The passing of Ray Bradbury
this past week was a wake up call for me. Firstly, it was a reminder
to re-read two of his notable works, Fahrenheit 451 and the Martian
Chronicles. He wrote other great stuff too, but those stick out. He
was one of an old breed of writer, the kind that wrote every day, with pen
and paper or old fasioned typewriter. He loved science fiction and was
apparently quite a collector of memorabilia, and, to those who had to
clear out his house, excessively.
While the L.A. Times had a nice article on Bradbury, the grocery store
checkout line literary offerings had other headliners. Prince William
and Kate Middleton are still the beautiful royal couple. The Kings are having a great
time with their newly won Stanley Cup, and deservedly so. Aliens do in
fact run Wal-Mart and Jennifer Aniston is breaking up and falling in
love, often on the same front page. Ah, the tabloids.
My attention fell on a publication that was tucked away on the bottom
rack. Its heading was far more eye catching and frightening than the
two-headed Martian claiming to be able to save the banking system.
Global change. According to a really well written piece in the
Economist, global change will mean much more than bumping the SPF up on
your sunscreen. It means the destruction of certain eco-climates and
the critters that live in them. It means that trade and business around
the globe will change. And it means more storms, with more wet and more
dry periods.
In southern California, this is a real problem. After a couple of
winters with some good rains, we have accumulated a lot brush growth in
the hills and canyons. Now this year we have had a fraction of our
normal precipitation, so there is the perfect combination for a hellish
fire season.
People falsely think that since they are far away from these brushy
areas that they have nothing to worry about. But that is the funny
thing about fires -- they don't see street signs or county lines. They
go wherever the wind takes their flying embers and just as readily burn
houses as easily as trees and brush.
Everyone should take some time to evaluate their own surroundings and
make their homes as fire proof as possible. Clear shrubs from around
the house. Trim and haul away old dead limbs from trees, especially
palms and eucalyptus. Old shake shingle roofs are like natural
tinder...get rid of them. Plant vegetation that is fire resistent.
Contact your closest fire station and ask them what is best for your
neighborhood.
The loss of any of one's possessions is heartbreaking, but you can do
something to prevent that. Don't let foolishness take away something
precious. In fact, doing nothing is like tossing a book in the fire
yourself. Paper does burn at 451 degrees, but in house fires where the
temperature far exceeds that, almost everything else is going to burn
too.
Showing posts with label global warming. Show all posts
Showing posts with label global warming. Show all posts
Sunday, June 24, 2012
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
Just the Tip of the Iceberg
The Los Angeles Times just published an article that is,
on one hand, not surprising, yet alarming on the other. Entitled “Earth may be near tipping point” by
Times writer Bettina Boxall, the article warns inhabitants of Planet Earth that
things are rapidly going south. While
some nay-sayers have staunchly decried “global warming” as something cooked up
by the scientific community to drum up research dollars (yes, I have heard
that!), we simply cannot continue our Grasshopper attitude and sing away while
the earth rapidly reaches homogeneity – and the end of life as we know it.
The signs are here.
The original paper, published in the prestigious journal Nature last
week, has a laundry list of them that even the non-scientists can see: Documented rising temperatures, increase in
severe weather, ocean temperatures rising (causing a change in pH and salinity),
human population booming. It took a
couple million years for the earth’s human population to reach one billion in
1804 and took 125 years to double by 1927.
We reached three billion in 1960, then doubled to 6 billion in only 40
years. It was a mere 10 years before another
billion came along, and, at this rate, we will continue to add another billion
to our total every dozen years or so.
Human impact is undeniable. Just look around your own neighborhood. Do you see more houses and less parks and
open space? Do you read about more air
and water pollution? Do you see more
cars on the road? Do you have more
extreme heat or cold or severe storms? Do
you experience more power outages? Of
course you do. We all do.
Far away more is happening. The ocean’s warming is
causing the polar ice caps to melt. We’ve all seen those heart-breaking scenes
of polar bears losing their breeding grounds and their numbers dwindle, but what
most people don’t realize is that the caps don’t just melt like one big ice
cube. It fractures and breaks off in big
chunks. The increased presence of ice
bergs is becoming a really big issue.
More and larger chunks are floating in places and at times that have
never been documented before. Fishing,
shipping and cruising industries have all started to feel the effect.
You’ve heard the phrase: Think Globally, Act Locally, so start
now because we can see the tip of this iceberg.
We KNOW that what lies below can be huge and hold dangerous
consequences. Realizing this global
crisis, start acting locally. Contact
local businesses about generating less waste and using less electricity. Really, do restaurants need to be 60 degrees
inside? Tell companies to stop wasting
space and resources on large and elaborate packaging And don’t buy stuff that does
come that way. Support public
transportation and fuel efficiency.
Emergency Preparedness is obviously my work’s focus, but
this is all related. Preparing for
future emergencies is really the same as preparing for life in general. What you do today can affect how well you
move into the future. We just need to
look out for the ice bergs.
Resources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_population
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