Did you read about those huge waves that have been hitting California since the last few days of 2023?
JUST IN: Evacuation warning has been issued in certain areas along the Pacific Coast Highway in California as the state continues to get rocked by massive waves.
The massive waves are caused by multiple storms throughout the Pacific.
Surfers are taking advantage, some traveling… pic.twitter.com/Wmd92WqvXv
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) December 30, 2023
Seriously, there are some wild videos out there, and I watched some of this on the webcams (Swellmagnet and Webcamtaxi are great sources). Did you know that this is your fault?
Huge waves are crashing on the California coast, in part due to climate change
JUANA SUMMERS, HOST: Giant waves are crashing along the California coast for the second time in two weeks thanks to stormy weather and high sea levels due in part to human-caused climate change. Tides are lower this week, so the waves are smaller, but they’re still forecast to get as high as 20 feet through the weekend. That is thrilling for surfers, but, as member station KQED climate reporter Ezra David Romero explains, all these waves are also eroding the state’s beaches.
EZRA DAVID ROMERO, BYLINE: When big waves happen, pro surfers drop everything and flock to them. On December 28, pro surfer Bianca Valenti caught the biggest wave of her life at Mavericks Beach, about an hour south of San Francisco. Forecasters had projected waves over 40 feet tall, but Valenti says this was bigger. (big snip)
ROMERO: Last week’s giant waves resulted from a few things – high tides, a storm giving them extra speed from the Gulf of Alaska and higher seas due to climate change and the climate pattern El Nino.
GARY GRIGGS: Waves are getting bigger.
ROMERO: UC Santa Cruz oceanographer Gary Griggs has studied the California coastline for decades. He says that human-caused climate change will force seas to rise in the future, making waves even bigger. A Scripps Institution of Oceanography study from last summer found that California waves have grown, on average, a foot taller in the last 50 years as climate change has heated up the planet.
GRIGGS: All the indications are that the water is going to continue to warm. It’s going to drive stronger winds, probably higher-intensity storms, greater wave power, bigger waves hitting more often.
Things are always happening with the weather and Earth systems, no need to assign witchcraft. But, let’s say that this is happening because it is a Holocene warm period: that doesn’t mean it is mostly/solely Mankind’s fault, just that the climate on Earth changes. In the doomsday cult word, this is all your fault.
Read: Giant California Waves Finally Blamed On ‘Climate Change’ »