Despite the news that the River Rhine is in a crisis due to “climate change” it has happened before, and many times. There are rocks in European rivers called Hunger Stones where people carved messages to mark the depth of the pain in the droughts. There are historical records of the Rhine drying up in spots so badly that people could walk across it with dry feet. In 1540 wells ran dry that had never run out of water. The whole decade was horrible, and in 1835 in Transylvania people were so hungry they ate dead cats and dogs.
History is being actively wiped out because it never serves the narrative. Megadroughts were longer and deeper in the last 2000 years. The whole decade of the 1530s was filled with drought but the worst drought was 1540.
Hell on Earth: the European drought of 1540
Patty Jansen
In the summer of 1540, the people searched ever more desperate for drinking water. Even a meter and a half under the normal water table in Switzerland was not a drop of water to be found, noted Hans Salat at the time. Spring and upwellings that had never faltered now lay dry. Others were strictly guarded and water was drawn according to a time schedule. Thousands of people along the River Ruhr died of poisoning from dirty water.
These messages carved in hunger stones go back as far as 1417. The message was essentially “If you see me, weep”. Famine was coming.
View of the Hunger Stone on the Elbe in Děčín. .
Imagine 600 years of droughts:
The stone marks the low water levels of the Elbe with different dates. The oldest legible inscription dates from 1616. Older inscriptions (1417, 1473) were rubbed off over time by ships at anchor. The stone is also inscribed with the saying “Girl, do not cry and do not complain, when it is dry, spray the field”. This saying was probably made in 1938 by the pump manufacturer Frantisek Sigmund. The saying was based on the older saying “If you see me, then cry”. The Deciner Hungerstein is one of the oldest hydrological monuments on the Elbe.
Even climate scientists hold 1540 in awe:
Europe’s devastating millennial drought
Andrew Frey, Spektrum (translated by Google.)
Eleven months without rain, a million deaths – in 1540, a previously and since unprecedented drought devastated all of Europe. Can she repeat herself?
The result: For eleven months there was almost no rain, the temperature was five to seven degrees above the normal values of the 20th century, the temperature must have climbed above 40 degrees in midsummer. Countless forest areas in Europe went up in flames, acrid smoke obscured the sunlight, and not a single thunderstorm was recorded for the entire summer of 1540.
July brought such a terrible scorching heat that the churches sent out prayers of supplication while the Rhine, Elbe and Seine could be waded through without getting wet. Where water still flowed, the warm broth turned green, and fish floated in it keel up. The level of Lake Constance dropped to a record level, and Lindau was even connected to the mainland. The surface water soon evaporated completely, the floors burst open, some drying cracks were so large that a foot could fit in them.
And the groundwater dropped too: in the Swiss canton of Lucerne, desperate people tried to dig for water in a river bed, but found not a single drop even at a depth of one and a half meters. Christian Pfister therefore estimates that only a quarter to a maximum of a third of the usual amount of rain came from the sky that year.
In Würzburg in 1540 the grapes were ripe early but dried up and raisin-like, so the winegrowers pressed them anyway and invented the “late harvest”. It became a legendary harvest and four bottles still remain unopened. Some wine experts opened one of the batch in 1961 when it was 421 years old. They remarked on the flavour with some amazement but said it lasted only a few moments before it oxidized and “became vinegar in our glasses”.
The drought of 1539-1540 was extensive and severe
The 1540 summer precipitation totals in Europe expressed as percentage deviations (× 100) from the 1961–1990 mean; (b) summer Palmer Drought Severity Index for 1540 in Europe according to OWDA . (Brázdil et al)
Fires, famine, dust, water mills ran out of water, and people walked across some parts of the Rhine
Severe heat and drought in summer and autumn afflicted Silesia, where there was practically no rain for 6 months. Many streams dried up and the water in the River Oder turned green. There were frequent forest fires and livestock suffered from hunger and thirst (Büsching, 1819). Similarly, severe heat, forest fires, poor harvest, shortages, and famine were mentioned for Bohemia, Silesia, and Lusatia (Gomolcke, 1737). In Greater Poland, summer and autumn were also very dry; it did not rain until the beginning of winter. Rivers were exceedingly low, brooks, ponds, and wells dried up and the land was desiccated to dust (Rojecki et al., 1965).
… water levels were low everywhere; it was even possible to ride or walk across the River Rhine. — Brazdil et al
Best horror story goes to the 1535 famine in Transylvania
So great was the hunger that people of both sexes and all ages lost their minds, walking around almost naked and consuming “unclean things”. Bethlen also mentioned cannibalism. Thousands of people starved to death. Corpses could be encountered on the streets, their mouths full of grass (Bethlen, 1782). In Făgăraş, desperate poor people turned to eating dead dogs and cats (Trauschenfels, 1860).
When streams and rivers fell or dried out, it became difficult or impossible to grind grain in regions that relied upon water mills. For example, the dry summer of 1536 forced the Erfurt municipality to consider the creation of a Rossmühle, a mill powered by horses (von Falckenstein, 1738). — Brazdil et al
The driest decade of the past 5 centuries
A New “Drought Atlas” Tracks Europe’s Extreme Weather Through History
Sarah Zielinski, The Smithsonian Magazine
Reconstructions based on documentary data indicate that the summers of 1531–1540 were the driest summer decade in central Europe of the past 5 centuries…
…during the extremely hot, dry summer of 1540 in the Netherlands, the water levels in rivers were so low that people could cross substantial rivers such as the Lys, the Scheldt, the Meuse, and the Rhine with “dry feet” (Descamps, 1852).
This “Drought Atlas” is largely based on tree rings, with all their confounded flaws, but at least it’s the same proxy all the way through. No one segued it into the modern record and pretended that trees were like glass thermometers. And at least these tree rings have some other documentary support.
REFERENCES
Brázdil, R., Dobrovolný, P., Bauch, M., Camenisch, C., Kiss, A., Kotyza, O., Oliński, P., and Řezníčková, L.: Central Europe, 1531–1540 CE: The driest summer decade of the past five centuries?, Clim. Past, 16, 2125–2151, https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-16-2125-2020, 2020.
Cook, et al (2015) Old World megadroughts and pluvials during the Common Era, Science Advances 06 Nov 2015: Vol. 1, no. 10, e1500561 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.1500561
Caption: The 1540 JJA precipitation totals in Europe expressed as percentage deviations (× 100) from the 1961–1990 mean (Pauling et al., 2006); (b) JJA scPDSI for 1540 in Europe according to OWDA (Cook et al., 2015). Brázdil, R., Dobrovolný, P., Bauch, M., Camenisch, C., Kiss, A., Kotyza, O., Oliński, P., and Řezníčková, L.: Central Europe, 1531–1540 CE: The driest summer decade of the past five centuries?, Clim. Past, 16, 2125–2151, https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-16-2125-2020, 2020.
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None of the weather events happening in Europe are anything new, it’s all happened before, nothing to do with climate change, move on, nothing to see here.
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At least there was no Hockey Stick graph to worry about back then. (heh…)
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But there is something to see here. It is most certainly news that there is a drought and fires or floods or whatever event it is. Just because it happened before, and that your feelings are hurt about it being linked to climate change, doesn’t diminish its news value. It is happening today and affects people right now and other people want to know about it, right now. That is the very definition of news, so no moving on and ther is something to see here.
011
Wow, only used half a pilly, and look what I got.
00
What we can see is that if it happened before then it cannot be due to
Man Made Climate Change,Climate Catastrophe,Climate Emergencyetc. but to Natural Weather or Natural Climate Change.70
“Just because it happened before,”
FAR WORSE has happened before… get over it.
There is absolutely NOTHING UNTOWARD about the current global climate.. PERIOD.
There is no need to INVENT some spurious non-existent cause for what is totally natural.
