1. I actually don't think there's as much disagreement here as it might seem. Clearly @MatthewCappucci is not blaming the girls or their counselors. But - clearly - the multi-million-dollar for-profit camp will own a substantial part of the responsibility for the scope of human losses. As the @Nytimes vividly reported, the $5-million expansion of the camp along Cypress Creek did not include relocating vulnerable cabins along the Guadalupe (there's way more from @AndrewRumbach and others on this elsewhere revkin.substack.com/i/167764976/ca…). ⤵️
2. Boosting community resilience to natural - and unnatural - hazards) is, like so many issues today, a systems challenge, as @oldscarf1stweek says. But it's clear in disaster-risk-reduction circles that, particularly for hyperlocal threats like this kind of flood or tornadoes, the "last mile" is, too often, where the gap between warning and response exists. @oldscarf1stweek is spot on that more must always be done by professionals (#EMG professionals, @NWS community outreach staff (those unfilled positions...), local meteorologists and media, social media and telecomm folks, and of course local elected officials). But that includes property owners too. ⤵️

“It’s like pitching a tent in the highway... It’s going to happen, sooner or later — a car is going to come, or a big flood is going to come.” - Anna Serra Llobet, quoted in a powerful @nytimes deconstruct of the built vulnerability at Camp Mystic. Story link below. 1/

She's been at this a long while. See below. 2. Camp Mystic Cabins Stood in an ‘Extremely Hazardous’ Floodway - @ByMikeBaker @merlerker @harrys_stevens @TmarcoH in @nytimes nytimes.com/interactive/20…

Surreal but real report from @HannahAllam at @propublica recalls my '06 reporting showing that 24-year-old Bush appointee George Deutsch was trying to muffle @NASAGISS climate scientist @DrJamesEHansen. (Fugate Instagram reel). But the @DHSgov move is potentially way more consequential. (And don't miss the part where Team Trump has cut the CP3 office from 80 downt to 20 people.) 1/
Here's the 2006 outcome: George C. Deutsch, the young presidential appointee at NASA who told public affairs workers to limit reporters' access to a top climate scientist and told a Web designer to add the word "theory" at every mention of the Big Bang, resigned yesterday, agency officials said.

Mr. Deutsch's resignation came on the same day that officials at Texas A&M University confirmed that he did not graduate from there, as his résumé on file at the agency asserted. nytimes.com/2006/02/08/pol… 2/

☕ Case study in how to read coverage of new science on perennial issues (nutrition, climate change, pandemic, etc...) and avoid the #whiplasheffect.

Stick to the basics and avoid the media #singlestudysyndrome habit of snagging your attention with a new study (new science is almost *always* tentative). 🧵
Example: That Cup of Coffee May Have a Longer-Term Perk / A new study of over 47,000 women found links between coffee drinking and healthy aging. Here’s what we know. by @alicegcallahan @nytimes
nytimes.com/2025/06/02/wel… 1. Not peer reviewed (peer review isn't a gold standard but is a valuable barometer). Of course, we journalists are in a bind. Embargoed press releases are dangled, papers are presented at meetings you're attending. Someone else will write it if you don't. Alice does a good job...

Just learned from reliable source that a small but effective unit helping boost capacity for resilient development has been X-ed by Musk/Trump (and the university: @ccb_boulder at @INSTAAR at @CUBoulder. 1/ The Consortium for Capacity Building (CCB) 2/ccb-boulder.org/about/

Great to see #songwriter @jesse_welles get his @nytimes moment! Gift link below #fastfolk 1/ 2/ Nice @DavidPeisner profile catches @jesse_welles in the studio in Nashville and builds a fine sketch of his hockeystick track - a tough label-driven grunge slog and now spare fun mixing off-the-news broadsides and writerly tunes. (no paywall)
nytimes.com/2025/02/12/art… I see Welles as an update to the #fastfolk movement I wrote about in The Times in 1999...

I finally figured out why @realDonaldTrump covets #Greenland. He wants to own Sondie Arctic Desert Golf Course - the world's northernmost permanent 18-hole course.

Here's my 2004 New York Times story (link in thread) with a few of my photos: Kangerlussuaq Journal; Golf Under a Handicap: Icy Cold Is Par for the Course 🧵⛳️

Out for an afternoon half-round of golf before heading to his job as a night watchman at the Kangerlussuaq Hotel, Peter Tollerup lined up what he hoped would be his final putt. It was a 20-footer, daunting not just for its length but also because of the bitter wind blowing off the vast ice sheet that covers 85 percent of this giant Arctic island.

The thermometer may have read an unusually balmy 40 degrees, but it felt a lot colder. Daunting, too, because there was nothing smooth and green about this putting green, which consisted not of grass but of tamped gray alluvial till, the espresso-fine powdered rock that is produced when a great grinding ice sheet scours bedrock.

