In 2010, when Yorkton was underwater, we had to go back to the early 1950s to find a similar flooding event. On Sunday night as many homeowners and business people nervously watched the waters rise again, we only had to look back two years.
What are the chances we would have three of this kind of weather event in just six years. Well, pretty darn good, actually, and getting better all the time.
As the city continued to assess the damage Tuesday, the American National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) released its annual 2015 State of the Climate Report, which concluded last year was the hottest on record.
The average temperature on the planet was 14.79 C in 2015, up from 2014, which held the previous record. In fact, we’ve set new high marks four times in the last 11 years.
It wasn’t just temperature records that were set. Others included the lowest level of groundwater storage and accelerating loss of Arctic sea ice and glaciers.
It is shocking that we continue to have to say it, but climate change is real and it is being driven by human activities. This reminder is especially poignant in Saskatchewan where we have a premier who calls climate science “misguided dogma” and a culture that largely revolves around the internal combustion engine.
At this point, however, it is not so much about blame as it is how we are going to deal with the new normal.
There is the big picture, of course, which is about stopping or at least slowing the progress of climate change by modifying our energy industries. That, however, is beyond the scope of our immediate problem.
Locally, if extreme weather events like Sunday’s storm are going to occur more on the scale of every other year as opposed to the previous half-century frequency, and all indications are they will, we are going to have to do something to protect ourselves.
One of the most urgent, and simplest, things we can all do is stay off the streets with our vehicles during severe weather events, city officials pointed out Monday. Mayor Bob Maloney called not driving through flood waters “common sense,” something which is apparently not all that common after all.
So, to spell it out, since apparently and shockingly you have to tell people these things, driving through flood waters creates waves, waves that wash over people’s properties and push water into their homes and businesses causing damage.
Coincidentally, all those greenhouse gas-belching vehicles that people were driving around in the storm and its immediate aftermath are part of the cause of the climate change which is heralding the more frequent and severe weather.
For all the people who were out exacerbating the problem, there were others trying to mitigate it. Fire Chief Trevor Morrissey said citizens keeping storm drains free of debris helped.
The good news is, there are identifiable hot spots in the city prone to flash flooding. Medium-term revamping of the city’s drainage strategy is ongoing and probably needs to be stepped up. As the new normal takes hold, there will come a time when provincial disaster aid dries up and private insurance becomes prohibitively expensive or unavailable.
In the short-term, the City may have to look at some investment in something like pumping stations in key areas.
We should also be aware that the future consequences of climate change may be unpredictable. While we have been getting very wet recently, this part of the world is also prone to severe drought. We don’t have to go back very far for that either. The most recent drought was 2000 to 2003 with 2001 being the driest year in more than a century.
That is also a good example of how foresight and changing practices can see us through bad times. Soil management techniques implemented following the disastrous dust bowl of the Dirty Thirties mitigated the impact of subsequent droughts.
This is our reality. The planet is changing and the impact is likely to be very significant here. For example, because our latitude and continental location, scientists predict our average temperature increase could be double to triple the global average.
There is no way of reversing climate change and it may even be a value judgment as to whether that would be desirable. We do have to deal with the consequences, however, and look to the City leadership to drive and the citizenry to support mitigation strategies.