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“It is most certainly news “…..Its ‘news value ” ……”the very definition of news ” ?
No appreciation of the scientific merits of the research Is it the case that you are still rambling nonsense and are incapable of basic distinctions such as rain bombs and floods or climatoligical data and newsworthiness ?…..
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Climate alarmists have been carefully avoiding historical warm, dry, or cold periods. They just don’t fit the narrative.
But as long as the activists, media, celebs and pollies stay on song, we and our formerly functional society are stuffed.
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This just shows proof that that those dastardly Glaciers and snow capped peaks at the head of the Rhine River in Switzerland are just not melting fast enough for the Alarmists. Blowtorches to melt that ice and snow anyone?……..lol
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…and wet periods also. What about the so-called “Magdalenenhochwasser” in 1342? then people entered Köln in boats by rowing over the city walls
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And this is why they no longer teach real history in what were once called “schools” but are now little more than indoctrination centres of the far Left.
They will of course teach the supposed evils of Western Civilisation, the “climate breakdown”, the supposed multitude of “genders”, general post-modernist beliefs such as “there is no such thing as objective reality” and that the climate is invariant and unchanging, hence no discussion of the Minoan, Egyptian, Roman or Medieval Climate Optima. And as Tony Heller has pointed out, the Medieval Climate Optimum has now been written out of history.
https://realclimatescience.com/2018/12/erasing-the-medieval-warm-period/
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I live some 10 meteres away from Rhine since 1985.
It’s not the first time it’s falling dry, remember 2003, 2 times some years later, nothing new, the birds around living from Rhine are happy( Egyptian goose, swans, gray herons, great white egrets, storks, cormorants, black kites, mallard ducks) Have a look here
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Interesting Krishna, I remember 2003 and 2005 as the two hottest years I can recall in Australia. Nothing since then has come close.
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It’s a big place William. Where were you at the time and what season(s) are you talking about?
30
Sydney, with travel those summers to SE Qld, Canberra and Melbourne, also Perth and Central Australia. Also quite a lot of international travel both years. Living in Sydney they are the only two summers we considered getting air conditioning. For the record I live near the Harbour and get the sea breezes.
01
Played cricket in the early 80’s in Liverpool Sydney in 45 degrees.
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It was hottest 1998 for me. In WA.
00
I lived in Germany for 10 years and did a bit of birding on the Rhine, particularly around Kuehkopf. Changing climate regimes affect Palearctic birds mostly with respect to their breeding periods, duration of breeding period and their migration patterns. Most of the birds illustrated in the link will be there regardless of this year’s ‘drought’, and the photos do not appear to be from this year. Kingfishers that nest in specialised micro-habitats in the riverbank will struggle to raise a brood.
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You are right, these photos are not actual, that’s right.
The kingfisher, as I read, isn’t “at home” there, but comes often in autumn around.
Kuehkopf is a very nice corner I like a lot, I live not far away and has been there. It’s known for it’s big black kites rookery and lot of other birds, kingfisher included.
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A good point well made. Back in those previous droughts, they were reported and no one was rude enough to diminsh the effects by saying, “Oh what is your problem, someone had it worse before”.
01
Plenty of people stupid enough to claim that it is “unprecedented” , the “new normal” and proof that we are heating the world to hell.
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So?
03
So it is valid to post historical evidence as a rebuttal.
You find that hard to understand?
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You can reject how a news story is reported all you like, but it doesn’t make the thing being reported less newsworthy.
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AGW is always about FAKE EXAGGERATION.
The sort of statements that only the most ignorant and gullible accept.
Newsworthy only as a small by-line in a WEATHER report.
It was a bit WARM for a few days.. like it has been many times before.
It rained a lot.. like it has many times before
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Yes, It’s unprecedented It hasn’t happened since the last IPCC report.
1000 Rhine, the Loire and the Seine ran dry
In the year 1152 The Rhine in Alsace nearly dried up.
1303, 1304 Rhine, Loire, Seine were dry
1793 Drought in Europe, low water in the Seine
In 1802 in France, the Seine dried up revealing Roman ruins.
And the Arctic is warming 4 times faster than the rest of the world (despite the ice being reluctant to melt).
But 4 times zero is ?
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From historical records for the UK (but biased to England)
These four years apparently experienced drought, with 1540 & 1541 particularly dry – in both these latter years, the Thames was so low that sea water extended above London Bridge, even at ebb tide in 1541.
General warmth over Europe during the spring & summer of 1540. For England, there are several references to a hot summer, with great heat & drought; also many deaths due to the ‘Ague’. In this year (1540), there was so little water flowing in the Seine through Paris that people were able to walk across.
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Extreme events have occurred in the past and the probability of their occurrence is changing. A small shift in probability makes a big difference.
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-58073295
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It’s not a good idea to use the BBC as a “scientific” reference, Simon. Propaganda yes, scientific fact no.
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Yale Uni, the US EPA, all of the national meteorological associations, the IPCC, and on and on, all say the same as the BBC article.
In summary;
Heatwaves are 2.8x more frequent
Droughts are 1.7x more frequent
Extreme rainstorms are 1.3x more frequent
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Peter, I suggest you watch Tony Heller’s videos on YouTube or free speech platforms.
He regularly debunks such claims.
You are most welcome to debunk anything he says.
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You beat me to it David. All the records have seen (including by Tony Heller) show decreasing frequency of almost all climate extremes, including storms, heavy rainfall and heat waves.
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Do yo mean Steven Goddard? A very odd person with no expertise in climate science. There have been many rebuttals on his fake claims.
https://www.desmog.com/steven-goddard/
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He has repeatedly challenged climate catastrophists to a debate and they are all too scared to face him. Why is that Simon?
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Debates prove nothing. Peer-reviewed literature is where science is determined.
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Not really. A hypothesis that makes good predictions is the way real science is determined.
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“Peer-reviewed literature is where science is determined.”
LOL.. retraction-watch anyone.
Basically NOTHING is climate science is reproducible except with models.
REALITY is not within that realm.
You do know that Peer-review has be relegated to “journal publication” status.
NOTHING TO DO WITH SCIENCE.. if you don’t know that, all you display is your scientific ignorance.
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Simon, with good gate keepers, even M.Mann gets papers reviewed and published 😀
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Simon.
Debate is the essence of the peer-review process.
You publish your “literature”
Other scientists examine your data, methodology and conclusions, and critique them.
You try to answer their criticisms.
Unless you are a warmenist, in which case you “hide the decline”, refuse to publish your raw data and methodology, and abuse everyone who questions you a “denier”.
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desmog know NOTHING, they make up FAKERY for the gullible left twit to follow.
Tony Heller has far more mathematical and scientific and computer programming knowledge than basically any self-named climate scientist.
He helped design some of the chips that have operated computers over the decades.
He has contributed far more to modern society and to climate science, than ANY self-named climate scientist has.
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Do you have an idea, who Steven Goddard is ?
https://co2coalition.org/teammember/tony-heller/
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I doubt there is even one so-called “climate scientist” with the mathematical, scientific and computing skills even remotely near what Tony Heller possesses.
[More or less a duplicate]ED
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Simon
Tell me again about trends. I don’t see one. Do you? Read some science, Simon, you have been brainwashed.
https://sealevel.info/Fraction_of_the_Globe_in_Drought_1982-2012_fig5c.png
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” Debates prove nothing ..Peer reviewed literature is where science is determined ” ?
Simon actually wrote that….. Peer review panels – at least ideally – debate the merits and deficiencies of scientific research you confused man….How on earth the error strewn pseudoscientific nonsense Sutton Mulvena paper ‘ Climate Change and Health ” was ever cleared for publication in the Medical Journal of Australia is another matter …I composed a damning rebuttal of that paper under Geoff Sherrington’s post in the comments section of Sterling Burnetts WUWT 2022 /06/09 article ” CNN Hypes False Dengue Fever Claims Putting Fears Ahead of Facts Again if you are interested Joanne ….
