February 7, 2025 • 50 mins
On this episode of The Middle we're asking you if you're prepared for the next natural disaster - whatever that may be. Jeremy is joined by CNN Chief Climate Correspondent Bill Weir and Kim Cobb, Director of the Institute at Brown for Environment and Society. The Middle's house DJ Tolliver joins as well, plus callers from around the country. #fire #disaster #earthquake #tornado #flooding #palisadefire #lafires #fema
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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Speaker 2 (00:56):
Time.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
Welcome to the Middle. I'm Jeremy Hobson along with our
house DJ Tolliver and Tolliver. We could do a show
this hour about Elon Musk. We could do a show
about Gaza. We can do a show about tariffs. There
is just so much going on right now.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Jamie, listen, my birthday is this month and all I
want is the gift of boredom. Please no more news, man,
I can't.
Speaker 4 (01:20):
Do it well.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
I will say, actually that we are going to do
or have done, shows on the topics I just mentioned.
But this week we're going to about to talk about
something that didn't start on January twentieth and will not
end when President Trump's term ends. That is the threat
of natural disasters hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, droughts, and of course, wildfires.
The recent fires in southern California cost at least twenty
(01:42):
nine people their lives and damage totals are estimated north
of two hundred and fifty billion dollars. The fires started
and spread in an instant because of extremely dry conditions
and winds nearing one hundred miles per hour. Here's NBCLA
reporter Robert Kavassek who found man fleeing his home in
the Palisades fire. That man was hopping on his bike
(02:05):
with two paintings in hand.
Speaker 5 (02:07):
This is like a hurricane in the middle of a
brush fire.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
You've got people right there is.
Speaker 6 (02:14):
That a homeowner that's trying to leave.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
Is this your house?
Speaker 7 (02:20):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Which is your house?
Speaker 7 (02:22):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (02:22):
This is our house. Backyard's on fire.
Speaker 8 (02:24):
I'm out of here.
Speaker 4 (02:25):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
So what happened?
Speaker 9 (02:27):
Is there anything we can do to help you?
Speaker 5 (02:28):
Sure you can take these paintings. I guess I can't
ride with these.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
Listen, I'll take them for you.
Speaker 5 (02:33):
I work at NBC.
Speaker 6 (02:35):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
I'll make sure you get them. Just unbelievable. And on
that night, the winds were so powerful that firefighters couldn't fly,
they couldn't drop water from the air. As you know,
many people have criticized the firefighting infrastructure, reservoirs, fire hydrant pressure,
available trucks, But as La County Fire Chief Anthony Maroney
explained to sixty Minutes, fire trucks and hydrants are no
(02:58):
match for a firestorm like what occurt.
Speaker 4 (03:01):
There's not enough fire engines for this.
Speaker 10 (03:03):
We think we've lost eight thousand structures, so times three
fire engines each, that requires twenty six thousand fire engines.
I don't think the state of California has twenty six
thousand fire engines.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
So, whether you live in a place that is threatened
by wildfires or hurricanes or tornadoes, or droughts or flooding, which,
by the way, is almost everywhere in the US. About
ninety four percent of Americans live in a county that
has gotten FEMA help for disasters since twenty eleven. We
want to hear from you. We want to know if
you feel you're prepared for a natural disaster or if
you think we are as a country. Tolliver, how can
(03:39):
people reach us?
Speaker 3 (03:40):
You can call us at eight four four for a
middle that's eight four four four six four three three
five three, or you can write in at Listen to
the Middle dot com. And you can also comment on
our new live stream on YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitch.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Let's meet our panel. CNN Chief Climate Correspondent Bill Weir
is with us.
Speaker 7 (03:57):
Bill, great to have you on the show. Jeremy Tolliver,
how are you guys going to be with you?
