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Our Leaders Must Acknowledge the Warming Climate Helped Power Hurricane Ian
Katrina. Sandy Hook. Irma. Parkland. Ian.
At first blush, there doesn’t seem to be much of a connection between hurricanes and school shootings, except that they are all unspeakable tragedies.
School shootings have become commonplace as we brace ourselves for the next one; the same is happening with the climate crisis.
Hurricanes are stronger and more damaging because of the warming climate. In less than 24 hours, Hurricane Ian transitioned from a tropical storm to a powerful hurricane, making landfall in Southwest Florida as a category 4 storm with winds of up to 155 mph. Preliminary research suggests Hurricane Ian dropped 10% more rain due to human-caused climate change.
After the shooting at Sandy Hook, and later, Parkland, Congress failed to pass any gun-safety laws. Finally, after the Uvalde school massacre, Congress passed a small, but hopefully meaningful, bipartisan gun-safety bill.
Now it is time for Congress to do the same to curb the growing threats from the warming climate.
While President Biden and Congressional Democrats passed the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, the legislation is too weak to address the growing climate problem. There is still no price on carbon, the…