20
‘ … all say the same as the BBC article.’
And they are all wearing blinkers, this has nothing to do with CO2. Meandering jet streams in both hemispheres are causing weather extremes.
‘The effect of solar activity on the Earth rate of rotation has been discovered and reported multiple times over the past 60 years, and not a single one of them it has been shown incorrect.
‘There is only one interpretation for that evidence. Solar activity affects the balance between zonal and meridional atmospheric circulation. As that balance is hugely important in atmospheric circulation, that makes the solar effect hugely important.’ (Javier / Climate Etc)
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We should also keep in mind the $Money$ that these charlatans are raking is. As President Trump would say, “It’s hu-u-u-u-ge!”
00
Hilliarious.
30
That fakery all comes from their MASSIVELY ERRONEOUS and FAKE climate attribution models.
Its total FANTASY.
They are the absolute opposite of any real science.
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More frequent than what? What baseline do they use? Its a bit like the doctor saying you have high cholesterol but maybe you always had high cholesterol compared to the average. No baseline so how do they know?
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Peter
Did you actually read your own link?
“There has been a “staggering rise” in the number of extreme weather events over the past 20 years, driven largely by rising global temperatures and other climatic changes, according to a new report from the United Nations.”
WE are talking about historical events, not those from a trivially short time ago which isn’t even long enough (30 years) to be termed ‘climate.’
However you have highlighted the entire problem inadvertently, which is that Historical climate knowledge is unfortunately very limited these days. If we want to look at extreme weather/climate we need to look to the more distant past. There are vast amounts of evidence to demonstrate that past events were often much worse than modern ones.
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tonyb even that statement is untrue …Far from a staggering rise over the past 20 years the widely recognized EM DAT catalogue of natural disasters shows a 10% decrease in climate and extreme weather disasters this century
10
Goodness me!!! UHI certainly as a lot to answer for Peter.
11
Peter Fitzroy:
Find a copy of
Historic storms of the north sea, British Isles and Northwest Europe,
H. H. Lamb in collaboration with Knud Frydendahl,
Cambridge University Press, 1991
Helpful information about St. Lucia’s Storm, 1287 approx. 50 -80,000 dead
The Grote Mandreke (Great Man Drowning) ~ 36,000,
St. Nicholas Flood
St. Marcellus’ Flood 36,000 est. dead
St. Lucia’s Flood 50-100,000 dead
St. Felix flood 100,000 dead
St. Elizabeth’s flood 10,000? dead
All Saint’s Flood 20,000 dead
The Great Storm of 1703 8-14,000 (see Daniel Defoe about the loss of a third of the British Navy)
The Christmas Flood of 1717 14,000 dead
The Christmas Flood of 1825 800+dead
50
If these nasty events are 3 times as frequent, or 1/3 as frequent, over a span of years and much geography they are still going to happen over time to a lot of people in a lot of places. If one could, as some claim, tweak the magic gas to turn back the climate to some earlier age, nasty weather events would still happen over time to a lot of people in a lot of places. As long as we live on an earth with a warm band around its belly and cold caps top and bottom, the interfaces will be tumultuous. Now, we can follow several millenia of practice to use technology to cope with these inevitable events, doing so with more capability and success as time goes on, or we can give back some of our hard won gains, and get nothing in return; fire codes and fire-safe construction don’t stop us from building firehouses; not should minor modeled changes in the anticipated frequency of weather event stop us from the practice of coping.
Deviations from the practice of coping due to climate religious extremism are likely to be evident in Europe this winter, be it harsh or mild.
The victims are unlikely to feel succored by the accumulated virtue signal of ‘carbon reduction’.
20
Stop lying Peter Fitzroy ……The IPCC’s 2013 ,2018 and 2021 climate extreme’s findings stipulate ” “low confidence ‘ in the hypothesis of increasing drought trends on a global scale
30
I am sure he would use some other “reliable source” like The Guardian.
171
Ask the WMO, there you get help
60
“Extreme events have occurred in the past and the probability of their occurrence is changing.”
True.
They have been occurring much less frequently, and we have much better warning system for when they do.
210
So mathematics is not your strong suit, Simon. The Beeb story is really quite silly. They tell us about “Bell curves” and demonstrate how the tails move with the average. Thus “proving” the average is moving because we are seeing evidence of climate tails.
Your maths must be really weak if you don’t see that this argument cannot be used for extremes of BOTH heat AND cold. The average will get pulled back by the next extreme cold that will also be blamed on CC.
220
‘One theory suggests higher temperatures in the Arctic are causing the jet stream to slow, increasing the likelihood of heat domes.’
Blocking high pressure is being experienced in both hemispheres, so back to the drawing board.
In fact a quiet sun is causing the ‘heat domes’.
120
Yes, you will get variations unlike in the past:
1800 – A dry summer.
1802 – A dry year.
1807 – A dry year & a dry summer.
1811 – Thames frozen in January
1813/14 severe winter
1815/16 severe winter
1816 – cold, wet
1817 – cold, wet
1818 – A long, dry & hot summer.
1819 wet followed by severe winter
1821 very wet year
1822/23 a severe winter
1824 very wet year
1825 – A dry summer. A notable hot spell in July.
1826 – A warm summer.
1827 – A dry summer.
1829/30 a severe winter
1831 wet summer
1835 – A dry summer.
1837/38 a severe winter
1840 – A dry year; a dry summer.
And there was some “weather problems” in Ireland a few years later.
200
WRONG.. again…
They don’t have enough data from the last 40-50 year, and defenitely not before that to show any change in patterns
If anything, the world climate is MUCH MORE gentle and benign, that during the LIA and lead-up to it. That is when the climate really changed.
And of course, for the time being, modern coal and gas give civilisation a massive ability to survive the occasional piece of extreme weather.
Question is .. why does the greenie agenda want to DESTROY all that. ?
132
‘A small shift in probability makes a big difference.’
Presumably the shift is caused by human induced CO2, it would be better to begin your research with natural variables.
‘In 1540 an exceptional drought affected large parts of Europe, including southern England. This summer half-year was so extreme that it constitutes a low-probability high-impact event.
‘The London chronicles all describe a sharp rise in mortality across the country due to agues, digestive disease and some plague occurrence. Cattle also died for lack of water, and water courses ran dry; even the Thames was so low as to allow salt water upriver from Old London Bridge.’ (EGU)
60
Simon, no one can look into future and predict anything with surety. Not when your reliable world time frame met data is, at best, 100 years old. If you look at proxies for time trends for historical met data the numbers indicate that if not for the last 2000 years, then more likely 6000 years, the earth has actually cooled.
80
Climatic disasters on the global scale have declined by a factor of 10% this century. Their probability is either “changing” downwards or there is no perceptible trend …Stop deluding yourself Simon
“Why Disasters Have Declined ” Michael Shellenberger ,Forbes Jan 10 ,2022
Roger Pielke Jr ‘Global Weather and Climate Disasters 2000 -2021 ‘
00
700 year old tree rings revealed 30 year droughts in West Australia on the fringes of the current wheat belt, so we should be aware that these cycles can occur, there’s still so much we have yet to discover.
221
What kind of trees?
80
Similar tree ring studies were carried out in Western Victoria on River Red Gums (Eucalyptus Camuldulensis)
That makes 5 proxy studies indicating more prolonged abd severe droughts in Australia’s past.
120
I was not aware the River Red Gum species – or indeed any eucalypts – exhibit annual growth rings Peter… Do you have a link ?
10
Pine trees, Cypress.
