Southwest wildfires

[dug]

Two real bad fires going near the Az./ NM. border right now.

The Horseshoe fire in the Chiricahua Mountains is now over 100,000 acres burned. We are breathing a thick brew of the smoke here well over 100 miles NE of the fire.

The Wallow fire burning in the White mountains is much larger and approaching 500 sq. miles burned with the smoke plume visible all the way into Iowa.

Both are in exceptionally beautiful areas.    High winds combined with 5% humidity have made the going tough for the thousands of fire crew battling it, probably it will not be fully contained until we get rain which should be in about a month.

A tough start to an ugly fire season. 

[Ajax]

Welcome to your future

Signed
Global Warming

[dug]

During my evening walk last night I was treated to a gorgeous sunset, created by smoke haze from the horseshoe fire. The filtered light casts an orangish glow that illuminates the landscape and makes colors more intense, greens especially seem to really pop making trees look almost surreal. Sort of like when I put a warm polarizing filter on my camera.

The first thing that came to mind was that I haven't seen a sunset like this since I lived in Tucson, and we used to get them nearly every night. Hmmmmmm... probably a good thing I got out of there! 

Wallow fire now over 600 sq. miles.

[muldoon]

There's a good bit of speculation about the potential for a multistate blackout tomorrow.  Seems there are multiple transmission lines in risk over the next 48 hours that could have a dramatic impact on Texas, New Mexico, Arizona power.  I'm going to doublcheck my generator tonight and move some stuff around between freezers just in case. 

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/2011/06/09/2011-06-09_arizona_wildfires_threatens_to_cause_blackouts_in_texas_new_mexico.html

http://m.ibtimes.com/arizona-texas-blackout-red-flag-warning-nws-wallow-fire-wildfire-new-mexico-phoenix-el-paso-electric-160123.html

http://www.npr.org/2011/06/09/137078844/arizona-blaze-threatens-multi-state-electrical-grid?ps=cprs

[ScottA]

Welcome to your future

Signed
Global Warming

Yeah, it's not like there where never wildfires before, but how does global warming climate change get to take credit for this?

[Ajax]

Yeah, it's not like there where never wildfires before, but how does global warming climate change get to take credit for this?

Google and 30 seconds answers your question

[ScottA]

Google and 30 seconds answers your question

Hey you're right. I found the answer in less than 30 seconds. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda

[Ajax]

Hey you're right. I found the answer in less than 30 seconds. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science

FIFY

[ScottA]

There was a time when science was certain the world was flat. Or how bout the theory that the earth was at the center of the universe? Saying science says so has no more weight than saying I said so. When I was growing up Pluto was still a planet. Global warming has not been proven in any way, it's a theory, so it's nearly certain that a single fire that's still burning can't be blamed on it by anything claiming to be science. Till I see some real proof I'll stick with the theory that global warming is nothing more than propaganda because the 4' of snow in my driveway last winter and the record -28 temp I saw last winter where very much real. Still I'm sure some scientist will claim I imagined it all or that warming causes it to get colder even though they offer no proof. I'm sorry but claiming that tempature records from tree rings are accurate to less than .01 F is pretty hard to belive. Hell even the thermometers used 50-100 years ago are of unknown acuaracy, yet we are expected to belive of trend of only +.4 F over the last 100 years is accurate when the tempature on a single day can vary by up to 100 times that much. Back in the 1970's we where being warned of a comming ice age. Science made that prediction too. So spare me the continued propaganda based on "I said so".

[Bob S.]

Scott hit the nail on the head. The whole thing is a big crock. Meant to windup saddling us all with increased taxes and fees and dictating how we live are lives. How about doubling your electric bill in carbon tax fees. Who do you think will pay them? They will be passed through to the customers. The EPA has been given too much power over us.

[Don_P]

As a footnote I believe the word would more correctly be hypothesis rather than theory. Gravity is a theory, an arrangement of bits of information (facts) into an ordered system that explains a phenomenon. A theory is more than a fact can ever be.

