Country has experienced 23 extreme weather events costing $1bn or more already this year, passing previous mark of 22 in 2020

Country has experienced 23 extreme weather events costing $1bn or more already this year, passing previous mark of 22 in 2020

With four months of 2023 still left, the US has set a record for the most natural disasters in a single year that have cost $1bn or more, as fires, floods and ferocious winds were among deadly events experts warn are being turbo-charged by the climate crisis.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) announced on Monday that there have already been 23 extreme weather events in the US this year that have cost at least $1bn. The current figure surpasses the record of 22 such events set in 2020.

So far, the total cost of disasters in 2023 is more than $57.6bn, according to Noaa.

  • netwren@lemmy.world
    21·
    1 year ago

    I mean it’s been how many decades of scientists screaming at us? Here in Florida the coral reefs are bleached, hottest summer yet it feels like, ocean is rising.

    I can’t help but think if we had listened to Al Gore.

      • PerCarita@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
        2·
        1 year ago

        I saw someone starting this thought exercise just yesterday - imagine Al Gore became president, say for two terms. Then the boat swung back into two terms of McCain, followed by Obama. No Iraq war. No Benghazi. Possibly no 2006 Housing Crisis. Maybe Covid would still have happened. But anyway, wouldn’t that have been a much happier timeline?

        Back to no Iraq War, maybe Saddam would have gotten toppled over locally. The Arab Spring would still have happened, but then also maybe no ISIS?

        • bradorsomething@ttrpg.network
          2·
          1 year ago

          the housing collapse was pretty inevitable, because so few people saw it coming. definitely no one in government. whichever party had been in power would have worn it around their neck like a dead pelican.

          • PerCarita@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
            2·
            1 year ago

            Didn’t the housing crisis start with bad policies and market deregulations? I’m not sure which government undid which regulations though

      • Evie @lemmy.world
        2·
        1 year ago

        Wait, how? Forgive my ignorance, I was 11 when bush and an Al Gore went head to head… what happened and how did the court affect this?

        • SheeEttin@lemmy.worldEnglish
          7·
          1 year ago

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2000_United_States_presidential_election_recount_in_Florida

          A lot of bullshit went down, from confusing ballots, to voter roll purges, to hanging chad, to Roger Stone (yes, that Roger Stone) organizing a “protest” of Republican staffers to disrupt proceedings and cause them to miss a deadline, to ultimately the Supreme Court saying that since Florida did not have a statewide standard for recounts, and to implement one would miss another deadline, they could not perform a recount, giving the electoral votes and the election to Bush.

          • Evie @lemmy.world
            3·
            1 year ago

            Oh, that’s what happened… this is the explanation of the recount plea Gore did and why it was ended? I had a really limited understanding of what happened there, but wow, now that you highlighted what really happened… that is sooo shity… so much more shity then the 'Al Gore wants a recount ’ it sounds like he had a legitimate claims for recount and the court blocked it? Am I understanding correctly?

            • SheeEttin@lemmy.worldEnglish
              5·
              1 year ago

              Right. And they started to do recounts, but the Republicans pulled out all the stops to block it at every turn, up to and including a conservative-leaning Supreme Court.

              It was just one more step in the post-Nixon Republican political machine.