Sustainability Corner: Hurricane Helene and climate breakdown
Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
On Thursday, Sept 26, Hurricane Helene landed in northern Florida/Georgia with 40-mile-per-hour speeds.
In the second issue of this semester's copy of The Lamron, the Sustainability Corner talked in depth about the damaging effects of “climate breakdown.” For a quick understanding of this article and term, this means “...the wide-scale deterioration of a biome—a region’s native weather, animal, and plant life—resulting from human-caused emissions known for region-wide changes in months…climate breakdown is the accelerated, sudden shift towards devastating biome changes…but drastically more brutal form[s]: Wildfires, floods, and systematic breakdowns [infrastructure collapse]...even been cited as affecting processes like thermohaline circulation…”
Due to the extremes that climate breakdown and climate change bring, every region of the world is more vulnerable than ever to climate uncertainty. There is no foolproof defense or fortification against the potentially catastrophic storms to come, and evidence for this becomes clear by looking at the devastating, quick-acting Hurricane Helene.
Various journals note that category four Hurricane Helene was “disastrous because of its unusual size, intensity, and speed. The perfect conditions were in place to supercharge the storm.” A hurricane like this is one we can predict and try to plan against as soon as two days in advance—at present. Even with this 48-hour window, the acknowledgment of heavy rainfall and high winds did not prepare individuals in the SouthEastern United States (US) for the damage to come, leaving many stuck at home, ill-prepared; many feel as if they were left helpless and not properly informed.
On Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024, Hurricane Helene landed in northern Florida/Georgia. Its 140-mile-per-hour wind speeds, accompanied by an expansive eye wall and spiral rainbands, indicated the worst was yet to come. Throughout the night and into the following day, this storm traveled north from Georgia through to the border of Tennessee and Virginia.
As it traveled more inland, the hurricane decreased in size, speed, and severity. Still, the number of storm surges—shorelines pushing inward due to increased tidal factors—continued to grow, with high rainfall further contributing to damages. Through its continued rampage, the spiral rainbands began to overflow Southern roadways, lakes, and even overload dams—causing acute or total failures—which fed into local towns with minimal drainage systems.
This damage culminated in a trail of decrepit infrastructure in its wake, leaving 132 dead and over 600 people still missing; both these numbers are set to rise. Entire neighborhoods, areas of woodland, and even cities have been left in flooded ruin. As many agencies rush to aid the affected cluster of states, talk of how to prevent the next, admittedly and anticipatedly, worse storm, and how to revitalize these formerly vibrant cityscapes.
The biggest factor behind this is the aging infrastructure within the US, which within itself can lead to catastrophe. Within the next year, sources say that “NID [National Inventory of Dams] dams have an average age of 61 years and, by 2025, 73 percent will be over 50. At least 4,000 NID dams are in poor condition and could pose safety risks in the event of failure. Many NID dams, having outlasted suitability for their original purpose…[and] Smaller, non-NID dams are on average, older, in worse condition ....” As these dams age and the weather worsens, the safety risks continue to grow exponentially.
As climate change continues to accelerate its effects, the best thing an individual can do is stay informed and “in the loop” about what is occurring globally—whether ecologically or human-related, especially incidents that cause massive emissions releases. People must work together to find solutions to this shared issue and we must aid one another to prevent further catastrophe.