Sunday Sundries: Thailand Flood Edition
When the government says…
You betcha it’s time to assume the opposite…
The Bangkok Post never misses a chance to talk about climate change and global warming. Weave that propaganda into the article like a demonic seamstress, LFG!
According to Mr Chawalit, another important factor that contributes to floods is global warming, which was one of the reasons that caused excessive rainfall in Bangkok in 2022 when the city saw 800 millimetres of rainfall in a single month while the whole year's rainfall was only 2,300 millimetres.
"Global warming is getting closer to us. The Earth's temperature should not rise by over 1.5 degrees Celsius, but it has now gone up by 1.2C.
"If it reaches 1.5C, more disasters, such as wildfires, floods, the melting of polar ice and overflows of seawater into rivers, will occur," he said.
In the next 26 years, sea levels in the Gulf of Thailand will rise by 75cm, which is the number the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts, he said. "By then, Bangkok may be submerged," said the water expert.
*Ahem* Michael Fish 1987 vibes, anyone, anyone??
Nevertheless, Thais band together as this monsoon season ain’t their, um, first rodeo…
Photo credit for the montage above: https://www.facebook.com/poetryofb?mibextid=LQQJ4d
Don’t ever say that Creed Speech doesn’t provide the occasional uplifting and heartwarming post, eh?
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"'Global warming is getting closer to us. The Earth's temperature should not rise by over 1.5 degrees Celsius, but it has now gone up by 1.2C. If it reaches 1.5C, more disasters, such as wildfires, floods, the melting of polar ice and overflows of seawater into rivers, will occur.'"
It would be pointless to tell him that "the Earth's temperature" has already gone up by 4.5C since 1750 and that absolutely nothing bad has happened. It would also be pointless to tell him that an average global temperature is just as meaningless as a house's average temperature: What you feel is the temperature of the room you're in at the moment, not the average of all the rooms. And whatever you do, don't tell him that when ice cubes melt in a glass of water, it doesn't make the glass overflow.
I will share some photos on next meme set of the flooding where we stay in Phuket. We ourselves are on high ground in a covered not in use restaurant in front of the campsite, but we are moated in right now, i.e. there is no way to get out of the restaurant, including to go to the bathroom, that does not involve wading through at least six inches of water. The handyman in the camp brought either friends or family of his into the restaurant last night: a man, his wife and their 12 month old baby all staying in a tiny tent, clearly looking like they've been evacuated from their probably flooded home. It's the worst I've seen it here, but certainly not catastrophic. It's the September very rainy season. The Adaman Sea level, incidentally, has not budged one inch over it...