The Los Angeles Wildfires Are Climate Disasters Compounded. Conditions for a January LA firestorm have not existed before now, writes a meteorologist and climate journalist. Earth Island Journal Eric Holthaus-January 9, 2025An exceptional mix of environmental conditions has created an ongoing firestorm without known historical precedent across southern California this week.The ingredients for these infernos in the Los Angeles area, near-hurricane strength winds and drought, foretell an emerging era of compound events — simultaneous types of historic weather conditions, happening at unusual times of the year, resulting in situations that overwhelm our ability to respond. The Palisades fire now ranks as the most destructive in Los Angeles history with hundreds of homes and other structures destroyed and damage so extensive that it exhausted municipal water supplies. In Pacific Palisades, wealthy homeowners fled by foot after abandoning their cars in gridlocked neighborhoods. In Pasadena, quickly advancing fire prompted evacuations as far into the urban grid as the famous Rose Parade route. Early estimates of the wildfires’ combined economic impact are in the tens of billions of dollars and could place the fires as the most damaging in US history.— exceeding the 2018 Camp Fire in Paradise, California.  These fires are a watershed moment, not just for residents of LA, but emblematic of a new era of complex, compound climate disaster. Conditions for a January firestorm in Los Angeles have never existed in all of known history, until they now do.

The short answer is that the greenhouse gases humans continue to emit are fueling the climate crisis and making big fires more common in California.As the atmosphere warms, hotter air evaporates water and can intensify drought more quickly.Melting Arctic ice creates changes in the jet stream’s behavior that make wind-driven large wildfires in California more likely. Recent studies have found that Santa Ana wind events could get less frequent but perhaps more intense in the winter months due to the climate crisis.

The more complicated answer is that these fires are an especially acute example of something climate scientists have been warning about for decades: compound climate disasters that, when they occur simultaneously, produce much more damage than they would individually. As the climate crisis escalates, the interdependent atmospheric, oceanic and ecological systems that constrain human civilization will lead to compounding and regime-shifting changes that are difficult to predict in advance. That idea formed a guiding theme of the Biden administration’s 2023 national climate assessment.....read on    https://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/articles/entry/the-los-angeles-wildfires-are-climate-disasters-compounded

• Amazon fires are causing glaciers in the Andes to melt even faster ObserverMatthew Harris Climate Science, Keele UniversityNovember 28, 2019  Fires occur in the rainforest every year, but the past 11 months saw the number of fires increase by more than 70% when compared with 2018, indicating a major acceleration in land clearing by the country’s logging and farming industries. When fires in the Amazon emit black carbon during the peak burning season (August to October), winds carry these clouds of smoke to Andean glaciers, which can sit higher than 5,000 metres above sea level. Despite being invisible to the naked eye, black carbon particles affect the ability of the snow to reflect incoming sunlight, a phenomenon known as “albedo”. Similar to how a dark-coloured car will heat up more quickly in direct sunlight when compared with a light-coloured one, glaciers covered by black carbon particles will absorb more heat, and thus melt faster. By using a computer simulation of how particles move through the atmosphere, known as HYSPLIT, the team was able to show that smoke plumes from the Amazon are carried by winds to the Andes, where they fall as an invisible mist across glaciers. Altogether, they found that fires in the Amazon in 2010 caused a 4.5% increase in water runoff from Zongo Glacier in Bolivia. The smoke from the fires rose high into the atmosphere and could be seen from space. Some regions of Brazil became covered in thick smoke that closed airports and darkened city skies. As the rainforest burns, it releases enormous amounts of carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, and larger particles of so-called “black carbon” (smoke and soot). 

• The phrase “enormous amounts” hardly does the numbers justice – in any given year, the burning of forests and grasslands in South America emits a whopping 800,000 tonnes of black carbon into the atmosphere. This truly astounding amount is almost double the black carbon produced by all combined energy use in Europe over 12 months. Not only does this absurd amount of smoke cause health issues and contribute to global warming but, as a growing number of scientific studies are showing, it also more directly contributes to the melting of glaciers. In a new paper published in the journal Scientific Reports, a team of researchers has outlined how smoke from fires in the Amazon in 2010 made glaciers in the Andes melt more quickly. Crucially, the authors also found that the effect of black carbon depends on the amount of dust covering a glacier – if the amount of dust is higher, then the glacier will already be absorbing most of the heat that might have been absorbed by the black carbon. Land clearing is one of the reasons that dust levels over South America doubled during the 20th century. Glaciers are some of the most important natural resources on the planet. Himalayan glaciers provide drinking water for 240m people, and 1.9 billion rely on them for food

