The Pakistan floods of August last year were devastating. And like carrion crow picking a carcass, the warmists were all over them within days. Hillary Clinton was among the first to provide the link, and true to lapdog religious-zealotry form, the BBC was also quickly in on the act. Here, science “reporter” Howard Falcon-Lang assembled a catalogue of alarmist evidence to tell us (as the main message of the piece):
Professor Rajiv Sinha, from the Indian Institute of Technology in Kanpur, who has had first hand experience of Asian river floods, takes a more strident position.
“What all the climate models predict is that the distribution of monsoon rains will become more uneven in the future,” he told BBC News….Total rainfall stays the same, but it comes in shorter more intense bursts.”
Very little doubt there, and of course – as usual – Mr Falcon-Lang provides no alternative opinion from experts with different views, other than a brief nod to that deforestation of the Indus and poor management of levees may also have played a (minor) role. The inference is clear. The billions of pounds of damage and torrent of human suffering was exactly in line with the great-god climate models. And the people of Pakistan had better get used to it. The start of the Apocalypse.
Spool forward. A peer-reviewed paper to be presented to the American Meteorological Society (currently meeting in Seattle) says:
Last summer’s disastrous Pakistan floods that killed more than 2,000 people and left more than 20 million injured or homeless were caused by a rogue weather system that wandered hundreds of miles farther west than is normal for such systems, new research shows.
And, as Anthony Watts points out, the word “climate”, let alone “climate change” is not even mentioned in the findings of the paper. It was a highly unusual weather event in an area prone to unstable cyclonic rainfall. Full stop, capital letter.
I will await with bated breath for the BBC’s corrected take on this. And wait….
I wouldn’t bther, if doesn’t fit their ‘narrative’ it doesn’t exist.
The BBC are fighting back. The front page of their website today has this on the top banner:
“Polar Bears: The search for sea ice”
Very early on in the article they tell us that a Polar Bear swam 426 miles looking for ice – which “could be a result of climate change”
The article does point out further down that Polar bears have been seen swimming in open water before – although that this is the first time the journey of a polar bear has been tracked.
The article doesn’t bother to dwell on wondering if this is typical behaviour for polar bears, instead the author goes for the money shot and brings up the cuddly, fluffy cub that completed the journey also – using more energy than the adult.
The image of the cub causes the reader to feel sorry for the polar bear, which is handy because it is just in time for the concluding statement and the real point of the article:
‘global climate change as a “substational threat” to their habitat.’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_9369000/9369317.stm
Hmmmm…. has the BBC gone just a little Creationist? If even polar bear cubs can swim 426 miles, that would kind of imply that either Darwin was drunk at the wheel and polar bears have evolved an ability to swim huge distances through freezing water for no reason at all, or alternatly that swimming is a natural part of polar bear life.
That is a very good point.
So no attempt by the BBC to investigate normal Polar Bear biology.
Just take an observation and link it to Climate Change. The BBC doesn’t do science , full stop.
Happy to have my quick calculation checked, but that works out at 2mph, continuously, for 9 days, without rest or sleep. Unless it’s an average and she and junior spun up to steroid pedalo levels* on occasion and then kipped over in the odd Greenpeace vessel bobbing about.
If true, that indeed strikes one as truly remarkable, especially to look for something to pop in the G&T (yes, I know it’s ‘cos the seals they eat live under it).
I am actually quite content for discussions on the extent of climate change to unfold sensibly, as I accept it does and may even be doing so nebatively. As to Man’s influence… not so sure. So any attempt to conflate polar bear travails with poster kids for (A)GW-led tax grabs is an eyebrow cranker.
I’d simply be interested in the input from a few other biologists on the facts of this purely as it does seem so extraordinary as a feat of strength and endurance.
It would be a pity if it turned out the facts were hyped in any way.
* http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_fast_can_polar_bears_swim
How fast can a polar bear swim?
they can swim at 20.1 mph
Not bad when it seems a marathon runner (26 miles) can manage about 12mph tops.
So it seems one might be able to waterski behind these guys! Eskimo watersports enthusiasts note.
But surely the fact that a rogue weather system was able to form is symptomatic of climate change? Climate change didn’t need to be mentioned, because everyone knows it’s a proven fact.
That’ll be the BBC reply, assuming they even bother.
I can’t for the life of me understand why climate change is newsworthy anyway – if there was NO climate change, that would be the time to worry, particularly if we were in the middle of a bad phase. At least we’re pretty sure that eventually we’ll have something different to look forward to, even if it’s cooler.
Any road up, you’ll have a long wait if you think the BBC are going to reverse their ideologies, after all, there are pensions to be considered.
Natsman,
You are right. At the end of the day, the BBC whores will sell anything to increase their own personal wealth.
Hell will freeze over before the bBC correct anything.
Erm so BBC/dezzie /scottie and the other greenish folk weather is now a sign global warm? disrup?? climat? sorry what is it this week? or not?.
Now that we have had 3 bad winters on the trot, the warmists are predicting that Britain will get cooler.
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2011/01/experts-warn.html
If I din’t know better I would say that these people change thier theories to match the weather.
“Yet scientists say Vila Real and London have something in common, thanks to the effects of global warming.
According to their analysis, the Mediterranean climate of Vila Real is exactly what Londoners can expect by 2071.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2007/may/15/climatechange.climatechangeenvironment
Britain will be briliant – you could sunbathe in the Portugese climate of London and at the weekend go ski-ing in Yorkshire.