Desdemona Despair

Blogging the End of the World™

Monster heat dome threatens temperature records today in Southern California – “Today will be one for the record books”

By Jason Samenow 6 July 2018 (The Washington Post) – Record-crushing heat is likely in Southern California through Saturday from the same deadly heat dome that has torched the central and eastern United States and parts of Canada over the past week.“Today [Friday] will be one for the record books,” the National Weather Service office […]

Red-hot planet: All-time heat records have been set all over the world during the past week

By Jason Samenow 5 July 2018 (The Washington Post) – From the normally mild summer climes of Ireland, Scotland and Canada to the scorching Middle East, numerous locations in the Northern Hemisphere have witnessed their hottest weather ever recorded over the past week.Large areas of heat pressure or heat domes scattered around the hemisphere led […]

Three rhino poachers eaten by lions in South Africa – “The lions are our watchers and guardians and the poachers picked the wrong pride and became a meal”

By Christina Zhao 5 July 2018(Newsweek) – A pride of lions ate a group of poachers after they broke into a game reserve earlier this week in South Africa to hunt rhinoceroses.Three men were believed to have been eaten alive by the predators sometime between Sunday night and Monday morning after they entered the Sibuya […]

Trump’s embattled EPA chief Scott Pruitt resigns amid ethics scandals

By Dartunorro Clark 5 July 2018 (NBC News) – Environmental Protection Agency administrator Scott Pruitt, who has faced mounting public outcry over multiple ethics scandals, has resigned from his position, President Donald Trump announced Thursday.In a pair of tweets, Trump said that Pruitt had offered his resignation and that the president had accepted.”I have accepted […]

BP: Carbon emissions and coal consumption increased in 2017, reversing recent trends – “This should serve as a wake-up call for all of us”

By Spencer Dale 13 June 2018(BP) – At first blush, some of last year’s data might seem a little disappointing. Growth in overall energy demand is up; gains in energy intensity are down. Coal consumption grew for the first time in four years. And, perhaps most striking of all, carbon emissions are up after three […]

Video: Teacher confronts EPA head Scott Pruitt during lunch in Washington, D.C. restaurant – “I had to say something. This man is directly and significantly harming my child’s — and every child’s — health and future.”

By Tom Porter 3 July 2018 (Newsweek) – A woman confronted Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt in a Washington, D.C., restaurant on Monday in the latest public confrontation between a member of the public and a Trump administration official. Teacher Kristin Mink posted the video of the incident on Facebook. While holding her young […]

2018 is currently fourth-worst U.S. wildfire season in last decade, keeping pace with worst season ever

2 July 2018 (Desdemona Despair) – Wildfire season in the U.S. is off to an active start. The National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) reports that more than 2.5 million acres have burned already, making this the fourth biggest season since 2008, just behind the year 2015, which turned out to be the worst season on […]

References to “climate change” removed from U.S. Treasury Department report

2 July 2018 (Silencing Science Tracker) – The U.S. Department of the Treasury removed references to “climate change” from its 2017 sustainability report. Notably, in a departure from the department’s 2016 report, the 2017 version no longer lists “climate change resilience” as a goal. The 2017 version also omits discussion — which had appeared in […]

Evacuations ordered as winds fuel Northern California fires – “A lot of friends and family were texting today and saying they were having some PTSD”

GUINDA, California, 1 July 2018 (AP) – Evacuations were ordered as dry, hot winds fueled a wildfire burning out of control Sunday in rural Northern California, sending a stream of smoke some 75 miles (120 kilometers) south into the San Francisco Bay Area.The fast-moving blaze that broke out Saturday in western Yolo County charred at […]

Video: Trump’s NASA administrator reverses course and accepts the reality of global warming – “I fully believe and know that the climate is changing. I also know that we, human beings, are contributing in a major way.”

28 June 2018 (We Can Solve This) – As a Congressman, Jim Bridenstine spent years as a vocal climate change denialist. It took him less than a month leading NASA to change his mind. #YEARSproject We Can Solve This

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