Let me preface this by saying when it comes to helping people, I put down my climate sword. I will likely be involved in countering the nonsense about the extremity of the weather this week, being because of climate change. That the usual suspects that were all fired up over last weeks impeachment circus simply move from one thing to another, they are likely to be all over this.
Note to John Kerry, AOC and whoever. I put maps on from the EIGHTTEEN NINETY NINE OUTBREAK the middle of last week. Guess what if you know yesterday, you know what is coming now. So before we start hearing this is climate change. So if they want to do that, they will walk right into the trap set here.
Feb 1899 is the worst outbreak on record for Texas:
Weather map on models, well in advance. Notice the date of the model initialization, Feb 10
It showed what is going on. BUT YOU WOULD HAVE TO PAYING ATTENTION AND KNOW THE PAST TO RECOGNIZE THIS.
So the worst pandemic since 1917 was mounting, but the congress was obsessed with impeachment.
While this will come and go faster than Covid, the link is there.
Here we have the worst 5 day period of winter extremes on record for areas centered over Texas. In 1899 the storm smashed the eastern seaboard after. This one made tracks for Ohio valley. What is wild is the cold stays and another snow and ice storm is on the way for the deep south and then the Midwest and northeast, Back to back snow and ice storms in Texas where it snows and ices on top of snow and ice is almost unheard of.
I am not going to rehash all the weather. I tried to get people to look at this last week and there is nothing I can do or say now that is not being said by everyone, My value is the WHY BEFORE THE WHAT not during. But here are a few points to consider
Like Covid, an impeachment proceeding likely affected the top echelons of government was distracting. I will tell you this, SOMEONE IN THE ADMINISTRATION SHOULD HAVE GOTTEN IN THE PRESIDENTS EAR. I was tweeting well in advance that a winter version of a major hurricane like response should be mounted, getting supplies in place before the fact ( snowfighting for instance) just like we get power trucks in place on the outside of where hurricanes will devastate. We have a situation here, in Texas alone, where the power grid is so severely tested in a situation where many more people are living than days when other cold outbreaks have occurred, that blackouts occur.
Consider the rural population of Texas. Not all of them live on Southfork like ranches. People shut off due to snow and ice that can not be cleaned off roads, without power, in cold typical of the northern and central plains, are at risk for their lives. Consider the immigration situation with people caught in cold. Agriculture and the possible hit to the Citrus Industry. Refineries shutting down due to cold. How off guard was the industry? ERCOT, the electric Reliability council of Texas prices were under 50 dollars early in the week
You can see spikes to 2500, then the spike to 6000, even retreats on Sunday were 10x or more than what is was at before. When spikes like that occur, the market was not ready.
It is our job to get our clients ready and so we were all over this early last week. Why? BECAUSE I WAS ACQUAINTED WITH WHAT HAPPENED IN 1899. Friday night, Texas became extremely pro-active as Governor Abbott, to his credit and that of his administration, declared the state of Emergency. But is not the function of the federal government one where they are a safety net? I DO NOT EXPECT PRESIDENT BIDEN TO BE DIGGING INTO WEATHER MAPS AND KNOWING THIS STUFF, but certainly he should have someone watching his back on this matter. The Ecological disaster of the freezes of 1983 and 1989 are likely to repeat themselves in the Texas coastal waters. Trees and powerlines coming down from ice are another problem. And its not just Texas, Louisiana Arkansas into Oklahoma are under the gun as the snow is not going to melt off the next day since there is record cold Another ice and snow storm hits mid week. Both of these cause major problems further northeast, but people in the Midwest are used to this. The fact is that METEOROLOGICALLY for winter, this is as extreme in the given area as a cat 5 hurricane is for hurricanes. The way they cause their misery is different but the cumulative pounding of the cold and variation from the average is as extreme as possible. ( BTW what was going on at the turn of the century? 1899 outbreak, 1900 Galveston hurricane?) Many people are not only going to be living thru the worst 5 day winter weather event of their lives so far, but its highly unlikely they will go through this again if they still live in these areas ( this kind of 5 days of extreme cold, snow and ice)
How extreme? As I am writing this snow is accumulating in Dallas at the lowest temperature its ever snowed to accumulate at.
Someone should have let the President know about the potential for this kind of thing, For goodness sakes, that is just good politics yet alone helping out in a situation that is life threatening, and in the worst case for many and will cause a cumulative economic hit to these areas that may rival a major hurricane. Think of business closed all week, or the power prices, or damage to citrus, we can go on and on. Lets pray there is not a loss of life
So my company was way out in front of this and I was echoing this all week for instance on twitter and trying to get an obsessed media to take notice BEFORE THE FACT. Sean Hannity did and so I was on his radio show, but other outlets emails and texts went unanswered or scheduled appearances that could have warned people were canned because of the impeachment.
So here is another forecast. I will have to pick up my climate sword again. Because this will get blamed. People that had no idea of what was going on, or at least not enough to say anything I saw in public, will then turn around and blame man made climate change. And the media will buy it. Never mind the maps from 1899 were there, the models were actually seeing it, it will make no difference. The weather will be weaponized and the media by and large will simply march along to what they are told.
It is the way things are today and it’s a shame.