Many people know about Charles Darwin's famous journey on the Beagle (captained by Admiral Robert FitzRoy) in 1831 to study anmial species in the Galapagos leading to the theory of evolution, but that same ship was the first for another important reason: it was the first use of the Beaufort scale to measure winds, named after Francis Beaufort, a hydrographer for the British Royal Navy. For hundreds of years countries all around the world had been sailing with ships using wind power, but finally they created a scale to measure how strong the wind was, something that's important in weather conditions even in modern times, especially so in light of the LA fires this past week that hit various areas in devastating fashion including Altadena and the Pacific Palisades. The original causes of each individual fire (Eaton Fire, Hirsch fire, etc.) are still being investigated, but the big culprit for why it spread across so many acres (thousands, at last check) is because of the high velocity of winds, categorized as "hurricane level" that swept the fire quickly and rampantly through the mountains and down into residential areas. So unlike various disaster movies that depict earthquakes or fires or something tangible and obviously threatening, the invisible force of wind was the big villain this week. There are various levels of wind starting from "breeze" (the best kind, that warm soothing feeling on the skin) to gale, which start to get into the 20s mph, you don't want to scatter pieces of paper around in gales, to storm weather and then finally hurricane level winds, going over 100mph. I've encountered some tough winds before in my life and I did live for 13 of my adult years in a place called the "Windy City," but I don't think I've encountered 100mph winds before. I can tell you that the windchill makes a 20 degree day feel like negative 5 degree day and bitter cold slapping into your face does not feel good, but I feel like storm winds would be close to sweeping you off your feet and providing near-fatal conditions.
It's kind of amazing that in these times of modern technology, when we're trying to send humans to Mars, see driverless cars in major cities through Google's Waymo technology, and created AI that has millions times higher processing ability than humans, that we can't solve......wind. Or climate change, or use any of the ocean's water to turn into drinking water. Neil deGrasse Tyson once said about the last problem that it's just a matter of money: it costs a lot to change that ocean water into drinking water. But wind? Is there no way to create windbreaks or barriers or some sort of invisibile field into the atmosphere to slow down the speed of winds? I guess the sky is too large and air covers such a large area to be contained in that way?
I think these are all 21st century problems; I can imagine sailors now in the 16th century traveling around the world like Magellan or Francis Drake, at the mercy of the winds, thinking how lucky human beings have it now here in the 21st century. At least we're here on land, the explorers then were often in the ocean dealing with real hurricanes, not just hurricane-level storms, without any barriers like trees, mountains, or structures to stop those winds. No wonder you hear so many stories of explorers getting "blown off course" like Pedro Cabral who was trying to go through the African coast to get to India but somehow ended up in Brazil..... that's a pretty big loop, even for me who sometimes opts for huge loops off teh main road to avoid traffic. Whatever the case, whenever it may, Mother Nature always wins, and this week she definitely won against firefighting efforts and humans in one of the most populated areas of the world, Los Angeles County. Not many people died, but thousands of people are without their homes, losing everything. I asked my parents if they have fire insurance in California: they do not, and it's common not to have those covered in California due to the insurance companies knowing it's a big risk so not including it. Some homeowners lost everything.
No comments:
Post a Comment