Citizen Power

If you think about it seriously you can often find a connection between unusual weather events and climate change.  That’s true of flooding this year already.  President Obama has declared a State of Emergency in Fargo, ND.   The Red River in the area is expected to crest at 43 feet this weekend, which will be a disaster for homes and businesses on this flood plain.  Right now, the flood waters are at over 40-1/2 feet .  Volunteers from across the Midwest are fighting against time to fill sandbags and implement flood relief measures.   Obama recently suggested that the flooding currently happening in Fargo is connected to climate change and that this flood should help raise everyone’s awareness of it.  He may be right.  Flooding to this degree, and it seems to get worse every year, is not how things have always been  in Fargo.

This page from North Dakota State University shows past flood photos.  It seems there have been Red River floods in the past but not as frequently as now (which is almost every year).  There were big floods in 1969, 1975, 1984, 1989, 1995, 1997, and then in 2001, 2006, and 2009.  Some of the flooding is being blamed on blizzards this year.  When I lived in Moorhead there were blizzards every year, but no major floods. In fact, the photo here is of Moorhead, only a couple of days ago.

But the floods in Fargo are probably doing a lot more in the U.S. to raise awareness of winter and bad weather, because no scientists are really coming out in the media to show cause and effect of rapid melting in the spring, or what might be causing this flooding.  I have noticed rapid melting gradually in the last 5-6 years, because I live in central Minnesota.  For the last 3 springs my unattached garage and much of my backyard has flooded.  My garage in particular has filled with more than an inch of water from melting snow.  This started happening a few years ago, no matter how much snow we have had.

Spring use to come gradually to Minnesota, but now it comes suddenly.  One week it’s below freezing, the next we have a string of days in the 40s and 50s.  This may be  caused by solar flares, (according to my crazy Congresswoman ) but I really doubt it.  (That last comment was sarcasm, in case you missed it).

The sudden melting seems very odd to me,  and I have lived in MN most of my life.  I can’t believe the Warming Fairies are to blame for this either (that makes as much sense as solar flares).  During this same time period, from March through May,  I have noticed that the “spring” weather in general is much warmer than it used to be, and I can plant my garden weeks earlier than I used to. But this is  all anecdotal — what we need is a real scientist coming out with temperature comparisons who also makes note of when these sudden temperature changes are happening, exactly, and then draws conclusions. To my knowledge we don’t have any sort of pronouncement like that yet. Maybe after the floods this year, this will be studied more in connection with climate change.

While I was in college, which was at a MN university in Moorhead  (the twin city of Fargo, ND, right across the river) I lived in that area for over 5 years.  I don’t recall the Red River ever flooding during the time period I lived there.  Winters were horribly cold and brutal with lots of snow, but there were no floods, at least not of this magnitude.  I think the flooding is occurring now because the melting is coming so quickly, and that might very well be due to climate change.

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