Speaker 1 (04:03):
Doing great? And Kim Cobb, director of the Institute at
Brown for Environment and Society, is with us as well. Kim,
welcome to you.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Oh, thanks so much for having me.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
So before we get to the phoes, let's talk about
some of the things that have come up because of
the wildfires Bill where you reported on them. There has
been criticism, as there is after every natural disaster, about
the preparation and response. But this was like a hurricane
of fire because of the wind. What more could have
been done to prepare.
Speaker 7 (04:32):
They are wrestling with that question right now, Jeremy. But
I think it's really it starts with imagination. I think
we lack the capacity to imagine an urban wildfire in
Santa Ana wind season typically that those things don't overlap.
Last year, there was too much water in Los Angeles,
So we're living now on an overheating planet through these
(04:52):
periods of weather whiplash where it's too much or not enough.
And there was a reservoir near the Palisades that was
closed for maintenance.
Speaker 4 (05:00):
There was a cover that had ripped.
Speaker 7 (05:02):
And just the fortuitous timing or unfortuitous timing of that
is being investigated as well. But even if that was full,
experts tell me it would have maybe saved a few
houses around the edges, because once the Palisades and once
the homes of from Sierra Madre almost to Pasadena became
the fuel and you can't fly, there's nothing you know,
(05:26):
ground crews can do. Humans have never stopped the Santa
Anna wildfire. You just have to wait for the winds
to change and for the weather to break. And so
whether it's Leahina or Paradise, California a couple of years ago,
or this one now, which to me was sort of
the combination of both of those and then scaled up,
it starts with realizing that these are not our father's fires,
(05:50):
These are not our grandfather's fires anymore.
Speaker 4 (05:52):
And the infrastructure.
Speaker 7 (05:53):
We've built, the way we built cities, the way we
build fire hydrant systems, has to adapt right now. Well,
you don't have anyhing about right now Altadena is looking
about half of Alta Dina needs to be put in
a landfill like half of a city, right and so
if landfills can't handle the damage of these, we certainly
(06:14):
the fire hydrants can't.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
You don't have another city in this country that you
have this kind of density right next to just wilderness,
you know, hills that are covered in trees and brushed
and everything else. Kim Cobb. President Trump has blamed water management.
He even claimed falsely that there's some sort of valve
to turn the water to southern California on that was
(06:37):
turned off and to prove his point, he told the
Army Corps of Engineers to release billions of gallons of
water into the farms of central California that was being
saved up for the dry season. But from your perspective,
what is the right lesson to learn about water management
forest management from these fires?
Speaker 2 (06:55):
Yeah, I mean California has been a place that has
been under acute drought pressure decades and that has resulted
in a very close coordination of water resources. Accordingly so
managed by city, but largely state and federal entities who
have to make very carefully calibraty decision about how that
very precious resource is used. And so, of course we
(07:18):
have heard that there is no pipe linking the water
release that Trump let go from those very precious reservoirs
which are designed for emergency use by farmers in the
dry summer months. There's no way that connects to LA
There's simply no connection point. And so this was a
massive waste of billions of dollars of water that may
(07:39):
be sorely needed, and we'll have damaging effects later on
this year. Of course, we can look at the design,
as Bill was talking about, of our critical infrastructure that's
not designed to respond to our present climate state, let
alone of the climate states that we know are coming
down the pike under continued warming for at least the
(07:59):
next decades. Let's hope we can turn it around before
then by reducing fossil fuel emissions. But we are woefully
prepared for our climate of now. And that's not just
for water resources and emergency firefighting efforts in LA. That
is also for coastal cities around the country. We saw Ashville,
of course, revisiting some of co decisions and zoning decisions.
(08:22):
This is an A to Z type of opportunity for
us to think critically about what does planning look like
for short and long term and how do we attack
emergency planning in response to respond to this climate emergency.
Speaker 1 (08:36):
And we're on in Nashville, so I wonder if we're
going to hear from somebody who went through a hurricane
Aleen Bill weird. The other thing that's come up from
Washington is that FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which
has been around since the late nineteen seventies, should be
done away with. Do people think, and you've been reporting
on many of these disasters, do people that you've spoken
with think that FEMA is not doing a good job.