20
Great Barrier Reef cores have shown that in the mid 1700s, just before Captain Cook came cruising up the east coast, there was a 27 year period when no silt from our major Queensland rivers, the Fitzroy & the Burdekin reached the reef. No wet season for 27 years.
Can you imagine what would be blamed if/when such a drought occurs again.
120
A decade ago I did a reconstruction of CET back to 1538 and reckoned that the years 1538 1539 and 1540 were the warmest and driest in the whole CET record.
Henry the eighth led prayers in 1540 for rain. Ironically I ceased the reconstruction at 1540 as much information came from monasteries and their manorial lands but as the king had started their dissolution around 1535 , which included the destruction of their records, it was difficult to go back further at that time.
240
A tyrant destroyed historical records all those centuries ago, exactly the same as is happening today.
Also, at the time Henry dissolved the monasteries they were hated by the people because all they did was tax or otherwise take from the poor and became very wealthy themselves, doing nothing in return.
In both instances, a familiar story today with history repeating itself but with the monasteries replaced by Big Green and the Left and still taking money from the poor to enrich themselves.
272
David…
When you have a tyrant attacking certain groups in order to take their land and money to use for his own purposes, it pays to be sceptical of the excuses that he gives.
The religious orders did not have the power to “tax”, as we understand it. Their wealth came in the form of gifts given by grateful (or guilty) parishioners (including Kings) and by growing, producing and trading. Some credit them as developing an early form of Capitalism, acting as sources of credit….. keep this process up for centuries and it starts to add up.
If it sounds more like a business model than a religious one, that might be a fair criticism, but it is worth remembering that the members of those orders lived very austere lives, worked hard… and provided care for the poor, the sick and shelter for travellers in an age when nobody else did.
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PeterW:
Yes and No. The various monasteries (and to a much lesser extent Nuneries) were also gifted land (which included serfs) from which they derived considerable income. This lead to some reduction in the ranks of the clergy as ‘dividing’ the income among themselves was more of a benefit to fewer. This wasn’t confined to England. Luther in Germany, Calvin in Geneva etc.
Henry had support for his dissolution (even though his favourites got a lot) because the number of monks had dropped substantially from that in previous centuries. Contemporary records showed some monasteries with as little as 12 monks.
90
Graeme
And not above a bit of skulduggery about that either.
IIRC one of the blokes who worked for R.V. Jones (Most Secret War) was an expert on ancient manuscripts and had discovered some write ins in different hand and ink.
20
Peter
The monasteries did much good work but many were fabulously wealthy and the higher ups in the order often lived very well. Mind you Henry’s cronies did very well for themselves when the monasteries were sold off after dissolution. The land, buildings, the stone, the wine and the art contained within made many outside the church very wealthy.
As for a ‘tax,’ in a way there was a good one of course, the ‘indulgences,’ during which a sinner would pay the church money to have their sin absolved. In that respect it has many parallels with offsetting carbon by planting trees or paying others to do so.
For anyone intrigued in the very interesting Medieval period bookmarked by the dissolution I thoroughly recommend the ‘Shardlake’ series by C J Sampson.
40
Yes, I think I mentioned most of that, but it’s an interesting aspect of that history and there is no doubt that some senior churchmen were highly politicised – for well and ill.
The idea that if you were given land, that it is therefore OK to take it by force, is questionable, and I see similar arguments WRT church property today. It’s always going to be “popular” when it is (a) rather risky to be seen as criticising the King and (b) is viewed as a way of extending the middle digit towards “those bastards in Rome who think they can tell us what to do...”
The thing about land, buildings and art is that they can make you “rich”, but without much cash to pay for a lavish lifestyle. Any farmer knows that, and many Nobles of the time suffered from the same problem. Some of the northern Earls were chronically short of cash.
Maybe I just get tired of cheap shots at “religion”.
Cheers…. Peter.
41
*CET – Central England Temperature.
50
John Stratton’s Agricultural Records takes us back to Roman times.
A wet summer came in 1542 and for the next few years the winters were bitterly cool.
40
I was coming back over dartmoor yesterday which is littered with Neolithic remnants and bronze age huts and called into the national park centre. A child was reading the information boards and, obviously confused, asked his mum’ why does it say here that the temperature in the bronze age was warmer and drier than today?’
Unfortunately they moved away so I didn’t hear the explanation as to why , if today, according to his school and no doubt parents, is the hottest and driest ever, how come it was warmer and drier in the past?
430
Good pickup there Tony, pity you didn’t hear the parents explanation, you might have been able to set the kid right.
140
TonyB, I hope that was the light bulb moment for the child and that it opens up a world of curiosity and scepticism. We have all had that moment.
170
“no one blamed coal or beef steak”
Nope, they blamed the Devil.
New religion, new devils.
211
Love the inference that all the water control and management systems build between the 1500’s and now have had no impact on water level in the Rhine. What a waste of money building all those dams and canals turned out to be
229
History will show the same about wind towers and solar parks – all that wasted money and resources spent connecting them up to a stable system only to discover that they are grid-scale disruptors and not worth the trouble.
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Yes, isn’t COAL and GAS and OIL powered technology a godsend.. !
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And of course Peter, many got very rich building all that stuff.
110
And of course, the HUGE population increases since the 1500’s will have had zero effect on water usage.. right ?
ie.. your comment is meaningless.
111
The Rhine has no locks or dams on it from the Main junction all the way to the North sea.
71
I am aware of at least four studies appearing to show that Australia has experienced far longer and hotter droughts in the past, than anything recorded since European settlement. Tree rings in Western Victoria, Coral Cores on the Barrier Reef, sediment cores and Antarctic Ice cores.
Also, for what it is worth, there is Aboriginal oral history. One records a time when the Murrumbidgee was so dry that the tribe could not find water, even by digging in the sand of the river’s bed. In desperation, they set out to walk to the Murray…. only the strong made it.
Another speaks of a time in which there was just one water source remaining in the whole length of the Hawkesbury River.
Drought is an ugly thing.
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There is also a suggestion of a 1500 year long drought somewhere betwwwn 5000 and 7000 years ago leading to the destruction of a previous human culture and it’s eventual replacement with a different one. This is one possible explanation for the change in rock art styles at about that time.
https://www.livescience.com/26163-mega-drought-killed-aboriginal-culture.html
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It seems certain that the mob that was here when Cook arrived were just the latest of many different tribes that made up the ancient history of Australia, just look at the Tasmanian ones for instance, cut off since the end of the ice age as they were.
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Yes, it would be most unusual if there had been only one single human migration to Australia, hence the suppression of scientific inquiry about Mungo Man/Woman, for example. They had a gracile character, unlike modern indigenous Australians.
It doesn’t fit the narrative. And for political reasons. If there had been multiple migrations the mainland population present at the time of European settlement would not be the first and could not claim “First Nation” status.
And native Tasmanian peoples also seem racially quite distinct.
Of course, the pygmy tribes of Northern Queensland, mentioned in Manning Clark’s “A Short History of Australia” have been totally written out of history for the same reason.
https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/history-wars/2002/06/the-extinction-of-the-australian-pygmies/
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David (once this gets through the MOD)
New species of early human discovered in the Philippines
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMf8pgXRMvs
However the discovery raises questions about the relationship between Homo Luzonensis, Homo Floresiensis and possibly Denisovans.
Then there is the complication of the Nesher Ramla hominid which seems to have been related to both modern man and the Neanderthals?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ts8yFSmQ0hU
(Nesher Ramla Hominid – New Type of Ancient Human!)
Indeed there is speculation that they were ancestors of the Neanderthals who evolved in the Middle East and spread west and east (to meet Denisovans).
31
‘They had a gracile character, unlike modern indigenous Australians.
Humans evolved from gracile apes and modern indigenous people are the same as us.
[Caught by the filter El gordo and apart from wandering off topic (not only you) I have a concern about 18C and will let the host decide if it’s ok.]AD
01
el+gordo, I didn’t say anything other than that.
