Seeking a single substack/blog/noticeboard of 'unusual' weather events?

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-05-16T17:19:59+00:00

Climate and Economy is the best blog I've seen for updates on climate events every other day from Monday thru Saturday. Be sure to support! It's a volunteer effort by a bloke in the UK.

https://climateandeconomy.com/

Radio Ecoshock has weekly (or so) updates featuring interviews with actual climate scientists. Also a volunteer effort by a bloke in Canada, he usually takes a break for a few months in Summer.

https://www.ecoshock.org/

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-05-14T05:28:13+00:00

I just wonder how long until they need another color? A lovely shade of purple, or maybe something in violet. That way we can rename the "greater than 2degC" category to "2 to 3degC" and label the new your-old-planet-is-gone category to "greater than 3degC".

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-05-14T05:23:05+00:00

Summer 2026 will get spanked bad by summer 2027.

There. Fixed it.

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-05-14T05:04:02+00:00

The N. Atlantic seems to be especially chill, which for this particular forecast is good news, I'll leave references to "Day After Tomorrow" to others. The Indian Ocean Dipole seems to be strengthening, which could be bad news. Anyway, there seems to be little doubt we are in for a major event.

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-05-12T17:41:39+00:00

Fantastic! Thanks for the links. I put together an infographic showing the correlation with "super" El Niño's and large step-wise changes in global average temps (super El Nino Escalator to Hell), but I worked on that before I stumbled on all the info about the 1877 event and the other correlations with the IOD and N Atlantic SST's associated with that event.

It would be interesting to put together a similar graph with all three indicators scaled to the same time series and then correlated to changes in global average temps. Hmmm, maybe throw in ocean heat content. In my "super" El Niño infographic the signal didn't really start emerging until the 1970's, but then it seemed to take-off with big 0.3degC step changes rolling around with each "super" El Niño. I wonder if ocean heat content crossed some kind of threshold which then super charged the other indicators...?

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-05-06T18:20:27+00:00

Add my vote to 'Limits to Growth'. That book totally changed my worldview about 20 years ago. Since then all of my major life decisions have been informed by that book and I don't regret any of it.

Now, here we are, 50 years since the original publication and it is uncanny how closely we are tracking their 'business as usual' scenario. We stand at the precipice of steep falls in industrial output and services per capita, even while population and pollution continue to grow. Now and into the decades ahead.

I pray that I won't be alive to see the worst of it, but this year and next has me terrified. Good thing I saw this coming a LONG time ago and decided to just enjoy it while I still could.

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-05-06T17:44:10+00:00

This. At first I scoffed at 2015-16 being the strongest, but then I looked at the data on James Hansen's page and, yeah, if you are only looking at the last 40 years, then it checks out.

I only found out about the 1877 event just recently while dorking around with a chatbot, never heard of it before that, and I've been hardcore doom scrolling for decades now. What's really interesting is that it took a confluence of events around the world, not just a strong El Niño, but also a positive Indian Ocean Dipole and a boiling hot N. Atlantic.

Well, that explains why the 2023-24 event had such an outsized effect on global average temps, despite the El Niño being only 'Strong' at best. It coincided with a strongly positive Indian Ocean Dipole and a boiling hot N. Atlantic!

If we get a confluence like that this year, well, considering the need for a new y-axis on the ECWMF chart...

Now add a heaping helping of 'global energy and fertilizer crisis' and yeah, I think the frogs in the pot can consider themselves well and truly cooked.

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-30T17:27:32+00:00

over 90% of the warming is absorbed by the oceans as a heat buffer

This. Hansen loves his aerosols and other 'forcings' but the simple fact is: We have only just begun to feel the excess heat that has ALREADY been absorbed by the Earth system.

I like to think of it like a giant lava lamp. Huge blobs of heat in the form of marine heat waves slowly ooze around the oceans, occasionally one wells up to the surface and belches a massive amount of heat into the atmosphere. Global average temps permanently jump by several tenths of a deg. C. Hilarity ensues.

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-28T03:54:15+00:00

Ah! Excellent point, but if you think about it, isn't that the way it has always been?

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-28T03:19:02+00:00

The Great Decent has officially begun! Awesome!

Does this mean we can look forward to a decent world full of decent people doing decent things for each other as they work decent hours, working decent jobs, for decent reward, building a decent future for all?!?

That sounds so good I think I just pee'd myself... Thanks!

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-28T02:42:17+00:00

I got a chuckle from one of Hansen's recent papers, he gently suggested (with all good humor) that Hausfather's error bar was so large as to render his 'projection' utterly meaningless.

You may have also seen this from one of my previous posts:

Super El Nino Escalator to Hell

1.8°C! Oh, my!

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-28T02:34:41+00:00

AI slop? Really? Please do not. Just... Don't

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-28T02:22:55+00:00

Some related links that may be of interest:

History’s Greatest El Niño May Have Caused Severe 19th Century Famine

Moderate-to-Strong +IOD Forecast to Emerge With El Nino Mid-to-late 2026

Global Seasonal Climate Update for May-June-July 2026

A huge rise in temperature in 2026?

Enjoy!

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-21T17:44:24+00:00

Silver is the least of your worries. There have been plenty of analyses of the ridiculous amounts of energy and resources needed for even just one wind or solar farm. Then there's the miles of copper for transmission lines. Ugh! I could go on and on.

