[-] [email protected] 4 points 6 hours ago* (last edited 6 hours ago)

Well, we know that the NWS produced the warnings about an hour in advance, that the staff who communicate with local officials had been fired, that Texas abused their emergency alerts on phones so people largely disabled them, and that local politicians were unwilling to invest in a local alert system because of anti-tax sentiment.

So its pretty clear the key problem was getting the warning to people. And that requires investing in systems to do that and having the discipline to limit their use when not life-critical

3
submitted 6 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

Dream up a brand name. The catchier, the better.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 7 hours ago

I suggest checking.

10
submitted 7 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

The key thing that was missing was any capacity by local officials to alert people beyond posting to X/Facebook in the middle of the night:

Rob Kelly, the Kerr County judge and its most senior elected official, said the county did not have a warning system because such systems are expensive, and local residents are resistant to new spending.

“Taxpayers won’t pay for it,” Mr. Kelly said. Asked if people might reconsider in light of the catastrophe, he said, “I don’t know.”

[-] [email protected] 20 points 8 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago)

No, but its better to understand what happened instead of some fiction being pushed by local officials.

When you do frequent midnight alerts for missing elderly, people disable the alerts on their phone entirely. Then when disaster hits, they don't know its coming. And because no planning was done for it, they can't evacuate a camp full of kids quickly enough even if they know what's about to happen.

Actually preventing this kind of thing means maintaining preparedness for decades when nothing happens.

21
submitted 9 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
12
submitted 12 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

Negotiators from the seven river basin states said in a series of meetings in recent weeks that they were discussing a plan rooted in a concept that breaks from decades of management practice. Rather than basing water releases on reservoir levels, it would base the amount released from the system’s two major reservoirs on the amount of water flowing in the river. The new concept would be more responsive as river flows become more variable.

31
submitted 13 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
132
submitted 13 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

Mastodon bots which mirror the NWS warnings back them up

What failed was local officials not succeeding in alerting people — in large part because they had plan or mechanism available to do so with the roughly one-hour warning that current meteorology can provide for specific flash floods like this.

Archived copies of the article:

30
submitted 16 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
679
submitted 17 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
[-] [email protected] 5 points 18 hours ago

They're preparing for a fight with the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal while a grizzly bear is growling at them.

101
submitted 19 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
40
submitted 19 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

President Trump’s efforts to freeze climate spending have sparked warnings of rippling consequences in years ahead. For many climate scientists, the consequences are already here.

Access options:

50
submitted 19 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

Even in places, like Central Texas, with a long history of floods, human-caused warming is creating the conditions for more frequent and severe deluges.

79
submitted 21 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
[-] [email protected] 35 points 1 day ago

He has, however, read a collection of Hitler's speeches:

Last April, perhaps in a surge of Czech nationalism, Ivana Trump told her lawyer Michael Kennedy that from time to time her husband reads a book of Hitler's collected speeches, My New Order, which he keeps in a cabinet by his bed. Kennedy now guards a copy of My New Order in a closet at his office, as if it were a grenade. Hitler's speeches, from his earliest days up through the Phony War of 1939, reveal his extraordinary ability as a master propagandist.

"Did your cousin John give you the Hitler speeches?" I asked Trump.

Trump hesitated. "Who told you that?"

"I don't remember," I said.

"Actually, it was my friend Marty Davis from Paramount who gave me a copy of Mein Kampf, and he's a Jew." ("I did give him a book about Hitler," Marty Davis said. "But it was My New Order, Hitler's speeches, not Mein Kampf. I thought he would find it interesting. I am his friend, but I'm not Jewish.")

Later, Trump returned to this subject. "If I had these speeches, and I am not saying that I do, I would never read them."

[-] [email protected] 25 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

He's been spewing antisemitism like this since at least 2015. (I didn't pay much attention to him before then)

It's not just ignorance when it's pointed out repeatedly over the years and you keep doing it.

[-] [email protected] 9 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

They're also emitting a lot of unburned natural gas, there are plans to install a lot more turbines, and it's much easier to fight something new and illegally installed than something that's been around a while. Plus, it's the NAACP fighting it, which makes sense, because the turbines are being used to power a chatbot that's tuned to be racist.

Ideally, we want to get rid of all fossil fuels, but any little place a victory is possible is a good thing.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 2 days ago

Happens every day already. Just not organized

[-] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

They tried. Problem is that most of the press is billionaire-owned and they're literally settling frivolous lawsuits Trump has filed in order to bribe him.

[-] [email protected] 8 points 2 days ago

Yes, the harm is the point

[-] [email protected] 24 points 3 days ago

The problem started in 2014, when a state-appointed administrator took over and stopped measures which had been used to limit corrosion, sharply increasing peoples' exposure to lead from the old pipes.

view more: next ›

silence7

0 post score
0 comment score
joined 2 years ago
MODERATOR OF