Speaker 7 (08:59):
Well, it depends on the disaster, depends on the timing.
There's sort of this natural five stages of grief people
go through after the whole life has been upended, and
one of those stages is anger, and a lot of
times it's anger at officials, it's the response. There's plenty
of people to be angry at in these but for
(09:20):
the most part, I see them bringing critical services at
times when they're most needed. And it all comes down
to the commanders. It comes down to the boots on
the ground, how they do it. I saw really wasteful
efforts after Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico where a runway
full of bottle waters was left or rot in the
sun because they had no way to distribute it there.
(09:42):
But then I've seen other places disasters or FEMA is
right there and people are really.
Speaker 4 (09:47):
Grateful to have them.
Speaker 7 (09:49):
The idea that states can handle these on their own
is that's the one that's going to sort of catch
a lot of political headwind because as you were talking
of two hundred and fifty billion dollars for one set
of wildfires, I mean, these are and when you get
into states. You know, in the Gulf States, they can't
afford these. Mexico City, Florida, which got hit by Hurricane
(10:11):
Michael I was walking around with the mayor. He said
the cleanup would be ten times his annual budget for
this little beachside town. So everybody's got to kick into
these in a way that spreads the risk.
Speaker 4 (10:24):
And the pain.
Speaker 7 (10:25):
But FEMA is not the cavalry, and so and even
I've been hearing this from many FEMA administrators that the
idea that they're going to come riding over the hill
and make you hole again is not accurate. They'll they'll
get you a head start, but the more prepared, you know,
the communities that have the most trust in each other
and the science are the ones that come out the
most unscathed on the other side, and FEMA is a
(10:48):
bonus to them in those cases.
Speaker 4 (10:49):
Will instant follow that start interrupt Jeremy.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
So if FEMA is done away with, what does like
disastro responds look like after that? They're the only, you know,
government agency I know that deals with that kind of thing.
Speaker 4 (11:01):
That's it.
Speaker 7 (11:01):
It would be state by state, I suppose, you know,
I don't.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
There's Trump has talked about just sort of reimbursing the
states but letting them handle everything.
Speaker 4 (11:10):
Letting them handle it.
Speaker 7 (11:11):
Sure, but when after a hurricane, I will I will
stand on you know, in the Florida, Keys or somewhere
with this and just watch the line trucks from from
fifty states come rolling pie watch the first responders, the
fire trucks, the heavy equipment from all over the country.
It really is an all hands on deck situation nationally.
(11:33):
And there's you know, mutual aid systems around the country.
Maybe those could be propped up with federal funding. I
don't know, but but it feels like in the middle
of you know, we're being bombarded by these disasters at
every front. The idea of gutting FEMA in the middle
of this instead of maybe reforming it and trying to
prop it up seems counterintuitive.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
You know, the three states that have gotten the most
money because of disasters are Louisiana, Florida, and Texas. All
of course in Hurricane Alley, I guess we would call
it Tolliver. This week in New Orleans is hosting the
Super Bowl, but it was twenty years ago this summer
that Hurricane Katrina devastated.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
The city Yeah, still the most expensive hurricane in US history.
Here's President George W. Bush addressed in the nation from
New Orleans after the storm.
Speaker 6 (12:23):
In the life of this nation, we have often been
reminded that nature is an awesome force, and that all
life is fragile. Were the heirs of men and women
who lived through those first terrible winters at Jamestown in Plymouth,
who rebuilt Chicago after a great fire, and San Francisco
after a great earthquake, who reclaimed the prairie from the
dust bowl of the nineteen thirties. Every time the people
(12:47):
of this land have come back from fire, flood, and
storm to build anew.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
I had forgotten about the winters at Jamestown, Tolliver. Yeah,
we'll be right back with more of your calls on
the Middle. This is the Middle. I'm Jeremy Hobson. If
you're just tuning, in the Middle is a national call
in show. We're focused on elevating voices from the middle geographically, politically,
and philosophically, or maybe you just want to meet in
(13:13):
the middle. This hour, we're asking you are you prepared
for the next natural disaster? And are we as a country?