Mr. Tollerup came up five feet short. ''Ah, well,'' he said. ''We're just practicing today.'' His partner, Soren Pinderup, the cook at the hotel, wearing a tropical-weight African shirt, missed his five-footer. They tapped in and headed for the clubhouse, a pair of brown trailers that were the only structures visible in this stretch of a barren glacier-carved valley that runs 115 miles west from the ice sheet to the coast.

Such is golf on what residents here contend is the northernmost permanent 18-hole golf course in the world, about 35 miles above the Arctic Circle. (The word permanent is important because there is plenty of ''ice golf'' played farther north, in places like Thule and Uummannaq, Greenland, hundreds of miles closer to the top of the globe. But those matches take place on temporary courses marked out on frozen lakes and similar spots.)

In retrospect it's kind of funny that I chose emergency brakes as the metaphor for the role of litigation in slowing the Trump Musk demolition derby. I just noticed pressure from @autosinnovate @GM @VW @Toyota et al has @SeanDuffyWI @USDOT reviewing new rule requiring automatic emergency brakes by 2029. Links in 🧵 .@autosinnovate had just filed suit (under the incoming industry-friendly administration) challenging the @NHTSAgov rule. Fine @davidshepardson @Reuters sustained reporting. 2/ reuters.com/business/autos…

This 🧵is NOT for those in harm's way in the LA-area catastrophe. Find local advice and help. It is for those facing similar #wui fire risks elsewhere (this is not "wildfire"; it's an urban firestorm sparked by wildfire) and eager to stay safe. As you see the rush to explain the vast losses, look for the word #grandfathered. You won't see it much but it's vital. Here's why. 1/
California has fine building codes for #wildfire risk reduction. osfm.fire.ca.gov/what-we-do/cod…. But in most communities, huge numbers of homes and other buildings are exempt because they were built before the new codes went into force. That's where the word #grandfathered comes in. There are other issues. But I'm just focusing on those exemptions for the moment. 2/

I’ve seen some assertions that it’s unprecedented to have hurricane impacts as far inland as those of #helene.

Case study- The massive losses in the great Vermont flood of November 1927
@NWS background:


A late season hurricane moved up the Atlantic coast in early November 1927 and proceeded to move up through the Connecticut River valley. The storm dumped generally 3-4 inches of rain through much of southern New England. However, as the system reached the higher altitudes in Vermont, the tropical system stalled due to the presence of two cold, high pressures areas just to the east and west. The result was widespread areas of 6 inches or more of rainfall during the period of November 2-5, with reports received of up to 15 inches of rainfall. In addition, October had been a very wet month, with rainfall generally about 150% of normal for the month.weather.gov/nerfc/hf_novem…
My heart goes out to those affected across the South by Hurricane Helene. At the same time, those calling this calamity (particularly the North Carolina devastation) "unprecedented" are exhibiting either amnesia or irresponsible conscious disregard for past tropical-storm-driven extreme floods there. There were double-storm flood disasters in 2004 and - particularly awful - 1916. Here's a trailer for David Weintraub's film on the centennial of the earlier disaster, with lots more in the 🧵, Here's his website: 1/saveculture.org/project/great-…

Global warming is a serious problem (as I've reported since 1988). But... "Experts and skippers say" is a warning sign in stories like this @reuters article straining to find a #climatechange angle in a tragic fatal yacht sinking in a freak windstorm in Sicily. A #singlesource clue. The one climatologist may be a fine researcher but is not "experts." 🧵
Bigger problem? No reference to the @IPCC_CH, the bedrock source for what climate science says. These reports should be the first stop for any journalist @CoveringClimate and seeking clarity on a particular hazard and region. There are lots of recent and projected changes with warming, but... 2/

Boy is this climate paper, finding substantial prompt heating effects from the 2020-onward cuts in 🚢🌋-style pollution, is stirring up all kinds of reactions - criticism from some climate modelers and "we told you so long ago" from those centering on shipping emissions over the last couple of years. As always, it's important to avoid #singlestudysyndrome, but that doesn't mean @tianle_yuan et al are wrong. Some reactions in 🧵 below as I come across them. And feel free to reply with others! 1/ The @dpcarrington story has a remarkably definitive headline considering the caveats: "‘Termination shock’: cut in ship pollution sparked global heating spurt"

https://x.com/dpcarrington/status/1796196247436480813

One problem with this bill is that Vermont is among northeastern states identified in a 2002 study as seeing a rising pattern of extreme scouring precipitation/flooding on time scales long predating fossil fuel emissions. I covered that paper (Noren, Bierman, Steig et al) in the @nytimes. (Video is of the November 1927 great flood event from a fading tropical system). Here's the @nytimes story and the @nature paper: "Millennial-scale storminess variability in the northeastern United States during the Holocene epoch" nytimes.com/2002/10/25/us/…
uvm.edu/~pbierman/clas…

