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Freak flooding in Guadalajara after a massive hail storm. Pictures on BBC:
Six suburbs in the Mexican city of Guadalajara were carpeted in a thick layer of ice after a heavy hailstorm. The ice was up to 1.5m (5ft) thick in places, half-burying vehicles.
[...] Hailstorms form when warm, moist air from the surface rises upwards forming showers and storms. Temperatures higher up, even in summer, can get well below 0C and so ice crystals form along with something called "supercooled water" which then grows into pellets of ice.
In severe thunderstorms, air can rise rapidly and is able to hold up these hailstones and allow them to expand in size. Eventually they get too heavy and fall to the ground.
In warmer parts of the year, such as in Guadalajara which has maximum temperatures of around 31-32C [(87-90 °F)] in June, more moisture is available, contributing to the formation of hailstorms.
Temperatures this month have been higher than normal with Torreon, to the north of Guadalajara, reaching highs of 37C [(99 °F)].
Hm, I wonder if somebody is going to mention anthropogenic warming with this?
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Wednesday July 03 2019, @12:41AM (1 child)
Why not? Birth rates have declined significantly in low-income countries [worldbank.org] in the last few decades, without a dramatic increase in CO2 emissions. Per that link, low-income nations have had their birth rates drop by nearly 1/3 over the last few decades, and there's no particular reason to think that they couldn't keep going.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday July 03 2019, @04:00AM
Low-income now is not the same as low-income fifty years ago. Everyone has been getting better wealth-wise. I believe that better explains the decline in human fertility worldwide. My view is that in 100 years what they speak of as low-income will correspond relatively to the low end developed world today, like say Spain - that is the world's economies will have narrowed to the point that there isn't much difference between the low end and high end economies. It's much easier to catch up to the developed world than it is to pass them.
That's a big part of the dynamic missed by much of the environmentalism movement. Wealth loss in the short term can result in a significant long term hit to environmentalist goals. And many of these plans create a substantial, permanent hit to wealth growth, meaning they're really destructive as both economic and environmental policies.