And by the way, if you've been through a natural disaster.
Have you come back from it? Telliver what's the number
to call in?
Speaker 3 (13:25):
It's eight four four for Middle that's eight four four
four sixty four three three five three. You can also
write to us to listen to the Middle dot Com,
or you gain us on social media.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
I'm joined by Kim Cobb, director of the Institute at
Brown for Environment in Society, and CNN Chief Climate correspondent
Bill Weir. And the phones are lighting up. Let's go
to Scotty, who's in Augusta, Georgia. Scotty, Welcome to the Middle.
Speaker 9 (13:45):
Go ahead, Hello the rolling Pete Matab, Central Georgia.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
So have you been through a natural disaster? Do you
feel prepared?
Speaker 9 (13:56):
Pellene survivor Yes, I was somewhat prepared thanks to getting
back into camping, but nowhere near as prepared as I
needed to be and will not be caught in that
position again.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
What do you mean? How are you not prepared and
how are you prepared?
Speaker 8 (14:10):
Now?
Speaker 9 (14:12):
Living two hundred and fifty miles inland and facing a
storm that was twice the size of Trina and a
category higher stronger than it was when it made landfall,
we were just no one was. It was unprecedented events
in caps, cataclysmic throughout in southeast, not just where I'm that.
Speaker 1 (14:31):
And now, what have you done to get yourself better prepared?
Speaker 9 (14:37):
Portable power, food and water stores, you know, just communication,
plans of action, Everything different one eighty turns from what
it had been because we just never expected we would
ever have to be dealing with that two agencies. I've
never figured I'd interact with FEMA and Red Cross I
used to work for. Now, I can't say that I've
interacted with both of them. I never thought I'd be
(14:58):
doing that because of a natural disaster here.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
And do you feel good about your interaction with them?
Speaker 9 (15:05):
Mostly do that. I think they got a bad rap
on it. I think they do an, especially in our case,
humongous job and did the best they can. I was
always treated well, even though you might have hours and
hours wait. You know, they were very helpful and did
the most that they could to help you understand the
process and get through it.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
Scotty, thanks for that call, Kim Cobb. One of the
things Scotty brings up there has been reported on recently,
which is the fact that these hurricanes are hitting inland,
that some of the worst problems that come from them
is not happening because of the storm surge. It's happening
further inland with flooding.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
Well, that's right, and I have to give a shout
out to Georgian somebody who lived in Atlanta recently for
eighteen years and had to live through some of those
hurricanes that made it way too far inland and caused
such destruction. And I think you're really alluding to the
fact that these are unthinkable coincidences that we're seeing with
(16:05):
fronts converging and extreme rainfall happening in places due to
these storms going much further, much wetter than they ever
have before, and it's challenging our imagination. We have no
lived experience with this kind of climate extreme that's again
fueled by fossil fuels. Science tells us that these links
are very strong, and so I really want to call
(16:26):
out what the color was talking about in terms of
individual preparedness, and we also have to recognize the role
for science and keeping people safe from these events. We
have to rely on the National Weather Service. We take
it for granted. We should not in this era. It
is under attack as it sits under the National Oceanic
and Atmospheric Administration, but paying attention to the science and
(16:48):
listening to how extremes are being fueled by climate change
and the science of those physical links is a critically
important part of challenging your imagination across the southeast, ross
the drought and wildfire stricken Western United States, and even
up into New England where we saw catastrophic flooding in
recent years, for example across Vermont and last year here
(17:10):
in Rhode Island of all places.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Well, and just to push on what you just said
about the fact that it's under attack, you're worried about
what Elon Musk and his people are doing in terms
of going after the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and
what that may mean for our science and weather and
climate situations.