10
Well, it would have to be a short history, wouldn’t it?
10
The fact that we have Aboriginal and Torris Strait Islanders means we have two distinct groups in Australia. It’s quite possible that many groups would have moved through Cape York and down the east coast to Tasmania. The ‘pygmy Aborigines’ in Qld, records of ‘little people’ around the hills behind Tamworth (as noted by Mitchell) and of course the Tasmanian people point to a different “nation’ to the Carpentarians.
10
Peter, you can sit down for a parma and a pot in many pubs in towns along the Murray River in Victoria and see photos of the river bone dry. Photos of vintage cars parked in the bed of the river which would ( in wet years ) be at least 3 m deep. Photos of the river showing it dry and just a series of billabongs which have retained water due to greater depth. You don’t need aboriginal spoken history- its all there in photographic splendour. Obviously, these photos were taken well before any of the major upper Murray dams were built.
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Rosco…. I live just north of the Murray and an aware of that history. I’ve seen the photos.
Difference is that even when the bed is mostly dry, there were still waterholes. and water to be found by digging into the sands of the river bed.
If the aboriginals were unable to find water, even by digging, then it’s not just that the river has stopped flowing, but the water-table has dropped even further….. not something that we’ve seen. They had to be pretty desperate to start what they knew would be a dry walk of that distance.
My local waterway is the Billabong Creek. It has stopped flowing a couple of times in the last century, but there was water in the deeper holes. Go back to the Federation Drought and the locals had to dig in the creekbed to water stock….. but they were never unable to get water in some way. Yet aboriginals told the first settlers that it was an unreliable source of water. Another hint of drier times in the past, is a well in which the water-table has risen 80 feet since the 1930s. Makes you wonder how much the climate has changed.
20
Every hot day. Climate Change.
Every cold day. Climate Change.
Floods. Climate Change.
Drought. Climate Change.
It’s not Climate Change, it’s the Climate.
And in the very cold winter to come with no energy, no wood to burn, no peat or coal, no briquettes and no water to moderate the weather, people will beg for the long promised Global Warming.
But to quote that world famous Australian Climate Scientist, “Even the rains which fall will not fill the dams”.
And the druids will say, more Easter Island Windmills. Appease the Climate Gods.
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“History is being actively wiped out because it never serves the narrative”
Reading the report on the EU drought in left-wing publications (you know who) the “journalist” doesn’t even try to hide their climate change alarmists think, no mention of historical droughts. Then you read the comments, it’s like armageddon is around the corner. The brainwashing is complete. You can scream till the cows come home, to be slaughtered because they fart to much. It’s over, cause all school leavers now and forever are brainwashed climate alarmists. The beginning of the end of our western way of life. Enjoy your dystopian future kids. Oh, and the spent renewables clean up bill is going to be a ” a man made climate change catastrophe”.
Dumb and dumber.
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The whole of the 20th century has been a ‘happy’ time for humans, apart from here in OZ, with the Federation drought and the Millennium drought , just to bookend the century, but planet earth is not always so kind to its inhabitants.
We tend to think that because we thrived in this ‘window’ of benevolence, that it will always be thus, well it won’t.
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There was a major Australian drought in 1940 as well, which generated the political push to build Warragamba Dam. Strange how many people forgot that one. Overshadowed by the war.
170
Major “Australian” drought that led to a damn being built in Sydney? Probably a very geographically limited drought, as most of them are. It’s a big place Australia.
21
The War years were hot and dry, at least for eastern Aus.
10
Yeah right….. it’s a bloody long way to walk your stock to Western Australia when that’s the nearest decent feed.
10
Getting to West Australia would not have helped them … the Kimberley pastoralists were losing stock to drought right up into 1942.
They made an initial survey of the Ord River in 1941, with the intent or damming it … so it was the same drought that got that project underway, although it took decades to finish.
10
122 years of Australian rainfall
00
Australia’s Variable Rainfall Poster (1890 to 2022)
00
Things were tough elsewhere in the world. America had a hard time during the 1930’s with drought and famine during the dust bowl era.
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The east coat of Australia is actually overdue for a major drought. The millennial drought (late 1990’s/ 2000’s) had relatively dry conditions for maybe longer but in general the conditions weren’t catastrophic. We haven’t had a major bone dry drought since 1982- that’s 40 years ago, it’s well overdue.
31
The 17-19 drought wasn’t exactly a picnic for a lot of blokes.
You remember when everyone was in a panic over fires down the coast? There was hardly a bloody fire west of the mountains….. because there was bugger-all to burn.
40
There is a great deal which is wrong about Climate Change fantasies. One is that drought is caused by heat. The reverse is true.
Regional cooling causes droughts. But seen from the summer perspective it looks like the heat made the rivers run dry. Sacrifice the children! Many societies did.
Drought and lack of water is a direct consequence of a colder climate. Every summer the snows on the Alps melt and the melt water flows through the rivers, so there is not enough snow. But this snow and rain came from clouds formed over hot ocean surfaces, not cold. If the water surface was not hot enough you did not get enough evaporation, so not enough snow and rain and the rivers run dry which makes the heat seem worse in summer, but the real problem was not enough ocean surface heat, over an ocean far away. Perversely if there is not enough snow it is because the previous winter was too cold, at least over the ocean where the evaporation happens which can be a great distance away from Europe.
So the fake story is that heat causes drought and cold causes rain. The reverse is true. And especially noticeable in India which is utterly dependent on the Monsoons, the overheating of the Indian ocean forcing massive evaporation which then cools the continent with drenching rain. And in North Africa which was the breadbasket of the Roman Empire, cooling stopped the monsoons and created the deserts we know today in Libya and Algeria and you can wander the ruins wonder why people lived there.
That’s the problem when you leave science to knee jerk politicians and Greens. And tell meteorologist that they know nothing about Climate. Only an anthropologist like Gina McCarthy knows about rain and heat and cold. Lived experience. Wrong conclusions.
And as I explained in the last post, invisible gas CO2 is exactly the same, evaporating from hot water and being absorbed again in cold water. But because it’s invisible, people have no idea that it is in such constant massive exchange between the vast oceans and the atmosphere. Or you can listen to the Dr.Tim Flannery or Vice President Al Gore, who both graduated in English with not a shred of science. Druids.
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I’m not quite sure what this article is trying to state. What was happening in the rest of the world in 1531-1540? The intro doesn’t say but intimates that the drought in Germany means that the current focus on climate change is not warranted as it has all happened before. But surely climate change is global so focussing on drought in one small part of the world isn’t really relevant. Without knowledge of what was happening globally, the decade drought is weather rather than climate.
The same can of course be said about unusual weather events now which are seized on, primarily by the MSM, as evidence that climate change is happening and we are all doomed if we don’t mend our ways. I’m not so sure.
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I think what this article is saying is that a few very hot days in the UK and Southern Europe is not unprecedented, despite all the media coverage of the ignorant saying it is caused by climate change. No more, no less. Jo is not saying that climate change is not, or will not in the future, change. Just that these recent occurrences does not prove that man is changing the climate.
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It’s not actually hot, it’s just hot air blown in from the desert, a bit like Melbourne in mid summer, nw winds shift the heat from the outback which is normally 40 to 50 c to Victoria.
81
By late October, to November, the poms will be freezing once again.
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Really ‘climate change is global’? Actually thinking about it, doesn’t Heller document 1921 as a world wide drought? So maybe it can happen? But can someone define climate? Are we talking 300 yrs or 30 hours, because it’s getting pretty elastic.?
I was in a rain event a few months ago, where in 24hrs 500 sq km got up to 30″,(it tailed off pretty quickly outside that area) and that is a harbinger for the world ending. Back in 1927, in 24hrs 2.6 million sq km of the Missippippi valley got up to 15″, on top of 9 drenching months. Towns in Kansas flooded up to 7 times. There is talk of atmospheric rivers. That was an atmospheric sea! And we are still here.
