Do Global Warming Alarmists Realize The US Won The Revolutionary War In Part Due To A “Category 6” Hurricane?
“Climate change” proponents love to blame any extreme weather event on human activities, specifically CO2 emissions. The National Climate Assessment states that “stronger evidence confirms that some of these increases are related to human activities” in regard to the weather events listed below:
- Heat Waves
- Drought
- Heavy Downpours
- Floods
- Hurricanes
- Winter storms
The irony of their position is laughable – not only does the climate change crowd show almost no regard towards meaningfully decreasing CO2 emissions, there exists scant evidence (at absolute best) that CO2 emissions have a meaningful impact on the planet’s climate. All of the above “extreme weather” events have occurred since long before the industrial revolution, with many (notably the dust bowl in the 1930s) occurring well before human beings began emitting substantial amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere.
This is especially pertinent in the case of hurricanes. Last week, 60 Minutes’ Lesley Stahl attempted to corner President Trump into backpedaling on his prior doubt of the climate change movement. Trump, to his credit, was having none of it:
Lesley Stahl: You know, I– I was thinking what if he said, “No, I’ve seen the hurricane situations, I’ve changed my mind. There really is climate change.” And I thought, “Wow, what an impact.”
President Donald Trump: Well– I’m not denying.
Lesley Stahl: What an impact that would make.
President Donald Trump: I’m not denying climate change. But it could very well go back. You know, we’re talkin’ about over a millions–
Lesley Stahl: But that’s denying it.
President Donald Trump: –of years. They say that we had hurricanes that were far worse than what we just had with Michael.
Incidentially enough, The Wall Street Journal released their review of the book “In The Hurricane’s Eye” just after Hurricane Michael dissipated – a book which, among other factors, attributes American victory in the Revolutionary War to… none other than one of the worst hurricane seasons on record:
Mr. Philbrick dwells on several uncanny strokes of luck for the allies. In the late summer and early fall of 1780, at least three massive hurricanes devastated the fleets and ports of the French, Spanish and British colonies in the West Indies. That destruction rendered de Grasse receptive to shifting his fleet out of harm’s way during the next hurricane season by sailing north to the continental coast.
The 1780 hurricane season, as described by The Weather Doctor, was one of the worst in history, in spite of the lack of modern-day storm tracking technology:
In retrospect, it was called the “Great Hurricane Season of 1780” and for good reason. Centuries before we had the ability to pinpoint all tropical storms with satellite, radar and aircraft surveillance, the record shows eight strong tropical storms made landfall on the continent and across the West Indies. The human toll from these storms has been estimated in the range of 27,000, a deadly record that still stands. The single “Great Hurricane of 1780” was blamed for 22,000 of those deaths, a total only approached once since — Hurricane Mitch in 1998 which claimed 11,000–19,000 lives, mostly in catastrophic flooding and landslides related to its torrential rains.
In a recent article titled, “The world has never seen a Category 6 hurricane – But the day may be coming”, the LA Times stated that a theoretical “category 6” hurricane could be attributed to climate change…
And although there is debate over whether there will be more or fewer of them, most researchers think hurricanes will be stronger.
Since each category covers a range of wind speeds, it would appear that once wind speed reaches 190 or 200 mph, the pattern may call for another category.
…even though the Great Hurricane of 1780 is estimated to have been “category 6” powerful:
The hurricane struck Barbados likely as a Category 5 hurricane, with at least one estimate of wind speeds as high as 320 km/h (200 mph) (greater than any in recorded history) before moving past Martinique, Saint Lucia, and Sint Eustatius and causing thousands of deaths on those islands. Coming in the midst of the American Revolution, the storm caused heavy losses to the British fleet contesting for control of the area, largely weakening British control over the Atlantic.
So not only has the Atlantic seen hurricane seasons as bad (or more likely, worse) than any in the past several decades, the existence of the United States can be attributed (in at least some part) due to one of them. This, of course, occurred long before fossil fuels were ever burned by man-made equipment.
But according to the climate change crowd, recent mega-powerful hurricanes have all been due to global warming, in spite of the Great Hurricane of 1780 decimating the British, French, and Spanish fleets, which (along with many other factors) ultimately led to the British surrender at Yorktown. Go figure.
Blaming modern-day natural disasters and/or major weather events on CO2 emissions is extremely suspect from a historical context. Major weather events such as hurricanes are parts of historically developed patterns that go back thousands of years, which often take thousands of years to develop. With thousands (if not millions) of different factors determining weather and/or climate, isolating one variable and attributing it any extreme weather ignores not only recent history, but anything else that could be occurring on a global or extrasolar basis to affect the planet’s climate.
Of course, none of that stops climate change proponents from putting forward ineffectual solutions to reduce CO2 emissions. If they really wanted CO2 emissions reduced, nuclear power would replace coal, oil and natural gas power and deforestation would be illegal, among many other actions that could be taken to meaningfully “decarbonize” human behavior. Climate change “solutions” are more akin to globalist schemes to implement carbon taxes that would most heavily impact the world’s poorest, without meaningfully changing the net CO2 impact of humans.
And while the far left will wail and gnash their teeth when President Trump labels himself a nationalist…
…at least he has the good sense to stand up to the mainstream media’s near-constant push to implement carbon taxes.