What's up with the weather?

Cyclone heading towards Hong Kong and south China. Volcano erupting in Java, Indonesia. Floods in European cities. Tornadoes and Hurricanes in North America. Drought in North Korea. Dramatic ice reduction at the polar caps.

If I take these phenomena, which I do, I would conclude that the whole world is in for one hell of a time. Read the signs, as it is always said. Well, now we better look at the weather conditions.

A relative who just returned from vacation in Brisbane, and Sydney, Australia told me that it was sunny one day and next day wintry conditions in the cities. Bizarre was the word she used.

Not recently, the river Danude overflowed its banks and caused massive floodings in several European countries. It was the worst in more than half a century. In December 2004, tsunami affected about 12 nations in the Asian region. By the time, the bodies were found and later buried, the death toll surpassed 300,000.

Volcanoes are suddenly active. Smog covers a large part of the Southeast Asian region. One word again, global-warming. Global warming is so serious that even Hollywood is starting to make movies about it. For example, Day After Tomorrow.

According to some scientists, the scenario in that movie can become reality should Mother Nature loses her temper. There is startling evidence that the polar caps are melting at a dramatic rate. If this continues, we really do have to shift further inland all over the world.

Thunderstorms are beginning to be more violent. Hailstones are no longer the subject of geography books. In America, hailstones caused some serious damage recently. CNN showed footages of hailstones as big as golf balls. Car windscreens were smashed and vehicles damaged by those hailstones.

The explanation for all these drastic atmospheric changes is found in the way the earth is being treated. Earth is afterall a living organism and anything that is a life form when subjected to averse conditions will switch to its self-preservation mode, as it is probably doing now.

Meanwhile, the latest AFP reports more than 180,000 people have been evacuated from the coastal areas of Guangdong province in the wake of Typhoon Chanchu which is heading its way.
On the same day (May 17, 2006), an earthquake measuring 6.4 shook the Indonesian island of Nias. Nias is also one of the islands that was devastated by the 2004 tsunami. On the island of Java, volcano Mt Merapi continues to spew poisonous gas and lava, as Code Red has been announced a couple of days ago.
Meanwhile, three northeastern states of America have declared a state of emergency as rains have hammered Massachussetts, New Hampshire and Maine for days, triggering floods.
Thousands in these States have been evacuated and hundreds of schools closed. Now as dark clouds loom over the horizon from East to West, fires and floods ravage the lands that humans have called home.

It has long past becoming a laughing issue. The question is: how serious are we in tackling these phenomena? Or, are we just waiting for the authorities to perform some miracles.

Frankly, we are just plain running out of time.