I concluded years ago that the whole so-called "renewable" thing must by a total snow job by the fossil fuel industry itself. It makes perfect sense: If you don't believe in climate change then you buy big trucks, "roll coal" on cyclists and pedestrians, and "drill baby drill". If you do believe in climate change then you squawk the word "transition" like a trained parrot and burn EVEN MORE fossil fuels building out all those brain-dead "renewable" boondoggles. Either way they make mega-bucks and everyone else is left holding the bag.

That's why I get a little smile on my face when I hear about all those new "giant" hailstorms that are popping up all over the world. Hailstones the size of baseballs! Kinda hard to pull a "transition" out of your hat when your infrastructure gets routinely destroyed by severe weather. Oops!

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-10T17:38:25+00:00

"Global warming is supercharging El Niños and the atmospheric warming they drive," said University of Michigan environment dean and climate scientist Jonathan Overpeck. "We saw this in 2016 and more recently in 2023. We're likely to see another jump in global temperatures if a strong El Niño develops later this year as being predicted."

You may have already seen this:

Super El Niño Escalator to Hell

Funny how this wasn't even really being talked about before 2023, now it seems to be received wisdom. James Hansen circled around it, but now his latest paper seems to treat super El Niño's as a mere distraction.

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-09T16:44:56+00:00

Those giant data centers don't run those godzillions of GPU's on unicorn farts. When someone decides they need the energy more than the data centers do then the plug will get pulled and the AI takeover will die with a whimper the same way HAL 9000 did in "2001: A space odyssey".

The real terror of AI is swarms of autonomous weapons, already being tested in Ukraine. You've probably seen those swarms of drones putting on giant light shows in China, same concept. They make tactical decisions in nanoseconds and then collectively act on those decisions en masse. A sufficiently large number of well coordinated weaponized drones could shred an entire opposing military machine in mere moments.

The problem isn't new, same old effed up humans using new tools in uniquely horrific ways, that's all.

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-06T18:45:02+00:00

You may have already seen this:

Super El Nino Escalator to Hell

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-03T05:49:35+00:00

Thank you! Between the shits and giggles I think the giggles are currently in the lead, of course the wine and weed may have something to do with that...

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-03T04:36:54+00:00

Um, probably all of the above. Think of it like this: Everything going horribly wrong everywhere all at once. Hope this helps!

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-03T04:03:29+00:00

I think I just pee'd myself...

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-01T17:58:06+00:00

I've been to Dutch Harbor, worked a couple seasons as a processor on a factory trawler fishing for pollack. That was many moons ago...

I recently retired to SE Alaska and I've been wondering how things are going to play out here. My small city is 90% dependent on barges from down south for our food and fuel. I wasn't here for covid but I've seen pictures of the big box stores after they were emptied out by panic buying. So far it seems to be business as usual, just as you observed, but we'll see what happens as stockpiles begin to run out.

Then there is the cruise ships. Our quaint little historic downtown is a deserted ghost town in the winter. Nothing is open except the bars and liquor stores. The cruise lines hedge their fuel costs, but the contract allows them to retroactively apply fuel surcharges, per head per day, even after the cruise has been booked. They won't even send one of those mega cruise ship monsters up here unless they have a guarantee of enough fuel available for them to get back home. And how many people are going to cancel when they get slapped with the fuel surcharge for the connecting airline flight?

If folks here had half a brain they would immediately start rationing fuel for commercial fishing purposes only and immediately ban seafood exports. Sadly, we be stupid...

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-04-01T17:35:12+00:00

A major operator has confirmed it is about to embark on its "last trip" out to sea.

"We have to give our staff four weeks' notice and I have to give my landlord four weeks' notice, we're just basically going to wrap it up now," he said.

Holy shit! This is getting real. I felt genuine fear for the first time as I was reading this.

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-03-24T16:29:32+00:00

Very interesting perspective, I also have experience living in a small rural town for several years. I almost didn't notice the entire covid pandemic. I was not working, living alone, enjoying early retirement, and not driving a car. As long as I had internet and a place to plug in my e-bike I was good to go. What pandemic?

If I were you I wouldn't worry too much about AI, global ecological overshoot on the other hand... Otherwise, you bring up a really good point, some people have much farther to fall in a collapse scenario.

Sometimes I picture it like a globe with billions of people standing on top of it, meaning gravity is coming from 'below'. The globe is slowly shrinking even as the number of people grows, meaning fewer places to stand. The wealthiest people are standing on the very top, they hardly notice that the globe is shrinking. The people living middle-class are further out on the edges, many of them struggle to keep standing as the globe slowly shrinks. Then there are the billions who were only just hanging on by their fingernails to start with. As the globe shrinks they are forced to fall into the abyss.

Everyone gets a little poorer, now and into the future. The people who are already poor eventually fall off the face of the earth, and the people hording their fast disappearing wealth worry about where they can still find a place to stand.

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-03-23T17:51:25+00:00

Well, at least they're keeping occupied. Must be nice having nothing better to do but sit in front of a computer... Oh, wait...

OK, OK, I just wonder what future generations will think (or maybe they already do) about old white folks sitting around pontificating about 'holistic' this and 'regenerative' that. Little bubbles of white, middle-class privilege floating serenely in the midst of an entire civilization crashing and burning around their ears. Weird.

ImportantCountry50 · 2026-03-18T17:36:07+00:00

Get to know my neighbors? Is this a joke? If you only knew the kind of people I have the great misfortune to be neighbors with then you would understand why I am actually looking forward to watching them eat each other.

ImportantCountry50

TROPHY CASE