Poisoned Weather: Year 2011 In Photos
The headlines of 2011 were driven by global warming disasters and the popular uprising against the powers-that-be who have accumulated profit at the expense of the future of humanity. The United States faced the most billion-dollar climate disasters ever, with 14 distinct disasters costing at least $53 billion to the U.S. economy. Stymied by the election of the science-denying Tea Party Congress, the Obama administration failed to pass climate pollution or oil and coal safety legislation in response to the disasters of 2010. The administration fought back attacks on investment in renewable energy and stopped the rush to build the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, spurred by mass protests.
A torn American flag stands in the wreckage of a church in Joplin May 24. (Robert Ray/Associated Press)
A monstrous dust storm (Haboob) roared through Phoenix, Arizona in July. (danbryant.com)
Cars are abandoned on Chicago’s Lake Shore Drive during the “Snowpocalypse” in February. (chicagotribune.com)
A before and after shot of Joplin, Missouri after a massive tornado on May 22. (zeitlosimagery)
Hurricane Irene approaches the east coast. (NOAA)
The vast tar sands surface mines of Alberta are among the most destructive industrial projects in human history, having already transformed more than 260 square miles of wetlands and forest into a post-apocalyptic moonscape. (Garth Lenz)
A weed grows out of the dry cracked bed of O.C. Fisher Lake on July 25 in San Angelo, TX. The 5,440 acre lake which was established to provide flood control and serve as a secondary drinking water source for San Angelo and the surrounding communities is now dry following an extended drought in the region. The lake which has a maximum depth of 58 feet is also used for boating, fishing and swimming. The San Angelo area has seen only 2.5 inches of rain this year. The past nine months have been the driest in Texas since record keeping began in 1895, with 75 percent of the state classified as exceptional drought, the worst level. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)
Smoke from the Wallow Wildfire surrounds trees in Eagar, Arizona, June 7, 2011. (Joshua Lott/Reuters)
A man sits in front of a destroyed apartment building following the Joplin, Missouri tornado. (Reuters)
Billy Stinson comforts his daughter Erin Stinson as they sit on the steps where their cottage once stood on August 28 in Nags Head, N.C. The cottage, built in 1903 and destroyed by Hurricane Irene, was one of the first vacation cottages built on Albemarle Sound in Nags Head. (Getty Images / Scott Olson)
A woman hangs onto a street sign in chest deep water along the flooded streets in Rangsit on the outskirts of Bangkok on October 24. (Getty Images / Paula Bronstein)
An aid worker using an iPad captures an image of a dead cow’s decomposing carcass in Wajir near the Kenya-Somalia border on July 23. (Reuters / Barry Malone)
A Buddhist monk walks in a flooded street in central Bangkok October 24, 2011. (Reuters/Damir Sagolj)
Joseph Mwangi, 34, sits in a state of shock after discovering the charred remains of two of his children, at the scene of a fuel explosion in Nairobi, Kenya. A leaking gasoline pipeline in Kenya’s capital exploded, turning part of a slum into an inferno in which scores of people were killed and more than 100 hurt, Sept. 12, 2001. (Ben Curtis/Associated Press)
Thai motorists travel through a flooded street during a heavy monsoon downpour in Bangkok. Dozens of people have died in northern Thailand over the past few weeks in floods that have also affected over a million people, Sept. 3, 2011. (Christophe Archambault/AFP/Getty Images)
A mother comforts her son in Concord, Alabama, near his house which was completely destroyed by a tornado in April. (AP / Jeff Roberts)
Partially-submerged vehicles sit stranded in floodwaters at a roundabout in the Thai ancient capital city of Ayutthaya, north of Bangkok, Oct. 16, 2011. Flood defenses protecting the Thai capital held up on Oct. 16, but the advancing waters that have swamped the inland still threaten to engulf Bangkok in a disaster that has claimed 300 lives. Thailand’s worst floods in decades have inundated huge swathes of the kingdom, swallowing homes and businesses, shutting down industry, and forcing tens of thousands of people to seek refuge in shelters. (Christophe Archambault/AFP/Getty Images)
Somali refugees who recently crossed the border from Somalia into southern Ethiopia cluster between two food tents as they wait to be called to collect food aid at the Kobe refugee camp on July 19. Ethiopian authorities and non-governmental organizations have accommodated almost 25,000 refugees at the camp since it was set up less then three weeks ago. Thousands of Somalis have fled in recent months to neighboring Ethiopia and Kenya in search of food and water, with many dying along the way, as the region suffers what the UN has described as the worst drought in decades. (Roberto Schmidt/AFP/Getty Images)
A Thai boy holds aloft banknotes while he swims in the floodwaters in Nonthaburi province, suburban Bangkok, Oct. 15, 2011. Thailand fought to hold back floodwaters flowing toward Bangkok as a spring tide hindered efforts to protect the city of 12 million people from the kingdom’s worst inundation in decades. (Parnchai Kittiwongsakul/AFP/Getty Images)
After a tornado struck, Faye Hyde sits on a mattress in what was her yard as she comforts her granddaughter Sierra Goldsmith, 2, in Conord Ala. (Jeff Roberts/The Birmingham News/AP)
A butterfly hovers over a flower as smoke rises around the Lee Valley Recreational area in the Apache National Forest during back burn operations as the Wallow Fire continues to burn June 12 in Big Lake, Az. The wild fire crossed the border into New Mexico, destroying over twenty structures, the majority in the resort town of Greer, and threatened thousands more. (Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images)
Cars stand submerged in overflow water from the Wolf River on McMiller Road in Memphis, Tenn. May 10, 2011. After weeks of rising to historic levels the Mississippi River reached a crest just shy of the forecast 48 feet at the Memphis gauge. “It’s going to meander around that level for the next 24 to 36 hours,” meteorologist Bill Borghoff said. “We’re going to pretty much hold onto the crest for a while.” (Mike Brown/Associated Press/The Commercial Appeal)
On July 5th a historic dust storm, or haboob, approaches downtown Phoenix, AZ. The wall of dust, which was estimated to be 70 miles long and over a mile high, moved at speeds of 35mph and had gusts up to 60mph. (Mike Olbinski Photography)
Many, many more photos at this link: http://thinkprogress.org/green/2011/12/31/388180/poisoned-weather-year-2011-in-photos/
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