• In South America, glaciers are crucial for water supply – in some towns, including Huaraz in Peru, more than 85% of drinking water comes from glaciers during times of drought. However, these truly vital sources of water are increasingly under threat as the planet feels the effects of global warming. Glaciers in the Andes have been receding rapidly for the last 50 years. The tropical belt of South America is predicted to become more dry and arid as the climate changes. A drier climate means more dust, and more fires. It also means more droughts, which make towns more reliant on glaciers for water. Unfortunately, as the above study shows, the fires assisted by dry conditions help to make these vital sources of water vanish more quickly.....read on       https://theconversation.com/amazon-fires-are-causing-glaciers-in-the-andes-to-melt-even-faster-128023

The climate crisis and all the evil in the world drives me to despair, The world will continue to be absurd, but you, with all your passion, can still make your corner of it more bearable Guardian Phileppa Perry Jun 24 2024  The question........I am finding it ever more difficult to be in this nasty world. Everything that I cherish is being destroyed and there is nowhere to go to find solace. I’ve always loved nature – but when I go for a walk now, I see every ash tree dying, I hear the loss of birdsong, I see how few insects there are. When I read the news, I just cannot comprehend how cruel humans are able to be, racism, misogyny, religious hate, cruelty to animals… The list is endless.I work in climate change and am having to pretend every day that there is still a chance we can prevent catastrophic climate change. I find it ever harder to be around people who don’t get just how bad things are. I don’t have kids and am single. I can’t talk to my family about it because they are rightwing, wealthy climate sceptics. They patronise me (despite the fact I’m nearly 60 and a chief executive). If I look to the future, I imagine how difficult it is going to be when food supplies are more affected by environmental crisis. People fought over toilet rolls during Covid – multiply that by 100 and apply it to food.I don’t want to face all this horribleness on my own. I’ve had lots of chances at relationships, but don’t want fear of the future to be the basis of one. In the meantime, I am trying to keep a lid on it, trying to dissociate my feelings, pretending all the bad stuff isn’t happening. When what I really want to do is scream my head off at everyone. Planet Earth is so beautiful, so incredible, I cry with the pain of what we are doing to it and to each other. How am I supposed to remain feeling in this fucked up world?

Philippa’s answer...... In his novel Candide, or Optimism, first published in 1759, Voltaire tells us of a young man who experiences a great deal of hardship and suffering. Using Candide’s experiences, Voltaire critiques the overly optimistic philosophy of the time. Like Candide, you too speak of a world marred by destruction and cruelty, and you are not mistaken. Although the forms of absurdity may change, the essence remains: human folly and suffering. Candide’s master is Pangloss who argues that “All is for the best in the best of all possible worlds,” of which Voltaire takes a dim view. You, like Candide, are not comforted by this hollow optimism. The death of nature, the cruelty of men, increasingly extreme weather, these are not trifles to be dismissed with the wave of a philosophical hand. I cannot offer you the false balm of easy answers. What I can offer, however, is this: the world has ever been thus.........read on    https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/nov/24/the-climate-crisis-and-all-the-evil-in-the-world-drives-me-to-despair 

New wildfires burn in US Northeast; California, West witnes s bigger blazes. Heavy smoke led to poor air quality and health advisories for parts of New Jersey and New York, including New York City.BS News Nov 13 2024 | New wildfires burned Tuesday across the N ortheast, adding to a series of blazes that have come amid very dry weather and killed at least one person, while much larger fires raged in California and other western states.Heavy smoke led to poor air quality and health advisories for parts of New Jersey and New York, including New York City.Firefighters in Massachusetts worked to contain dozens of fires amid strong winds and drought conditions. The National Weather Service issued a red flag warning for much of  that state and parts of Connecticut, saying conditions were critical and fires could rapidly spread. Massachusetts officials said all of the 200 or so fires they had been dealing with this month had been caused by human behaviour, and Governor Maura Healey urged people to avoid lighting fires. Now is not the time to burn leaves. Now is not the time to go outside and light a fire, she told reporters in Middleton. One fire in southern New Jersey tripped fire alarms and set off carbon monoxide detectors, causing an unprecedented number of 911 calls Monday, officials said.....read on  https://www.business-standard.com/world-news/new-wildfires-burn-in-us-northeast-california-west-witness-bigger-blazes-124111300014_1.html  ........AND...... Wildfires burning on both coasts; Amtrak service disrupted in Northeast. USA Today Christopher Cann Jorge L. Ortiz Nov,12 2024Firefighters in California gained a foothold in the battle against a wildfire north of Los Angeles while weather officials on Tuesday issued red flag warnings across the Northeast, where two fires disrupted a popular train service between New York and Boston. The Mountain Fire in California's Ventura County, whose explosive growth was fueled by 80-mph winds last week, has burned 32 square miles as of Tuesday. As winds slowed, firefighters raised the containment level to 48%, allowing officials to downgrade several evacuation orders.The fire has torched over 200 homes and businesses and injured six people, according to Cal Fire, the state's firefighting agency.....read on           https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/11/12/wildfires-burn-california-new-jersey-new-york/76215776007/