Speaker 2 (17:30):
Yeah, we already know, for example, that this administration is
openly hostile to climate science and climate scientists. They would
disregard the threat of global warming and diminish it, and
with a drill baby, drill agenda, charge forward in a
world where they can pretend to deny the science of
(17:50):
climate change. And it doesn't care who's in the White House,
It's going to march forward. It represents a clear and
present danger to every single American to our health and
well being, in safety, to our economy, into our national security.
And so I think we need to recognize that these
incredible federal servants who have been saving so many lives
(18:12):
across these suite of horrific extremes we've all writtenessed in
recent years, and they deserve a prominent shout out and
they deserve the credit that we all take. So for granted, let's.
Speaker 1 (18:23):
Go to John, who's in Kansas City. John, welcome to
the middle Are you prepared for the next natural disaster?
Speaker 11 (18:31):
I am now, but I definitely wasn't five years ago
when I was hit by e F three tornado in
the middle of the night in Nashville. What happened and well,
I had about five minutes to get the kids to
the hallway before it literally was on top of us,
and I was laying on top of my seven year
(18:51):
old daughter as it tried to suck us out of
the house. And luckily there wasn't a scratch on us,
but all the walls were gone, roof was gone, and
it was just it was like a movie scene and
just something you never thought you would go through. And
I wasn't ready, and so now you know I've made
steps to be ready this time.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
Well, just tell me quickly, what kind of steps have
you made to be ready this time?
Speaker 11 (19:16):
So when I went to bed that night, I didn't
even look at the weather. I didn't pay attention to
the weather or anything like that. So now before I
go to bed, I pay attention to the weather. I
have an app on my phone that would wake me up,
because you get that little notification from the Weather Service
saying there's a tornado, but it's it's not very loud,
and it won't necessarily wake you up unless you get one.
Speaker 4 (19:37):
Of those apps.
Speaker 11 (19:38):
So I'd get one of those apps. And I'm just
a lot more like knowledgeable about what tornadoes are and
when they may occur, so I can get my family
to safety sooner. And now we have a basement. That's
good too.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
Yeah, always good to have a basement in a tornado situation. John,
thank you very much. Bill, we are We've now just
heard from two people who do not live a long
the coasts and have been dealing with real disasters. Nobody
would say to them, well, you shouldn't build your house
there again, because the tornado might head at a second time,
or you know, the flooding might come one hundred miles inland.
Speaker 7 (20:12):
That's interesting. You hear that a lot about managed retreat
on the coast. Why are we paying to rebuild these
you know beach towns. Well, it's everywhere now, you know,
it's in the heartland. The science on tornadoes around climate
change is the spottiest because they don't spend a lot
of time on the ground the way hurricanes you can
study them for a long time. But it seems like
the tornado alley is shifting from the Great Plains.
Speaker 4 (20:34):
Sort of towards the southeast.
Speaker 7 (20:35):
There so people in regions that we would never thought
about that before. It's just something to loom from the
wisdom of those folks who have been through it before.
And you know, I did a story recently on where
are the climate havens? I actually wrote a book to
my son about how to live on this planet we
broke by accident.
Speaker 4 (20:54):
For him, it starts like where do you live? What
are the places?
Speaker 7 (20:57):
And there's science that's you know, scientists who said forty
seventh parallel like the north the line that goes like
through Buffalo and Duluth and across to.
Speaker 4 (21:06):
The course West, the sweet.
Speaker 7 (21:08):
Spot up there, and there's plenty of middle fresh water
and the Great Lakes and all of that. But then
there's but that is, that's no guarantee of what could
happen in any of these places. And so it's it's
it's the boy scout motto, you know, be prepared wherever.