There are a zillion book clubs, and online book chats, but how many communities put on dramatic readings drawing from a nonfiction climate book?
Thrilled to discover that our tiny Maine town is one. A packed house at Lamoine Grange today for a show built on The Treeline by @BenRawlence 1/lamoinearts.org

The performers took on the roles of Saami herders and Siberian villagers and scientists confronting rapid climatic and ecological disruptions, building on the reporting of Rawlence and reminding me repeatedly of the fieldwork of Kari Norgaard. 2/ us.macmillan.com/books/97812502…

So is there an international criminal investigation under way given that an Ecuador-based company added lead to cinnamon that ended up poisoning American (and other) kids?

"It was eventually determined that the lead was from contaminated cinnamon purchased from a third-party supplier. The FDA has reported that the lead was likely added to the cinnamon to increase its weight and therefore its commercial value." @bmarler.

So what company did this?! Some details from @Coral_TheBeach in @foodsafetynews 1/ "Sold under the brands Wanabana, Schnucks, and Weis, the applesauce was made at an Austrofoods facility in Ecuador using cinnamon from Negasmart." "The @US_FDA deputy commissioner for its Human Foods Program, Jim Jones, has said that he believes the cinnamon was intentionally contaminated with lead. Lead can increase the weight of foods." More: foodsafetynews.com/2023/12/offici…
foodsafetynews.com/2023/11/compan…

The prime factor in #sikkimflood appears to be a glacial-lake outburst flood (#GLOF). Get used to that acronym. #climatechange is changing Himalayan ice dynamics in big ways. Vulnerability downstream is enormous. More on another risk factor: increasing dam construction on these meltwater rivers: Pulling together a #sustainwhat discussion with @icimod (and hopefully Rajeev) with help from @kashishds 1/

https://twitter.com/icicle_diaries/status/1709572207813517655

And the #GLOF threat is not restricted to the Himalayas. Remember August, when a #GLOF surge on the Mendenhall River caused flooding in Juneau, Alaska? A @USGS webcam caught the astonishing build, build, build, flush dynamic. 2/

@GeoffreySupran @KA_Nicholas @johnfocook @colognav @NaomiOreskes 1. Great question⤴! I recommend widening the lens to capture #trustscience lessons from the #covid19 pandemic. See this fantastic paper by @FloydZhang93 on impacts of @nature's #Biden endorsement (thread includes @ArthurLupia's piece )

https://x.com/FloydZhang93/status/1638344610278932480

@GeoffreySupran @KA_Nicholas @johnfocook @colognav @NaomiOreskes @FloydZhang93 @Nature @ArthurLupia 2. Of course there is no yes/no answer to your debate. Hopefully that won't be the expectation! All climate scientists (or journalists) are also people, voters, citizens, who should advocate for whatever policies they see best... BUT...

As the Siberian cold spreads, I'm thinking back to how Russia, more than most countries, has weaponized winter - almost always in defense. So much so that foes spoke of "General Winter" as a leader of Russian forces. Now, by destroying so much of Ukraine's energy infrastructure in his invasion, Putin is using winter cold as an offensive weapon. #PutinWarCrimes

https://twitter.com/_/status/1604049886940483585

I would like to run a @columbiaclimate #sustainwhat conversation on #atrocityprevention building on this post and conversations I've held on #fragilestates and the #page21effect (where intelligence briefs list risks, but with no clear prioritization) revkin.substack.com/p/as-russian-a… 1/

https://twitter.com/StateCSO/status/1605920621732429829

Can the U.S. Go From Responding to Fragility to Spreading Resilience? @MathewABarlow, Linda Robinson of @RANDCorporation, @MickeyGlantz @RodSchoonover..
2/

Because @evan_greer will be on my show Wednesday 2pm in part to explore his @OpenAI #ChatGPT Christmas tunes, I had to commission a song as well. My prompt: "Write a country song about Vladimir Putin's dreams for the world." 🧵🎶⤵️

https://twitter.com/Revkin/status/1605402458590793728

Verse 1: He's the leader of the land of snow and ice, Where the mighty bear roams free. He's the one they call Vladimir Putin, He's got big dreams for you and me....

A #sustainwhat takeaway from NY's tragic #FlashFloodEmergency, inspired by a listener who said her phone alert came with no call to action. Is it time for #flashflood "#DryOut" training in flood-risk regions akin to quake states' #shakeout work? pscp.tv/Revkin/1BdxYYq… 1/ One reason: Flash floods pose a distinctly different threat compared to coastal flooding. As @wxpizza notes, they can happen almost anywhere and are local. The response challenge is similar to that with tornadoes. @climatesociety & @NASA working on this. 2'