Falcon Chronicle Issue 3, February/March 2013 | Page 2

WORLD NEWS

TYPHON BOPHA AND GLOBAL WARMING:

IS THERE A CONNECTION?

By Benson Hall

See what happens when we pollute the world?! This happens: a Super Typhoon. In other words, the storm classified like this is extremely powerful and very dangerous, like Superstorm Sandy. Typhoon Bopha, also known as Pablo, was a super typhoon. This massive storm formed on November 22nd, 2012, rather unusually close to the equator and dissipated on December 9th, 2012. It was a category 5 typhoon. Its strongest winds peaked at 260 km/h. It killed at least 600 people and displaced many more. It struck Micronesia, Palau and the Philippines. The Philippines were hit the worst, when the typhoon hit peak intensity. Now, as it formed, a band of thunderstorms formed with the typhoon, explosively growing and intensifying the typhoon. After making landfall at the Philippines, it weakened to a tropical storm but intensified again but made no more landfalls and died off on December 9th, 2012. Now these storms are just getting stronger, aren’t they? Well, global warming is part of the reason why. (The other reason is that it had a perfect environment to intensify.) Floods are more severe because of global warming. The ice melts so it creates higher water levels. The weather gets hotter, making it ideal for severe thunderstorms, large hurricanes, mega heat waves, unusually warm winter days, you know, the usual. Have you heard of acid rain? That’s rain that can melt and wound many things! Yes, even the human body is affected if hit on contact. It can melt stone, wood, steel, etc. Acid rain comes from the factories’ smoke they deliver. It gets in the cloud with rain in it and then, it all comes down as acid rain. Anyway, many of these storms seem to intensify but it’s mostly because of global warming itself!!!

Typhoon Wreckage

Tweet @FalcChronicle and let us know if you think there is a connection between global warming and natural disasters!