In our media connected lives, it would be impossible to miss the storm of news about the recent natural disasters plaguing America. There is constant 24-hour news coverage of our friends in the South being hit by the historical hurricanes Harvey and Irma (with Jose sprinkled in there), coupled with the rampage of wildfires in the Pacific Northwest and disastrous hailstorms in central America. It seems that everywhere in America, Earth is angry. While that might be true, it is important to broaden our scope, beyond our own chaotic horizons.
In recent months, South Asia was thrashed and overwhelmed by flooding; the worst it has had in 40 years. An estimated 1,300 have died, a death toll 11 times higher than Irma and Harvey combined. According to democracynow.org, “Some 40 million people have seen their homes, businesses, crops destroyed—one-and-a-half million homes destroyed. Thirty to 40 percent of those killed were children,” which equates to about 390-520 children lost to the storms. Entire villages have been obliterated, close to two thousand schools have been closed, and thousands of people have been displaced. It is a tragedy composed of cutting, clear and cruel statistics.
So what happened? A monsoon happened. Without getting too science-y, a monsoon is a shift of moist winds from sea to land when the land gets too hot, and as the moist air collects, it becomes too heavy, causing rain. This isn’t an uncommon event in India, or around the rest of the world, but one of this caliber is very unusual. In a study published by Geoscience Frontiers in 2015, it is stated that manmade climate change has a direct relationship with the severity of precipitation during the Indian monsoon season after the 1970’s. This means that the warming of the globe increases the level of precipitation and flooding in South Asia.
“Countries by carbon dioxide emissions in thousands of tonnes per annum, via the burning of fossil fuels (blue the highest and green the lowest).” — Image and description courtesy of www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions”
So what we have here, in a country that is often invisible to the public eye, is a country suffering by our choices. China and the USA produce the most carbon emissions, which is a huge contributor to global warming. Our actions are plaguing South Asia, a country composed of about 40 percent of the world’s poorest people. What is happening in the USA is extremely tragic and unsettling, I know. But when tragedy hits, too often our perspectives shrink, narrowing our scope of what we see as important. It is easier to feel empathy for those in our worlds and homes, but our impact extends beyond ourselves elsewhere, and understanding that is half the battle.