Anyway
Entries from — A Chronological Listing of Early Weather Events 7th Edition James A. Marusek
impact@hughes.net
From 1540 to 1543, there was a general famine in the Sind [now Pakistan].
57
In 1540, there was a famine in the Bombay Presidency in India.
156
In 1540, several regions of China experienced flooding including: 153
Impact (www.breadandbutterscience.com) 2010
384
— During the period between 6 May and 4 June, floods due to heavy and protracted rains struck Hunan
province in south-central China at Ching. During the same period of time, floods struck Kwangsi (now
Guangxi province) in southern China along the border with Vietnam at Ma-p’ing and Hupeh (now Hubei
province) in central China at Huang-p’o.
— During the period between 4 July and 1 August, floods struck Szechwan (now Sichuan province) in
southwest China at P’êng, Ch’ung-ning, Hsin-fan, K’ai-chiang and Chin-t’ang. Innumerable houses
damaged by the floodwaters. Innumerable people and cattle drowned.
— During the period 1-29 September, floods struck Shansi (now Shanxi province) in northern China at
Lin. Houses and city walls were damaged by the floodwaters.
In 1540, a drought engulfed Kweichow (now Guizhou province) in southwestern China at Shih-ch’ien.
During the period between 6 May 1540 and 5 February 1541, a drought engulfed many regions of
China.
153
In 1540 during the summer and winter, there was a drought in Hupeh and Kweichow provinces in
China.
165
In 1540 during the 7th moon in the vicinity of Shanghai, China, there was a roaring of the sea; a northeast
wind; several myriads [a very great number] were drowned; it was a year of dearth; men and crops
perished.166
1541 A.D. In France, it was extraordinarily hot.61
In 1541, there was a remarkable drought in England. At Nottingham, almost all the small rivers dried up,
and the River Trent was diminished to a staggering brook. The River Thames was so low that seawater,
even at ebb, extended beyond London Bridge. Many cattle died for want of water, especially at
Nottinghamshire, and many thousands of people died from grievous diarrhea and dysentery.212
In Abassine on 4 and 12 April, there was a tempest of thunder, hail and north wind.72
In 1541, floods struck Chekiang (now Zhejiang province) on the east coast of China at Taichow.
Innumerable people drowned. In the same year, a drought engulfed Kweichow (now Guizhou province
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Also didn’t that part of Europe have world ending floods fairly recently? So once again, will someone define climate?
50
“climate” is defined as the average of a 30 year period. Just ask anyone in the know.
Why it wasn’t 31 or 29 years or any other number? Mysticism is the reason as near as I can tell.
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I keep wondering, after we “mend our ways” and return to the non-anthropogenic climate, you know, the one before nature did a major whoopsie and produced unnatural us, there will be no more floods?
I seem to recall a similar story.
After all, animal sacrifice never worked.
People sacrifice? Not sure its’ full potential has been given a fair chance.
It is just so primitive to think a volcano would be satisfied with just one virgin.
Europe, Russia, and China modernized after their culling.
Fortunately, the engineers of the third one are still around for consult.
I think the new Great Forward LeapSet might be getting it right this time.
Think global.
To get to Net Zero, ya’ pretty much need zeros across the equation.
At least according to the colonialist math I was taught.
(Is there a difference between Net Zero and Gross Zero? I mean, ‘equity’ used to be just a financial term.)
I’ll ask a college student for clarification.
They are wise.
Wait, I don’t know how to TikTok.
31
Ian…. the main argument of disastrous climate change is models. There is no disaster at the moment, and won’t be if governments resist the temptation to start wars, mess with trade and deny us the things we need to grow food. The correlation between CO2 and observed warming is very weak, because the earth was warming well before the industrial revolution kicked off large-scale CO2 production, and has been erratic throughout the recent decades, despite consistent CO2 production,
The historical evidence all tends to show that the earth was warmer and CO2 higher for most of the time, and that warm periods and higher CO2 were high growth times that were good for life, including human life. However in order to frighten people, every unusual weather event is being touted in the media as some kind of new normal because we are returning the same CO2 to the atmosphere that produced the lush growth that created coal and oil.
So they keep claiming that local droughts are “proof” on universal warming, and we keep showing them that worse local droughts have happened before. That explains the interest.
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There is NO EVIDENCE of human caused global climate change.
I defy you to produce any real scientific evidence.. not non-validated models.
The whole AGW thing is akin to a Grimm Bros fairy tale.
21
https://factsanddetails.com/world/cat56/sub364/entry-6158.html#:~:text=There%20was%20a%20severe%20200,period%20of%20chaos%20that%20followed.
First came the droughts,
And then when Moses came around he had to build an ark to save the animals from the floods.
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Noah built the ark about 2000 years earlier.
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If he ever did!
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He did.
04
Ah Ha! Do I spot a fan f Dr. Irving Finkel? (Curator of Cuneiforms at the British Museum)
20
It would be interesting to take a group of AGW zealots for a ride in the Wayback Machine to 1540’s Megadrought Europe and get them to proseletise to the hurting masses that the drought was caused by their use of wood and coal for heating, cottage industry and cooking and their use of farm animals for food. Rough justice would soon disabuse the AGW religionists from their hubris and provide a bit of catharsis for the villagers.
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The animation of the North American Drought Atlas is well worth a look. It really demonstrates the geographically variable nature of climate extremes, and why claims such as those below, without specific attribution, are misleading:
Claims such as those above when posted need specific attribution/links so that they can be sensibly verified. Otherwise, they sound like marketing claims from wrinkle cream/baldness cure/99.9% of germs style ads.
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Apologies – I reread the link and it’s better than I initially thought. Once you get past the statistics covering only a 20 year period, I actually agree with the end statement:
The first thing on the list is to stop building in known historical flood zones.
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Some say a good way to not get flooded is to not buy a house or land down by the crick, a la Gympie, Lismore, Woodburn.
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Parallels everywhere.
I mentioned Egypt & the Nile drying up a while ago.
Al-Maqrizi says in that tragedy that continued since the year 596-589 AH / 1200-12202 AD: “In it, the forces could not be found in the homes of Egypt, the prices increased and the bones increased until the dead people ate and ate each other, and a great mourning followed, and the prices started from the beginning of the year and extended for three years. The Nile is in it for a short period until the lack of power, and a great scholar with their families and children went out to Egypt to the Levant, so they died in the streets by starvation.
He encouraged death in the rich and the poor, and he informed the righteous (Ayyubid) shroud of the dead in his shroud – within a short period of time – about two hundred thousand people and twenty thousand people, and the dogs ate all of them, and the children were eaten a lot.
https://www.tellerreport.com/news/2020-07-05-when-the-nile-dried-up-a-thousand-years-ago—–what-did-the-egyptians-do-to-face-the-disaster-.H1-qGYOJ1w.html
…and some say the dustbowl era won’t return…
“No man can tell what he’ll do when driven by hunger”
– Alexander Pearce 1824 Cannibal Convict
Better get those home food gardens going. 😉
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Droughts and flooding rains eh!
Maybe they’ll progress to a poem as well?
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They are not as bright as she was.
80
We did a river trip from Budapest to Amsterdam, saw numerous churches, cathedral, and castles, the castles were there to house the toll collectors for those who used ‘their’ bit of the river Rhine, churches and cathedrals were built with funds given by the poor folk who needed help with the crops, animals childbearing, and whenever something went wrong, the church would say give us money and we will pray to the ‘Great Spirit’ who will ensure that it rains, your crop thrives, your wife becomes with child, and the child survives to help on the farm.
They knew no better.
