Climate change: it’s only weather

By Richard North - December 23, 2022

On 21 December, the Washington Post ran a major article headed: “Winter storm to trigger dangerous blizzard, high winds and Arctic cold”.

“Nearly 70 million people are under winter storm watches or warnings, and 90 million are under wind chill alerts”, the sub-heading read, while the first paragraph spelt out the situation. “An exceptionally powerful winter storm”, it said, “is set to unleash dangerous weather across the eastern two-thirds of the country into the holiday weekend, disrupting air and land travel during one of the busiest times of year”.

In more detail, we were told that some snow would break out in the Upper Midwest and Plains on Wednesday, but the most severe conditions were anticipated Thursday and Friday across the Great Lakes.

“Brief bursts of heavy snow, strong wind gusts, and rapidly falling temperatures will likely lead to sudden whiteouts, flash freezing, and icy roads”, the National Weather Service wrote. “Even in areas unaffected by snow, dangerous cold is expected”.

The following evening, a follow-up piece in the same paper confirmed the worst. “Americans brace for ‘once in a generation’ winter storm chaos”, it headlined. “Dreams of a white Christmas week deteriorated to panic over whiteout conditions Thursday”, reported Danielle Paquette wrote, “as Americans braced for what forecasters called ‘once in a generation’ winter storm chaos”.

The warnings sounded across the United States: Get ready for pounding snow, freezing rain, subzero temperatures, power outages and ruined holiday plans. The Midwest hunkered down for a potential “bomb cyclone,” which meteorologists described as a cross between a hurricane and a blizzard.

At least 4,200 flights were cancelled ahead of the busiest travel weekend of the year, and icy roads imperilled drivers. Highway patrol troopers in Wyoming responded to more than 100 car wrecks in 12 hours. The governors of Georgia, Kentucky and North Carolina declared states of emergency.

“I encourage everyone, everyone to please heed the local warnings”, president Biden told reporters. “This is not like a snow day when you were a kid. This is serious stuff”, he said.

Despite the drama though, and the evident seriousness of the situation, UK media coverage at the moment has been relatively slight. Late yesterday, though, the Mail Online did run a piece with a lengthy headline,

The tenor left no doubt as to the seriousness of the events unfolding in North America as we were told: “At least five killed on treacherous roads and nearly 9,000 flights cancelled as once-in-a-generation ‘snowpocalypse’ begins to batter almost every state: Six governors call a state of emergency amid sub-zero temps and whiteout conditions”.

The Times is also running a piece headed: “‘Bomb cyclone’ ushers in a freezing Christmas”, telling us that much of the US “faces its coldest Christmas in decades”, as an arctic winter storm sweeps the country, bringing heavy snow and cyclone-force winds before the festive weekend.

To give an indication of how bad the situation is, the paper tells us that, in Denver, Colorado, the temperature plunged by 33 degrees in seven hours, to minus 22ºC. On the same day last year, it was minus 5ºC. It cites the National Weather Service warning that, “Wind chills of this magnitude can cause frostbite in less than five minutes if precautions are not taken, with hypothermia and death also possible from prolonged exposure to the cold”.

Early on the case though was the Guardian, which often has better international weather coverage than most British papers, reflecting its obsession with global warming, or the “climate emergency” as it prefers to call it.

This paper ran a piece yesterday, headed: “Potential bomb cyclone is ‘serious stuff’, Biden warns as Arctic blast looms” mirroring the Washington Post coverage.

But this is “serious stuff” in more than one sense as the severity and extent of the storm – and the third serious weather event this winter in the United States – could have a material effect on the climate change religion, once the great unwashed get to realise that the “great freeze” does not exactly constitute warming.

Evidently aware of this peril, the Guardian has been quick to rush out an explainer with the heading: “Historic heat to extreme chill: why is the US experiencing a cold snap?”, in a bid to reassure the faithful that climate change is on target to destroy the planet.

“Blistering cold events are becoming more stark and pose a threat not only to humans but to entire ecosystems”, writes Gabrielle Canon, the climate reporter and extreme weather correspondent for the Guardian US. Only this paper could have such a post.

Cannon enlists “climate scientist” Daniel Swain to tell us that “the shock to the system” is going to be substantial “because we haven’t seen this in a long time”, as he notes that, in general, “numbing cold is becoming less common”. And therein is the core message that the Guardian wishes to present.

We have Swain go on to tell us that the current conditions “may well be the coldest temperatures I ever experience for the rest of my life in this part of the world”. As people around the world brace for more extreme heatwaves and extreme rainfall events – made more likely by the climate crisis – he says, we will still have to navigate these sharp shifts. “This is a reminder that we can still get these kinds of events even in a warming climate”.

So there we are. In the Guardian’s obsessive little world, all is well as the extreme cold don’t mean nuffin. We can still get these kinds of events even in a warming climate. The religion is safe for now.

But, while there is limited coverage is being given to this exceptional US weather, virtually nothing is being said of dramatic events in Japan where record levels of snow are being reported, forecast to last until Monday, concentrated in areas of the country along the Sea of Japan.

Snow is also hitting Vladivostok in eastern Russia, at levels sufficient to excite the interest of the Chinse news agency, while Moscow has been buried in what is being called “historic” levels of snowfall. Yet, in 2008, the capital was experiencing its warmest winter ever and having to truck snow in to enable an alpine skiing event.

Closer to home, in Iceland, exceptional falls of snow are being recorded, with unusually severe blizzard conditions. Numerous flights have been cancelled and thousands of passengers have been stranded at Keflavik Airport.

Nor are we out of the woods in the UK, with the Mail warning us that there is a risk of snow on Boxing Day, running into the New Year. The UK will be battling below-average temperatures and numerous wintry blasts, with some areas seeing winds as cold as -11ºC.

The point, of course, is that during the summer, when we had periods of warm weather, the media was all over it like a bad smell and couldn’t get enough of climate change.

Already the Guardian is happily crowing that “Global temperatures in 2023 [are] set to be among hottest on record”, but when exceptional winter conditions span the globe, all we see is the usual suspects rushing to tell us that “it’s only weather”.