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anjou · 13-01-2010, 06:57

Well I guess if a hurricane lands in a desolate unpopulated country then no financial damage can be done and nature cleans up after, but that statement from NOAA doesnt realy tell it like it is

cdennyb · 13-01-2010, 07:59

The weasther up here in the northern portion of California has undergone some dramatic shifts in the weather. When I was 12 years old, my Dad and I used to go deer hunting not far from our house in the local foothills and since my birthday is mid September, the season usually opened around that day every year. I can remember seasons when you had to bundle up with a tee shirt, flannel long sleeve shirt, goosedown vest and a heavy jacket to go up in the hills during that month. Over the years I have personally noticed a trend to the weather that "pushes" it later and later into the year and season. Two years ago, my daughter and I were water skiing at Christmas! Yes, it was cold, in the mid 60's but compared to the snow covered mountains and freezing temps and stoms of the years past, I would say it was a dramatic shift.
Now we have milder winters and they don't start until late November and now continue well into May. Back in the younger days winter was over in Mar-April.
Global warming? Global cooling? who really knows. All I know from living at the same place all my life is that the weather has shifted and become milder and for whatever reason, I think we all will be needing a boat soon.

Roaring Girl · 13-01-2010, 08:31

There is already an immense impact as a result of resource wars in eastern Africa. A good argument can be made that Darfur and the related lawlessness in Somalia are the first water wars, and we all know as sailors what that is doing to our freedom of movement.

On a different scale and effecting far more cruisers, are the efforts of desperate people to get from Africa to Europe by crossing the southern Med and the Atlantic to the Canaries in small boats. It is a real issue to ensure that you have plans to manage the situation should you encounter such a vessel.

Some of this is a direct consequence of a changing climate; other causes are of overfarming/deforestation/acquifer drainage/over-population, all connected to wasteful and unbalanced use of large scale but finite resources to the serious disadvantage of large populations. Inevitably people try to keep their families alive and achieve prosperity by whatever means they can. (This is not a defense of piracy!)

I would say that these are the most immediate impacts, especially for those of us living and/or sailing outside the hurricane belts. If the Gulf Stream and other conveyor currents do stop and this proves to be a major on/off switch for the current climate, we could also see other enormous changes both to temperature/precipitation and to the intensity/frequency of extreme weather events, effecting the ability to cruise in large parts of the world.

bobsadler · 13-01-2010, 08:56

if it's "colder" it's weather, if it's "warmer" it's climate change

al gore is going to make bernie maddox look like an amateur

Bash · 13-01-2010, 08:56

there's a fairly simple logic here. If you want to become a hurricane, you've got to start out as a tropical storm. Tropical storms gain their intensity from warm water. The more warm the water is, the greater the intensity of the resultant storms.

Long-term gains in ocean temperatures will certainly effect cruising lifestyles.

cdennyb · 13-01-2010, 09:02

It may turn out that crusiers and vessel owners are the only ones that actually escape any of the disaster related hardships described in several posts above. Think for a minute.
Cruisers are very conservative, they value their water and provision easily (or not) for the long term and they have a skill set that is survival based not hand-out based. They do for themselves and others more often than not and they are usually quite friendly.
If vigilanty type unrest breaks out on land, for the most part, us cruisers (if we can get to the boat) will easily survive better than the land based ones that are trapped in the disaster that was created by the lack of resources.

slomotion · 13-01-2010, 10:53

The decline and destruction of coral reefs in the Bahamas and Caribbean over the last 10 to 15 years is undeniable. The cause or mix of causes from one location to another may vary, but the culprits include careless visitors (including cruisers), overfishing, warmer sea temperatures, pollution, increased CO2 levels, and introduction of non-native species.

I don’t know whether all these factors can properly be labeled "climate change", but certainly some of them can. I have seen the results over time in several places and they are quite disturbing. It might be different if there were evidence of new coral reef formation somewhere, but I have neither seen nor heard of it except for the occasional deliberate sinking of an old ship.