We have a similar cult active nowadays, saying give us money (carbon tax) and we will see that the planet doesn’t burn to a crisp, we will do this, that and the other, we just need you to sacrifice to the weather gods and all will be well.
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Chronological snobbery is the assumption that our ancestors were stupid, and that we got here by our own efforts, instead of standing on their shoulders. IIRC, a great many of the Cathedrals were built during periods of plenty, and people of all ranks contributed, including the very wealthy. Gratitude for good times was a thing, then. Now it’s mostly entitlement.
Maybe stupid is thinking that people gave when they had nothing to give, and kept on doing what wasn’t working.
20
What about the Azores High?
In this video, MailOnline’s Shivali Best explains the Azores High – a new weather phenomena that is ‘driving Europe’s extreme drought’.
The Azores High usually sits to the south but is currently directly over the UK and Ireland, stretching from the Azores Islands.
Using climate models, scientists simulated global weather over the past 1,200 years and found that the number of large Azores Highs is extremely unusual
https://newscinema.in/whats-causing-europes-extreme-summer-how-the-answer-could-lie-far-away-over-the-atlantic
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It is wonderful how climate models which get nothing right and cannot possibly predict next year are assumed to have perfect predictability of the past over a thousand years ago.
I would love to see these Climate models accurately predict the temperatures of even the last 200 years. And only then would I consider their simulation of global weather 1200 years ago to be possibly correct. I can only assume they have nothing better to do than computer voodoo.
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Add this and recoil further in horror
“Claim: Reserve Banks Should Hire Climate Scientists”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2022/08/10/claim-reserve-banks-must-hire-climate-scientists/
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” the Azores High – a new weather phenomena ”
Say What?
The sailors of “The Age of Discovery” would be surprised.
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‘The Azores High is a large center of high atmospheric pressure …’
Blocking high pressure is a sign of global cooling.
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“scientists simulated global weather over the past 1,200 years”
What an absolutely ridiculous statement for anyone to make.
I assume they must have shown the MWP being somewhat warmer than now !
10
The media and the UN and all the rest of the green cabal will simply blame the drought on ” climate change “. They will jump up and down and shout ” See! We told you! The scientists were right! We need climate action NOW! ”
And you know what? 90% of the sheeple will believe it. More carbon restrictions coming, folks.
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Thanks again Jo. Just when all the “climate change” madness gets too much, you provide a fresh air of sanity. Nothing in meteorological history is “unprecedented” if your time frame is long enough.
110
Thanks again Jo for trying to encourage people to THINK for themselves. In 1500 the world population was about 438 million and life expectancy was under 40 and terrible loss of life from extreme events like droughts, floods etc brought about famine and death.
But the earlier Holocene was much warmer than 1500 or 2022 and we know sea levels were much higher around the world. Of course the previous Eemian inter-glacial was much warmer and sea levels then were even higher than the Holocene optimum. Oh and co2 levels then were about 280 ppm not the 418 ppm today.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_in_1500
60
OT, but so hilarious I have to link the story.
Bowen: Opportunity to make more solar panels in Australia (Sky mainpage headline, 14 Aug)
Yes, our Energy Minister thinks lithium is used in solar panels.
Sigh.
160
The bloke is an idiot – we all know that from his days as the Immigration minister in the RGR Australian government. This just proves it again. QED.
120
Stupidity is not an aberration in Australian politics, it is a built-in feature.
60
I saw that, he is hardly across his brief.
50
“Across his brief”
That could be taken as a prediction of results
10
Don’t you need cheap electricity to produce solar panels at a competitive price?
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Great to see Bowen pushing the need for massive increase in supplies of reliable electricity... ie coal and gas
… because that is what is needed to produce solar panels.
60
This is not even true. The panels are assembled in Australia from wafers produced overseas.
50
Poland and Germany face massive environmental disaster
Tons of dead fish were discovered this week in the Oder River, which flows through both countries
Authorities in Poland and Germany are trying to determine the cause of a major environmental disaster in Poland’s second largest river, which also flows through the Czech Republic and eastern Germany.
Tons of dead fish have been seen floating or washed ashore on the banks of Oder River over the past two weeks. Photos and videos published on social media show the surface of the river covered by fish carcasses, while dead beavers can also be seen floating on the water.
The German broadcaster rbb24 reported on Saturday that the disaster had reached the Szczecin Lagoon at the mouth of the Oder that flows into the Baltic Sea. Hundreds of volunteers as well as some 300 German emergency service specialists have been collecting dead animals in the Oder in an area spanning some 80 kilometers.
On Friday, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki stated that “huge amounts of chemical waste were probably dumped in the Oder River with full awareness of the risks and consequences.” He also vowed to bring the perpetrators to justice. “We will not let this matter go. We will not rest until the guilty are severely punished,” he said in a video published on Facebook.
The cause of the pollution remains unknown. On Friday, rbb24 reported, citing the Brandenburg State Laboratory, that extremely high levels of mercury had been detected in water samples taken from the river. The amount of the highly toxic substance in the river was reportedly so high the testing equipment could not properly display the test results and the test had to be repeated.
The incident comes as Europe faces a massive drought and heat waves, which have caused water levels in many major rivers on the continent to fall. Some media have reported that this fact may have also contributed to the disaster.
40
Only speculation, but low river levels can permit groundwater contaminated by leachate from okd industrial sites to flow into the river.
20
Australian Primary school kids should be made to learn ‘My Country’ by Dorothea Mackellar, and be able to quote it word perfect and to be able to explain what the author is saying to the reader.
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[…] JoNova, Patty Janson; A brutal European megadrought in 1540, during the little ice age, brings context to […]
00
https://lustialab.com/Lustia/labs.htm
If anyone is interested in tree-ring research, link above is a good start. Dozens of links related to holocene climate and tree-ring studies.
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Megadrought during Little Ice Age.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2022/08/13/the-european-climate-megadrought-which-happened-482-years-ago/
40
It is interesting that the 1540 date is within the frame of the “Little Ice Age”, (1500-1850), which, even MORE interestingly, followed the Medieval Warm Period.
Unfortunately, there seems to be not a lot of accurate temperature records from back then, but if people were actually ice-skating on the Thames River, it was certainly chilly.
Something about: “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. “
70
And horse drawn carriages were crossing the River Thames on the ice.
20
Landslides sweep away cars as flash floods hit Sicily and Reggio Calabria, Italy on August 12 – second serious flooding event in 4 days
Chave Weather YouTube
Fri, 12 Aug 2022
Flash flooding hit Reggio Calabria and the island of Sicily, Italy on August 12th 2022.
A strong storm in the Strait of Messina caused waves to wash onshore, destroying beaches.
Heavy rain caused floods as drainage systems overflowed.
Rain washed down hillsides, turning roads into waterfalls.
Buildings and vehicles were damaged, as water levels rose.
Landslides occurred in rural areas, causing further damage to structures.
As flood levels subsided, roads were filled with mud and debris.
Emergency services are working to help affected citizens and clear roads.
20
This is one of those events OO, that years ago would have never been reported in the heritage media. Maybe in Europe, but nowhere else. Perhaps a paragraph on p20, just below the crossword. Now, every weather event is reported on, in the myriad of weather channels, blogs and social media feeds.
90
Like those flood heights from way back that gained publicity in those recent German floods
10
This is a summer storm. Peak sun intensity on shallow water, massive evaporation. And steam has twice the lifting power of hot air. Where rivers run from the snow melt in spring and spring, this dumping rain causes disastrous flash floods. It is not Climate Change, but the usual summer storms. A consequence of peak solar intensity and steadily warmer surface temperature in shallow water and high humidity at the end of summer which drives this, not air temperature. +2C is of no consequence, even if it were true. But it’s a disaster and all disasters are Climate Change, so it must be Climate Change, not the usual weather. So it’s nice that only Climate Scientists knows what is climate change and what is not, or no one would know. And all journalists and politicians and Greens are climate scientists.
