now means more record snow and cold during the winter.
The Polar Vortex used to be evidence that a new ice age is setting in. Now apparently it is evidence that the Earth is burning up, writes Steve Goddard on his website realclimatescience.com.
I can hear it being cited during many a heated family debate — the AGW alarmists new ace-in-the-hole to explain away the encroaching Grand Solar Minimum.
Total Snow Mass for the NH is well-above the 30-year average — link.
Global Average Temperatures continue to fall — link.
And it has nothing to do with increasing CO2 heating the planet, it’s all the result of our sun beginning its latest shut down (relatively) which past cycles suggest is due.
WHAT THE SCIENCE SUGGESTS IS ACTUALLY HAPPENING
Research (linked below) shows blocking persistence increases when solar activity is low, causing weather patterns to become locked in place at high and intermediate latitudes for prolonged periods of time.
During a solar minimum, the jet stream’s usual Zonal Flow (a west–east direction) reverts to more of a Meridional Flow (a north-south direction) — this is exaggerated further during a Grand Solar Minimum, like the one we’re likely entering now, and explains why regions become unseasonably hot or cold and others unusually dry or rainy, with the extremes lasting for an extended period of time.
Mikhaël Schwander, et al, 2017 — “The 247-year-long analysis of the 11-year solar cycle impact on late winter European weather patterns suggests a reduction in the occurrence of westerly flow types linked to a reduced mean zonal flow under low solar activity. Based on this observational evidence, we estimate the probability to have cold conditions in winter over Europe to be higher under low solar activity than under high activity.”
We’ve known the mechanisms for decades, as this article from 1975’s Science Mag would indicate, but as they contradict the modern political Global Warming agenda they’re conveniently forgotten:
TEXAS ‘OUT-SNOWING’ PARTS OF ALASKA? — ALL PREDICTED DURING A GRAND SOLAR MINIMUM
Back in the fall of 2018, Texas was reported to be ‘out-snowing’ Fairbanks, Alaska.
The story was twisted by the mainstream media to somehow prove AGW, however the phenomenon is exactly the pattern we’d expect to see during a Grand Solar Minimum.
Looking at NASA’s own Maunder Minimum Temperature Reconstruction Maps, some regions actually warm during periods of global cooling — the Arctic, North Atlantic and Alaska being the main ones (although ‘warm’ to the Arctic, for example, is still well-below freezing — there’s no melt):
CONTRARY to popular thinking and clever marketing, there is no “consensus” on the theory of dangerous man-made climate change. Too many variables exist within the climate system to allow for certainty of future scenarios.
THIS doesn’t deter the $2,000,000,000,000 US per year (2 Trillion)Climate Crisis Industry who manufacture catastrophic climate scenarios (pushed far enough into the distant future as to not be held accountable) with a guarantee of climate calamity unless their utopian ‘green’ dreams are realised.
BUOYED by their recent House Congress win in the 2018 mid-term elections, the hard-Left of the American Democrat party, led by pinup-socialist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, have doubled-down on their pet global warming theory, proposing the radically-dystopian climate agenda, a Green New Deal.
FOR all the economic pain and social upheaval that inevitably ensues when draconian climate policy is enacted, it is only fair and reasonable for the taxpayer to ask one simple question about a climate which demands so much of their hard-earned money – “what is broken?”.
THE best way to answer this is to look at the current state of a set of common environmental metrics and analyse their relationship with carbon dioxide – the colourless, odourless, tasteless trace gas at the centre of the supposed “climate crisis”.
IN the interests of “cherry-picking”, there are a myriad of environmental metrics that make up the climate system. The examples cited for the purpose of this report are the more common associations picked up by the press and interest groups to facilitate climate change discussion and ‘debate’.
*THE empirical evidence featured in this post is taken from the latest data supplied by government scientific agencies and peer-reviewed studies. Hyper and direct links supplied per sample.
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ARCTIC
STATE OF ARCTIC SEA-ICE : 2018 SUMMER MINIMUM
ARCTIC SEA-ICE EXTENT (September 2018)
MINIMUM sea-ice extent has been trending up over the past decade. The EXACT opposite of what the press and ‘97% experts’ have been telling you :
“Only two things are infinite; the universe and human stupidity.” – Albert Einstein
WATCH…
“The collusion between wind energy and government disgusts me. If the Federal Production Tax Credit for wind energy didn’t exist, you would not see another industrial wind energy turbine built.”– Warren Buffet
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THE entire rationale for wind turbines is to stop global warming climate change by reducing the amount of CO2 being returned to the atmosphere from the burning of fossil fuels.
THE energy required for a helicopter to de-ice all the blades on a wind farm must outweigh any supposed saving in CO2 by a factor of 100 or more. Notwithstanding that no wind farm has saved a gram of CO2 due to construction and the necessary spinning reserve.
THE attached picture, taken from a wind farm in Sweden, is a metaphor for the complete insanity of the mad rush into useless UNreliables – wind and solar. Symbolic ‘energy’ gestures to the folly of ‘green’ madness that fail both physically and financially wherever installed.
THIS one photo alone sums up the collective era of eco-stupidity that we live in today, where rational thought, logic, reason and commonsense has been gleefully abandoned for enormous amounts of public money with valuable resources needlessly sacrificed.
SOME OF WHAT THE “97% CONSENSUS” ASSURED US ABOUT SNOWFALL :
❄️ SNOW will become “A very rare and exciting event. Children just aren’t going to know what snow is.” – Dr. Viner CRU (2000)
❄️ “Milder winter temps will decrease heavy snowstorms” IPCC (2001)
❄️ “Resorts could lose 1/4 of snow in 15 years” – CSIRO (2003)
❄️ “Alps Under Threat” THE AGE (2005)
❄️ “End of Snow?” NYTimes (2014)
AND, for the “global warming = more moisture in the air” enthusiasts, don’t forget that you need *cold* air to make snow.
Snow in Bavaria [image credit: BBC] It seems that rumours of the end of snowy European winters have been greatly exaggerated. Countries as far south as Greece have been badly affected.
Winter storms have killed several people across Europe, including in Germany, reports DW.com.
While conditions have improved in some parts, meteorologists predict it’s just the calm before the next storm.
A polar bear on hummocked sea ice in Franz Josef Land. Photo by Michael Hambrey, date not specified but estimated based on tour dates to be 22 or 23 June 2019. 
Snow in Bavaria [image credit: BBC]
Climatism 
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