Update October 29 below.

Today politicians in the U.S. seem to be rather concerned about the possible impact of hurricane Sandy on the upcoming election on November 6, not so much about possible causes of natural disasters. Neither President Barack Obama nor his rival Mitt Romney had even discussed climate change and how to fight it in their televised debates.

Both should have. The Midwest and Mid-Atlantic had experienced in June this year the most destructive derecho in North American history after weeks of extremely hot weather. What is now still a North Atlantic hurricane may indeed develop into a Perfect Storm if absorbed, after landfall tomorrow night, by a powerful Nor’easter, something which had actually happened on Halloween 1991. Only 17 months later, a winter hurricane, the Storm of the Century (see picture), hit more than 40% of the United States and eventually even stretched from Canada to Central America. 310 people died. I was in Chicago and got of the last flights out of the States. A similar path of destruction along the American East coast as current hurricane Sandy took hurricane Irene in August last year. In this year’s August hurricane Isaac hit Louisiana at least two times and even affected the GOP National Convention in Tampa, Florida, in which Romney was to be officially nominated presidential candidate. Hurricane Katrina of 2005 which devastated New Orleans is not forgotten.

It is well-established that global warming will rapidly lead to more and stronger storms and other extreme weather events. Soon, we are no longer talking about storms of the century anymore.

28 October 2012 @ 11:50 am

Update October 29, 2012. As has been predicted and feared, the storm has dramatically strengthened and not yet even made landfall. Its sheer size in fact makes it a monster. Click on the picture and see its development and path since it devastated the Caribbean.