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TdeF
” And all journalists and politicians and Greens are climate scientists.”
And all farmers, graziers and others of that large, usually ignored, ilk should be recognised as
Applied Climate Scientists
40
Agreed. The first group know nothing about neither science nor experience but argue as if they have both. The second live and work outside in the weather and risk their livelihood short and long term on their lived experience over many years. And are both practical and often educated meteorologists. And you can be sure a climate scientist has no physical science training at all.
20
This will become a feature across the Mediterranean in coming decades and centuries. It is now close to the limit temperature of 30C:
https://earth.nullschool.net/#2022/08/13/0000Z/ocean/primary/waves/overlay=sea_surface_temp/orthographic=-356.47,47.74,820/loc=12.468,39.309
That means intense storms become a possibility; even cyclones. Unlike the Persian Gulf, the Mediterranean is large enough to build its own weather system. It will produce monsoon similar to what is experienced in the Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengall in May but a couple of months later. Peak season will be shorter an occur in August.
This is the process that leads to the northern Sahara re-greening.
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With more rain forecast I heard a country property owner tell a group of friends that he was installing more water tanks, some were surprised and asked why after all the rain and flooding since 2020.
The reply was predictable, preparing for the next drought.
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But the climate was perfect back then, nature was in balance. Why?
If only they had climate scientists back then they would have known what caused it, like we do today.
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Aloha! In ancient Greece “hubris” was a crime. It was punishable by death. If that law were applied today there would be no politicians left alive and half the scientists would be gone along with every member of davos! There is much wisdom in the past.
“HE WHO CAN MAKE YOU BELIEVE ABSURDITIES, CAN MAKE YOU COMMIT ATROCITIES.” -VOLTAIRE
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Lake Garda, Italy’s biggest lake, plunges to record-low water levels
Italy’s worst drought in decades has reduced its largest lake to near its lowest level ever recorded.
Tourists arriving at Lake Garda this weekend were greeted to swaths of previously underwater rocks extending far from the waterline.
“We came last year, we liked it, and we came back this year,” tourist Beatrice Masi said as she sat on the rocks. “We found the landscape had changed a lot. We were a bit shocked when we arrived, because we had our usual walk around, and the water wasn’t there.”
Northern Italy hasn’t seen significant rainfall for months, and snowfall this year was down 70%, drying up important waterways.
Many European countries — including Spain, Germany, Portugal, France and the Netherlands – are also enduring droughts this summer that have crippled their farming and shipping industries and promoted authorities to restrict water use. In France, the drought has forced the first halt to production of a famed cheese crafted for over 2,000 years.
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From the Cornwall Alliance
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Forgot LINK
1,500 Years Of Heatwaves
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I never knew we had computers and satellites 1000 years ago. This is just another example of the lies and nonsense that the Greens and other associated morons are trying to indoctrinate the world with their nonsense.
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I find it perplexing that sceptics point to other similar events in the past to dismiss current events being related to climate change. I too am sceptical of the extent to which a warming atmosphere will affect weather, but I don’t dismiss the possibility. Weather events do occur and for a variety of reasons. The fact a megadrought occurred in the past isn’t surprising and doesn’t tell us anything about one happening now in terms of causes. IF the warming atmosphere leads to changes in weather, shouldn’t we expect hotter, wetter, drier events? Many of which have occurred in the past as well. We can only say climate now is changing when we have the benefit of say another 200 years of records to look at. But just because something has happened before doesn’t mean that something happening now isn’t the result of “climate change”.
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Hi Graeme, you mention “warming atmosphere” and there’s no question that the atmosphere is able to change rapidly under the influences that do cause change.
The problem we must continue to address is the false scientific claim that human origin CO2 is one of those influences.
The stark reality is that human origin CO2 can have no effect on atmospheric temperature and that’s scientifically indisputable; even if CO2 had a mechanism by which it could store heat in the atmosphere there’s a significant stumbling point in the quantitative aspects of this claim.
If we are going to discuss the overwhelmingly chaotic nature of weather, we should always add the disclaimer that CO2 has no part in the discussion.
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Climate changes due primarily to solar influence, an external forcing mechanism. As Keith said, CO2 is not involved in rising world temperature.
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Graeme…
With the lack of raw data supporting what the models are telling us to expect, the poor correlation between CO2 levels and global temperatures, the panic-merchants have taken to grabbing every infrequent weather event as their “proof”.
The obvious rejoinder is to point out that exactly the same things – and worse things – have happened in the past. When droughts in Europe occur without “Greenhouse”, it is logically impossible to argue that droughts in Europe can only be caused by human activity. Continuing to make these claims is dishonest.
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New Normal
‘In none of the dozens of reports I have read is there any actual historical data to compare against this event, whether rainfall or water level data. We are told this is the lowest water level since 2018, as if this means anything at all. There is no evidence presented to show that this drought is in any way unprecedented, or that droughts are becoming more extreme.’ (Homewood / Not a lot of people know that)
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Interesting. But from 1300 to 1307 here was a terrible seven year drought in Europe due to a high pressure system sat over Europe non stop, at the point where the Mediaeval Warm Period ended and The Little Ice Age began, to last some 400 years. A very good long range forecaster, James Corbyn (Jeremy’s older brother) who is a retired astrophysicist, says the world is going into a new Little Ice Age now. This is behind some of the weather. How would Europe handle another seven years like that? There might be a reverse flow of people into North Africa and the Middle East?
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I think you mean Piers Corbyn.
As far as predictions go he has a much better record than Climatologists. He used to bet against the Met Office
predictionsforecasts until he won so much that the bookmakers refused to take his bets. The UK Met Office is full on “Climate Change (or whatever its is called this week)”.Piers view There is no such thing as climate change https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bLbM3lndAo
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We have the Medieval Warming Period, followed by the Little Ice Age, and now the Modern Warming Period. Within these periods there can be droughts , floods or whatever. No need to dig too deeply into these occurrences…it is just the natural climate cycle of the Earth (!!!)
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[…] The 1540 Megadrought in Europe: Rhine ran dry, fires burned, and no one blamed coal or beef steakPrevious articleI fallimenti dei raccolti sono ora a LIVELLI DI CRISI in tutto il mondo mentre le Nazioni Unite dichiarano guerra ai FERTILIZZANTIAlessia C. F. (ALKA)https://liberticida.altervista.org/Esploro, indago, analizzo, cerco, sempre con passione. Sono autonoma, sono un ronin per libera vocazione perché non voglio avere padroni. Cosa dicono di me? Che sono filo-russa, che sono filo-cinese. Nulla di più sbagliato. Io non mi faccio influenzare. Profilo e riporto cosa accade nel mondo geopolitico. Freiheit ist ein Krieg Preferisco i piani ortogonali inclinati, mi piace nuotare e analizzare il mondo deep. Ascolto il rumore di fondo del mondo per capire quali nuove direzioni prende la geopolitica, la politica e l'economia. Mi appartengo, odio le etichette perché come mi è stato insegnato tempo fa “ogni etichetta è una gabbia, più etichette sono più gabbie. Ma queste gabbie non solo imprigionano chi le riceve, ma anche chi le mette, in particolare se non sa esattamente distinguere tra l'etichetta e il contenuto. L'etichetta può descrivere il contenuto o ingannare il lettore”. So ascoltare, seguo il mio fiuto e rifletto allo sfinimento finché non vedo tutti gli scenari che si aprono sui vari piani. Non medito in cima alla montagna, mi immergo nella follia degli abissi oscuri dell'umanità. […]
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[…] The 1540 Megadrought in Europe: Rhine ran dry, fires burned, and no one blamed coal or beef steak […]
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