As ‘nature acts’, this is not the time for inertia

THE three tragic deaths as a result of Ophelia are a vivid reminder of the fearsome power and savagery of nature. The grief of the families concerned is shared by the country. Given the unprecedented nature of this hurricane in everything but name, it is a testament to the National Emergency Co-ordination Group that the toll was not higher. Met Éireann might also be commended for getting a simple and clear message out to the public – don’t go out, and stay safe. Taoiseach Leo Varadkar also deserves credit for playing a decisive role in this.

There is a reason why birds sing after the storm, they have survived. Survival is not always to be taken for granted. Certainly not when a legacy of global warming may mean that our winters have the potential to be 10 times warmer, and our summers eight times wetter. It is time to take on board the hard lessons of increasingly frequent extreme weather. The truth is that power cuts, the lack of key public transport, and disruption to water supplies will become far more commonplace.

The devastation could have been far worse had tides been higher and if rainfalls had been heavy. We can hardly rely on dumb luck to see us through. Poor planning and building on flood plains have been badly exposed by climate change. We have to do things differently. Some 800 million people are currently vulnerable to climate change; this includes droughts, floods, heat waves, various extreme weather events and rises in sea levels.

We have been remiss in meeting our own targets, and there is clearly a fear among political parties other than the Greens to accept unpalatable truths on climate change. We have come to a pass where it is a contest between the forces that are destroying the environment and those that might be mobilised to save it. Where exactly we stand can only be determined by action, not inertia. We know to our cost, as Voltaire once wrote: “Men argue. Nature acts.”