Can We Keep the Climate Crisis From Becoming A Climate Catastrophe?

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(By Larry Underwood, UUSJ Board member from Bull Run Unitarian Universalists, Manassas, VA)

In July I re-visited the Alaska I had lived in for 22 years, when it was largely pristine wilderness. I joined the annual summer tour of Alaska sponsored by four Alaskan UU congregations. I went seeking the beauty, excitement, and wildlife for which Alaska is famous. The tour did not disappoint.

But wherever we went the specter of climate change intruded on an otherwise idyllic experience. This summer the entirety of interior Alaska was bathed in a persistent, thick cloud of smoke from hundreds of wildfires. Over 1.1 million acres had already burned by mid-July. The train from Fairbanks to Anchorage took us through untrodden miles of beautiful wilderness marred by smoke and a plethora of dead and dying trees. Warmer than normal winters have allowed the spruce bark beetle to survive and ravish the forests, setting the stage for the next round of wildfires.

Indeed, after we left new fires flared up in August north and south of Anchorage, which saw 91°F—its warmest temperature ever. Palmer, a small city just north of Anchorage, recorded a temperature of 103°F. Rivers close to Anchorage were at flood stage, not from an abundance of precipitation, but from unprecedented snow and glacial ice melt.

This is what Alaska looked like shrouded with wildfire smoke in July.
This is what the scene would have been without smoke.

(Photos by Bill Stejskal)

Residents told us that persistent heat, wildfires, and melting glaciers are becoming commonplace in Alaska, winter and summer.

And it’s not just Alaska.

  • Wildfires raged throughout the Arctic and sub-Arctic in Siberia, Canada, and even Greenland.
  • Record temperatures are being recorded worldwide this summer. Heatwaves spread throughout Europe, where Paris set an all time temperature record of 109°F in July.
  • A weather station north of the Arctic Circle in Norway recorded a jaw-dropping 94° F.
  • This year’s heat waves have also swept through the Middle East, India, South America and Australia.
  • Worldwide, July was the warmest month ever recorded.

Is 2019 an anomaly or a harbinger of earth’s new normal? Trend-lines suggest the latter.

As UU’s we are called to live our faith through action. Please consider joining UU’s from around the country at the “Building a Movement for a Green New Deal”—a three-day conference in Washington, DC sponsored by several UU organizations including UUSJ  (see full by following the title link above) to learn how we can start the long process of recovery to keep the climate crisis from becoming a climate catastrophe.