A hypothesis is a jumping off point for further investigation, fact finding, on the way to forming a theory. Alot of things that we call laws are actually theories and alot of things we call theories are actually hypotheses. A hypothesis wants to grow up to become a theory if we can avoid falsifying the data (facts) along the way... from either side. Which is why we have peer review.

These may seem like minor points of semantics, they are worlds apart in meaning.

Don't get me started on whether the learned ancients fell for the flat earth junk. This mess was created by a story by Washington Irving and a gang of nutjobs, Draper and White during the period when the theory of evolution was a hot topic in the late 19th century. Somehow we latched onto it and it made it into our popular myths. These are the thugs that gave us the whole science vs religion pack of hooey that we've been dealing with ever since.
Mankind has pretty universally accepted the fact that the earth is an orb since before the time of Christ.

I'm patient, the truth isn't going anywhere.

edit; Thanks for the pics Dug, those are some huge fires, hoping you all get a break.

[Ajax]

Till I see some real proof I'll stick with the theory that global warming is nothing more than propaganda because the 4' of snow in my driveway last winter and the record -28 temp I saw last winter where very much real.

How's that workin' out for you now?

Oklahoma was drier in the four months following Thanksgiving than it has been in any similar period since 1921. That's saying a lot in the state known for the 1930s Dust Bowl, when drought, destructive farming practices and high winds generated severe dust storms that stripped the land of its topsoil.

[Native_NM]

Between 18,000 years ago and AD1900, did the temperature rise more or less than it has in the last 100 years?   That's a rhetorical question, Farley.  During the last LGM, Canada was under a sheet of ice, as was New York and North Dakota. The glaciers extended clear down to the Missouri river.  We know it's getting warmer. The million dollar question is why. If you believe Al Gore, et al, it's CO2. The industrial revolution represents 200/18,000 years of the known warming period. Last time I watched the Flinstones Fred and Barney were still peddling the car.  They were still pitching slaves into volcanos 800 years ago, and old Honest Abe read his books by the light of an oil lamp.   The modern fossil fuel age is about 90 years. Most of the temperature increase occurred well before the industrial revolution and the CO2 increase.  Somebody explain that. 

Oh, Al Gore earned $200 million on that million dollar question.  I wonder when "enough is enough"?

Is it getting warmer? Of course.  I support higher gas taxes for a multitude of financial and environmental reasons. The theory of AGW isn't one of them. 

[rick91351]

Looks like to me we have pretty much been in a period of global warming since the end of the last ice age.  (Give or take a few mini-ice ages.)

 

[peternap]

I guess it's time to tell share the real story of Global Warming. To be honest it stinks!

It involves longline fishing fleets n the Arctic.

Killer Whales survive on a diet of Fish and Seals.
It's a scientific fact that Seals contain a substance called Fartigens and Fish are high in antifartigens.

A balanced diet produces a benign mix.

The longline fishing boats are decimating the Fish in the Arctic so the Whales have had to supplement their diet with Eskimos.

Because of untold generations of eating seal blubber, Eskimos also have a high Fartigen content (The F factor) and this creates an F positive makeup in the Whales GI Tract.

Scientists are calling this the Jacuzzi effect!

The damage is easily measured by graphing the intensity of the Aura Borealas as these huge "Fartigen" laced clouds are ignited in the Ionosphere and destroying the Ozone layer.

This is now creating a new and even more deadly issue.
Because the Japanese are harvesting Whales (For scientific purposes) and selling the meat to their citizens, there is a very real possibility that the Jacuzzi effect could adjust it's center over Japan and become radioactive as well.

The Japanese Jacuzzi would also have high levels of mercury because Bottlenose Dolphin meat is often sold as and mixed with whale for consumption.

We have no idea what the result of highly irradiated mercury fartigens may do when burned in the atmosphere.

Be afraid!

This could be the dawn of...: