{"id":413479,"date":"2025-11-16T15:53:40","date_gmt":"2025-11-16T14:53:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=413479"},"modified":"2025-12-27T23:04:03","modified_gmt":"2025-12-27T22:04:03","slug":"no-the-independent-weather-disasters-do-not-threaten-survival-in-the-u-k","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=413479","title":{"rendered":"No, The Independent, Weather Disasters Do Not Threaten Survival in the U.K."},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"A<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From ClimateRealism<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Anthony Watts<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Screenshot<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In The Independent\u2019s<\/em> article, \u201cIs your kitchen at risk from climate change? It\u2019s closer to home than you think,\u201d<\/a> author David Simon warns that the climate crisis has moved from \u201cour children\u2019s future\u201d into our homes. Data show these claims are false. Weather hasn\u2019t turned unusually severe nor is the U.K.\u2019s continued survival threatened by flooding or sea level rise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simon claims that extreme weather is now threatening the \u201cfoundations on which we\u2019ve built our lives,\u201d pointing to recent floods, hurricanes, and NASA projections that supposedly show London and other urban areas will soon be under water, writing, \u201c[i]ncreasing numbers of homes here and worldwide are being damaged or destroyed by flooding and other disasters.\u201d He specifically references Hurricanes Katrina (2005) and Sandy (2012).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe frequency of such flooding is increasing,\u201d Simon asserts, concluding that ignoring or denying the \u201charsh realities of climate change . . . [is] short-sighted and delusional.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simon\u2019s commentary is long on rhetoric and unverified assertions, but short on facts. As\u00a0Climate at a Glance: Hurricanes<\/a><\/em>\u00a0explains, long-term data on hurricanes show that there has been no increase in hurricanes as the planet has modestly warmed. In fact, data show hurricane numbers have trended slightly downward since 1971. Also, the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change\u2019s (IPCC\u00a0\u00a0Sixth Assessment Report<\/strong><\/a>\u2014an organization Simon once contributed to\u2014states plainly that there is\u00a0\u201clow confidence in any long-term trends in hurricane activity\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0no detectable increase in global tropical cyclone frequency or landfall intensity<\/strong>. What\u2019s true of hurricanes is equally true of flooding, the IPCC has discovered no worsening trend. See the IPCC table 12.12 below:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
Table 12.12 from\u00a0Page 90\u00a0\u2013 Chapter 12 of the UN IPCC Sixth Assessment Report. Emergence of\u00a0Climate Impact Drivers\u00a0(CIDs) in time periods, as assessed in this section.\u00a0The color corresponds to the confidence of the region with the highest confidence: white colors indicate where evidence of a climate change signal is lacking or the signal is not present, leading to overall low confidence of an emerging signal.\u00a0Highlight and arrow added by A. Watts.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Attributing individual weather disasters to climate change is illegitimate. Floods and hurricanes are weather<\/strong>, not climate<\/a>. They are temporary events shaped by local and regional atmospheric conditions, not global temperature averages. A flood in New York or a hurricane in the Caribbean does not prove a global trend\u2014it\u2019s a single data point in a noisy system. Only a long-term trend in flood or hurricane frequency or severity might suggest that climate change is making these types of events more common or more intense, but no such long-term trends exist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When Simon cites the \u201cunprecedentedly wet\u201d period from 2022 to 2024 in the UK, he omits historical context. Britain\u2019s Met Office records show comparable or worse flooding events going back centuries, including the devastating Thames 1947 flood<\/a>. The event, considered one of the worst floods of the twentieth century, inundated thousands of acres of farmland, displaced tens of thousands of people, crippled business and industry, and caused major damage. Simon also missed the 1953 North Sea inundation<\/a> \u201cthat struck low-lying coastal areas of the Netherlands, Belgium, and the United Kingdom. More than 2,000 people were killed on land and hundreds more at sea. It was the worst natural disaster of the 20th century in the United Kingdom and the worst in the Netherlands since the Middle Ages.\u201d And these terrible natural disasters occurred when carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere were much lower.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The idea that today\u2019s storms are unique, worse, and driven by climate change is ridiculous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Simon\u2019s article also relies on speculative modeling rather than data. His warning that \u201cNASA projections show vast swathes of [London] at severe risk of flooding by 2030\u201d is based on computer-generated scenarios<\/strong>, not on actual measured trends. According to sea-level monitoring, the current rate of rise near London\u2019s Thames Estuary at Sheerness<\/a> is modest\u2014around 1.5 millimeters per year<\/a>\u2014comparable to natural post-glacial rebound rates. London sits, on average, about 25 meters above sea level. At the Thames, the river bank varies from 1.5 meters above sea level at its lowest point to 21.6 meters at the highest level. As a result, at current rates of rise, it would take 1,000 to about 47,333 years for London to flood at the Thames shore depending upon the location. Thus, contrary to Simon\u2019s alarmist claim, there is no sign of a \u201cclimate emergency\u201d in the tide gauge record.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The broader scientific evidence aligns with Climate Realism\u2019s<\/em><\/a> repeated findings: floods, droughts, and storms show no consistent global increase. Localized urban flooding is often a function of poor drainage design, aging infrastructure, or land-use changes\u2014not rising CO\u2082 levels. Moreover, IPCC acknowledges that climate change is as likely to have reduced flooding as it is to have made flooding events more common.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Which brings us back to the absurd headline question: \u201cIs your kitchen at risk from climate change?\u201d<\/em> No, it isn\u2019t. Your kitchen may be threatened by local planning mistakes, overdevelopment, and infrastructure failures, but it is not at risk from climate change. Climate change did not pour concrete over natural floodplains or build cities below sea level, humans did.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By conflating everyday weather with global climate, Simon and The Independent<\/em> mislead readers into believing the ordinary is catastrophic. As Climate at a Glance: Extreme Weather<\/a><\/em> points out, the media\u2019s fixation on fear has no statistical foundation. The long-term record shows no significant global trend in extreme weather events. If there is any real risk highlighted by this story, it is of a possible erosion of public trust in media that chooses once again to promote false alarms over accurate reporting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In The Independent\u2019s article, \u201cIs your kitchen at risk from climate change? It\u2019s closer to home than you think,\u201d author David Simon warns that the climate crisis has moved from \u201cour children\u2019s future\u201d into our homes. Data show these claims are false. Weather hasn\u2019t turned unusually severe nor is the U.K.\u2019s continued survival threatened by flooding or sea level rise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":413485,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","advanced_seo_description":"Discover why claims of climate change threatening U.K. homes are misleading. Explore data debunking myths of increasing extreme weather events.","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9jbGltYXRlLXNjaWVuY2UucHJlc3NcL3dwLWNvbnRlbnRcL3VwbG9hZHNcLzIwMjVcLzExXC9BUU5tSHUyNVUtUHl4QUh5aTFkcUxOYmxDSUFZWU5FeklFbEMxWHhmLW5PN1ljY0RCM1dxUmREeFlobEtwY01VSTZPVmFTVzdRNHRDNzRyMG1jOUVxbTRTY0JRUnJqeWhsOUR0Z0lTX3NqRVkxSmx3WVQ3bmNPRnNkRXZWYnlyMi5qcGVnP2ZpdD03MjMlMkM0MTAmc3NsPTEiLCJ0eHQiOiJObywgVGhlIEluZGVwZW5kZW50LCBXZWF0aGVyIERpc2FzdGVycyBEbyBOb3QgVGhyZWF0ZW4gU3Vydml2YWwgaW4gdGhlIFUuSy4iLCJ0ZW1wbGF0ZSI6ImhpZ2h3YXkiLCJmb250IjoiIiwiYmxvZ19pZCI6MTU1ODEyNDQ5fQ.BbKFilfFBPdr0g4il70iaIKFbnXUze_515ogslEW_AQMQ"},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[691818056,691819743,691839683,691839681,691821514,691822331,691823396,691833027,691818513],"class_list":["post-413479","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-climate-change","tag-climate-propaganda","tag-computer-generated-scenarios","tag-david-simon","tag-ipcc-sixth-assessment-report","tag-the-independent","tag-u-n-intergovernmental-panel-on-climate-change-ipcc","tag-weather-and-climate","tag-weather-disasters","fallback-thumbnail"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/AQNmHu25U-PyxAHyi1dqLNblCIAYYNEzIElC1Xxf-nO7YccDB3WqRdDxYhlKpcMUI6OVaSW7Q4tC74r0mc9Eqm4ScBQRrjyhl9DtgIS_sjEY1JlwYT7ncOFsdEvVbyr2.jpeg?fit=1799%2C1019&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1Jz1","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":417308,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=417308","url_meta":{"origin":413479,"position":0},"title":"Climate Fact-Check November 2025","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"12\/14\/2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Climate change NOT making hurricanes or wildfires worse \u2013 Calif. Wildfires caused by arson Atlantic Ocean\u2019s \u201cconveyor belt\u201d is NOT on the verge of collapse \u2013 Fossil fuels saving lives.","rel":"","context":"In \"Atlantic Meridian Overturning Circulation (AMOC)\"","block_context":{"text":"Atlantic Meridian Overturning Circulation (AMOC)","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=atlantic-meridian-overturning-circulation-amoc"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/0November-2025-summary.png?fit=1200%2C672&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/0November-2025-summary.png?fit=1200%2C672&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/0November-2025-summary.png?fit=1200%2C672&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/0November-2025-summary.png?fit=1200%2C672&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/0November-2025-summary.png?fit=1200%2C672&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":354504,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=354504","url_meta":{"origin":413479,"position":1},"title":"IPCC U-Turn as it Prepares to Start Blaming Humans for Bad Weather","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"12\/15\/2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Fears are growing that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) could water down or even ditch its current finding that almost all types of extreme weather events have little or no sign of past human involvement, or any going forward to 2100.","rel":"","context":"In \"Attribution studies\"","block_context":{"text":"Attribution studies","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=attribution-studies"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/0Screenshot-2024-12-13-182901.jpeg?fit=1200%2C648&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/0Screenshot-2024-12-13-182901.jpeg?fit=1200%2C648&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/0Screenshot-2024-12-13-182901.jpeg?fit=1200%2C648&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/0Screenshot-2024-12-13-182901.jpeg?fit=1200%2C648&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/0Screenshot-2024-12-13-182901.jpeg?fit=1200%2C648&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":263409,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=263409","url_meta":{"origin":413479,"position":2},"title":"Climate Crisis Shock: No Change in Average U.K. Temperatures for More Than Two Decades","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"06\/22\/2023","format":false,"excerpt":"It was a tad on the warm side last year in the United Kingdom. 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In other words, global agricultural production was not \u201creduced\u201d by disasters.","rel":"","context":"In \"climate disasters\"","block_context":{"text":"climate disasters","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=climate-disasters"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/0climate-crisis-0117201.jpg?fit=1200%2C810&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/0climate-crisis-0117201.jpg?fit=1200%2C810&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/0climate-crisis-0117201.jpg?fit=1200%2C810&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/0climate-crisis-0117201.jpg?fit=1200%2C810&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/0climate-crisis-0117201.jpg?fit=1200%2C810&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":358536,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=358536","url_meta":{"origin":413479,"position":5},"title":"No, Associated Press, Extreme Weather Events in a Single Year Are Not Climate Change","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"12\/24\/2024","format":false,"excerpt":"A recent article in the\u00a0Seattle Times, titled \u201cFrom water destruction to deadly heat: Associated Press photographers capture climate change in 2024,\u201d presents a series of photographs depicting various natural disasters and extreme weather events from 2024, attributing these occurrences to climate change. While the Associated Press (AP) imagery is compelling,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Associated Press (AP)\"","block_context":{"text":"Associated Press (AP)","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?tag=associated-press-ap"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/0Extreme-weather-scaled-1.jpg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/0Extreme-weather-scaled-1.jpg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/0Extreme-weather-scaled-1.jpg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/0Extreme-weather-scaled-1.jpg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/0Extreme-weather-scaled-1.jpg?fit=1200%2C800&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/413479","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/121246920"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=413479"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/413479\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":418903,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/413479\/revisions\/418903"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/413485"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=413479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=413479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=413479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}