Dakota Beacon

I picked up a free copy of “Tidbits”, issue  # 1,150, at the grocery store. This January 2, 2020 issue featured an article by Janet Spencer titled “Rain” which outlined several random facts concerning rainfall. The further I read, the more I realized that this article proves something I've understood for decades.

The world record drought duration was 14 years in Arica, Chile from October 1903 to January 1918.

The world record rainfall for a one year duration was 86 feet 8 inches in 1860-61 at Cherrapunji, India.

The world record rainfall for a 2 day (48 hours) duration was 98.1” in 1995, also at Cherrapunji.

The world record rainfall for a 1 day (24 hours) duration was 71.9 inches in 1966 at Cilaos, Reunion during Tropical Cyclone Denise.

The world record rainfall for a 1 hour duration was 12” in 1947 at Holt, Missouri.

The world record rainfall for a 1 minute duration was 1.23“ in 1956 at Unionville, Maryland.

Only one of these “world record” events occurred during the last 50 years!

For years I have been hearing claims by a multitude of sources that this or that “single weather event” further substantiates the claim that global warming is occurring at an alarming rate. During the last few decades, several computer models that predicted global warming were eventually discredited. Subsequently, nearly the entire “federal climate study grant addicted” scientific community has embraced the term “global climate change”. After all, who could deny that the climate changes? It has been doing so since the beginning of time.

As an experienced hydrologist and civil engineer, it has always astounded me that journalists, leftist politicians, and other special interests favoring larger and more intrusive government would gullibly accept individual weather events as further proof of “global warming”. And even more unbelievable is the tendency of the same folks to deem the terms “global warming” and “global climate change” interchangeable. Factually, the first is, at best, a theory and the latter a fact of life. The first is employed by politicians to alarm us to vote a certain way; and the latter is something we should factor into every decision we make as individuals. Individuals can make a difference whereas government can seemingly only magnify differences…

So the next time you hear someone on television, cable, or radio warning that any single weather event proves that global warming is a fact, not just a theory,,, or claims that anyone with a brain denies that climate has always been changing...laugh out loud as I do!