**sneuman** · 16-01-2010, 04:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by bobsadler

if it's "colder" it's weather, if it's "warmer" it's climate change

al gore is going to make bernie maddox look like an amateur

or, a little thing called "solar minimum". It happens every 11 years like clockwork and has no direct correlation to man-made climate change, it only masks the change on the low side and adds to it on the high end.

The fact is the warmest periods are consistently warmer than at any time in modern history. That's not in dispute.

bobsadler · 16-01-2010, 04:58

sneuman: if you can pick your "modern" period that may be true but i've yet to hear of anyone recently dairy farming in greenland (medieval warm period) or harvesting acres of wine grapes in britain (roman warm period)

idpnd · 16-01-2010, 05:20

I'm surprised, and pleasantly so, that no global warming deniers have turned up considering this is a US-dominated forum.. Must be the sailing demographic

anjou · 16-01-2010, 05:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by idpnd

I'm surprised, and pleasantly so, that no global warming deniers have turned up considering this is a US-dominated forum.. Must be the sailing demographic

I think its obvious to all rational and intelligent people that climate change is a reality. It is happening.

What is in disagreement is who or what is the cause of it.
The scientists are in disagreement and the problem for many of us is, who can we believe.
Research Scientists need paying by someone and are leaned on to be partial.
Independants are mostly hippy types and dont carry as much credibility in first world eyes.

KestrelBuck · 16-01-2010, 05:34

1. Climate change is not in dispute. The dispute is weather it is caused by human activity. In conservation biology there is the notion 'carrying capacity.' What is the carrying capacity of the planet? If you doubt the wisdom of this question then think of Easter island as an example. Or, why do electronics have heat sinks in them? Where is earth's heat sink?
2. Regarding vineyards in England, go see Vineyards in England and Wales
3. Regarding cows in Greenland
Arctic Harvest: Global Warming a Boon for Greenland's Farmers - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International
4. Those of you who are engineers understand the difference between local and global maxima and minima. When discussing climate change one's observation about the weather in one's neighborhood does not allow one to sort out local and global weather changes.
5. I have looked at the so called hockey stick temperature data, the methodology used to analyze it, and I have read the most vocal of the critics. I have enough facility with statistics to know that I could approach the data in an entirely different manner and arrive at the same conclusion as the original author. Who is right? We must decide for ourselves on the basis of the preponderance of evidence.
6. Another approach to deciding how we will deal with climate change, or not, is offered by a high school science teacher who has a good, basic understanding of game theory. Go to youtube and watch the his video

YouTube - How It All Ends

KestrelBuck · 16-01-2010, 05:36

Just one more observation
7. Biologists who think about these things are reporting that all over the globe insects and migratory birds are now to be found in habitats where they were not previously seen.

**GordMay** · 16-01-2010, 05:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by bobsadler

sneuman: if you can pick your "modern" period that may be true but i've yet to hear of anyone recently dairy farming in greenland (medieval warm period) or harvesting acres of wine grapes in britain (roman warm period)

“Tipping Points*” are the levels (threshold) at which the momentum for change becomes unstoppable (inevitable).
Climactic tipping points can occur when the climate reaches a state such that strong amplifying feedbacks (domino effect) are activated by only moderate additional changes. These can occur irrespective of previous variations, which did not reach the tipping point of no return, after which truly catastrophic changes become inevitable.
I don’t know where the Earth’s climactic tipping point lies:
ie: how much carbon do we have to pump into the atmosphere and how much warmer does the climate need to be before get there?
It's understandable that many of us would take refuge in that uncertainty, and hope that we'll somehow have the climate problem solved before we cross the tipping point; but that would be a catastrophic mistake.
The finding that the climate has warmed in recent decades, and that human activities are already contributing adversely to global climate change has been endorsed by every national science academy that has issued a statement on climate change, including the science academies of all of the major industrialized countries. The scientific evidence cannot be selectively chosen to support a cause (on either side of the issue).
This is not a matter of belief or disbelief. Concerns about climate change arise from the scientific evidence that humanity's activities are leading to (unwholesome) changes in our climate. The scientific evidence is overwhelming.

* Tipping Point: adding a small amount of weight to a balanced object can cause it to suddenly and completely topple.