Climate Change? Nahhh ...

Utah man trying to kill spider with lighter started Springville wildfire, police say | KSL.com

 

Manmade climate change?

Compacted dirt, destroyed mountaintops and deforestation in eastern Kentucky have often been left ignored by the coal companies that mined there, despite legal requirements that they attempt to return the land to its natural state when mining concludes. In recent decades, that spurned responsibility has, at times, turned heavy rains into floods and caused local residents who once counted on mining for jobs and prosperity to bring litigation against their former employers in Appalachian courtrooms.

Lawyers who have pursued these cases in the past said it is still too early to pursue a case in the most recent flooding, as studies need to be conducted and claimants contacted, but interest in holding someone to account for the lost homes and at least 37 dead is growing.

"It may be too early to tell, but I've received a couple phone calls already," said Ned Pillersdorf, a Kentucky lawyer in Prestonburg who has successfully sued coal companies for flood damage in the past. "No one is denying the amount of rain we had — it truly was a 1,000 year event — but did the strip mines contribute? Absolutely."

Kentucky, particularly the eastern mountains, are littered with abandoned coal mines. Many are a result of strip mining or mountaintop removal mining, the latter a method in which mining companies use explosives to blast off a mountain's summit to get to the coal inside.

Pillersdorf, whose home was flooded, noted that the areas worst hit in his county are the ones closest to the strip mines.

"It is obviously just a clear slam dunk in terms of corporate irresponsibility," said Alex Gibson, the executive director of Appalshop, the culture and education center in Whitesburg that was hit by more than 6 feet of water. "And of how we can predict an outcome and ignore all the signs along the way until the tragedy happens and then act like, 'Yeah, but we didn't see it coming. It was God's work.’” ...

Kevin Thompson, an attorney whose work earned national attention for challenging powerful coal CEO Don Blankenship, … that it would be much more difficult to bring a challenge more than a decade later. While the issues are the same, he said that partisanship and the politicization of science have created new challenges in the courtroom.

"There's always been politics, but what has changed is people's unwillingness to accept science and engineering principles," he said. "It has jaded their political views to the point that plaintiffs can't get fair compensation for damage done to them by mountaintop removal.”

Not all views are skewed by politics, Thompson clarified, but it can make it difficult to get all 12 members of a jury to side with the plaintiff.

“Almost all of the law firms that I know that represent coal mining families have stopped litigating these kinds of cases,” Thompson added. “It’s become really difficult.”​

Abandoned mines and poor oversight worsened Kentucky flooding, attorneys say

 

I can't believe 1,000 people WENT to Death Valley on a day in August.

Some of the approximately 1,000 people stranded at Death Valley National Park have left in spite of flooding - CNN

 

I went last June when it was 121. I just never got car or went off the main road. A very beautiful place.

 

So California and the Southwest in general are fighting a severe drought and wildfires. Seems like the perfect time to fire up the fear engine and speculate about a monthlong rain event that could produce a city-drowning flood 60 years from now.

 

The NYT did that story one better (or worse) with this ominous presentation.

The Coming California Megastorm

Not that either outlet, like, gives a shit, but ask yourself how that might read to a Californian who can't just...pick up and move? Because it's not like there's some magic climate bill that wards off the angry weather gods; if the shutdown of world society, during Covid, couldn't and didn't do, a gradual movement to solar panels won't slow this down.

No matter. The Day After Tomorrow approach beckons.

Here's the press release from the study...it's tame by comparison!

Climate change makes catastrophic flood twice as likely, study shows

 

Rrrrriiiiiiigggggggghhhhhtttt

Yeah I’ll believe it when I see it.

 

The study and press release is interesting.

I'm honestly surprised NYT made it into a movie trailer.

 

Just got back from 10 days in Europe. There are places where you can walk across the Rhine and the Danube. Pretty damn soon the river cruise industry is going to be a world of hurt.