Speaker 3 (21:24):
I had a quick question for you, Jeremy. I'm sorry
I keep jumping because I want to get to zecles,
but I wanted to ask you. So we're talking about
Hurricane Alley, what are some things like infrastructurally that the
government can do to prepare people for hurricanes. I know,
like a lot of these things already happening, but I
just don't know personally, so I would like to know.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
Yeah, So I think when we think about the landscape
for preparedness, we have to think about the many different
layers that have to go into that. So, you know,
first you're talking about zoning. You know, where are we building,
how are we leveraging this science of what we know
about extremes and the fact that they're getting work into
that infrastructure planning. Again, we can talk about the water
(22:03):
resources and out west, or we could talk about floodplaine
regions in the southeastern United States. So that goes to zoning.
Then you go to code, which is often set you know,
could be set by state or local officials. What standards
are we building too? We see, we see some incredible
striking examples. We all saw about Hurricane Michael ripping through
(22:25):
the Panhandle of Florida. Some houses left perfectly intact because
they were built to a beyond code in recognition of
that particular owner being concerned about wind thrust and storm
search survived, So that goes to code, and then we
can go to insurance.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
My goodness, how much does that?
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Yeah? Yeah, forest store emerging from the palisades of course
in Altadena, people left under insured by the shifting landscape
under their own feet. And so, mark my words, we're
going to see more of these kinds of storre worries.
It's going to be a fever pitch. It already is
in some of these devastated communities. People are going to
be pushed out of generational homes. This is still going
(23:09):
to be recalibrating for quite some time. There's a federal
rolehill to play, of course, there's also state and local
roles here. To play to keep community safe and keep
people house.
Speaker 7 (23:18):
Frankly, one of my favorite stories if I could JOm
ahead and Jeremy, I'm sorry. The one of my favorite
stories of somebody turning anxiety into action. Because Kim brought
up Hurricane Michael. Was a woman named Annette Rubin who
was an NFL wife. She met her husband, who played
for the Seahawks and Seattle had never been through a hurricane,
was a new mom. When Michael came, it shook her
(23:38):
up so much that the next day she says, I
can't do this six months a year.
Speaker 4 (23:43):
What are you guys crazy? You guys went to bed,
what is the you know?
Speaker 7 (23:47):
She was googling what is the building code hurricane strength
that my house can take and she realized it was
not up to code even though she was in this
brand new house. So with no experience in construction, she
went down a rabbit hole looking for what houses survived
and what were they made of. And she ended up
starting a company that she imported this technology from Italy
that uses sprayable stone basically the kind of you know,
(24:09):
gunite that you would use to make a swimming pool.
You put it on these insulated panels, and the thing
is it can stand two hundred and fifty mile on
hour winds. It's bomb proof, it's earthquake proof. And she's
trying to spread the gospel of preparedness in you know,
the Gulf Coast of Florida, where people don't think about this,
don't think about shelter in these ways.
Speaker 4 (24:30):
But insurance is sure thinking about it this way.
Speaker 7 (24:32):
So market forces are going to force these sorts of ideas.
Speaker 4 (24:36):
The houses I saw in the Palisades that.
Speaker 7 (24:39):
In the middle of a burned out block look like
they're right out of architectural Digest because they're designed in
the fireroom specific, right, And it's so striking when you
see that. And one of the more people see that, boy,
that architect's phone is ringing off the hook.
Speaker 4 (24:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:52):
Although I will say one of the things I've been
reading is that if you outfed a house to be
kind of fireproof, it might actually be the opposite of
what you want to deal with earthquakes in the exact
same location. Just that's what is good for earthquakes and
bad for fires.
Speaker 4 (25:07):
And let's go to exactly.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
Let's get to a call. Aaron is in Longmont, Colorado,
Aeron Welcome to the middle go ahead.
Speaker 8 (25:16):
Yeah. Yeah. So I'm a disaster volunteer also the author
of How to Prepare For Everything, and I'm definitely not prepared,
mainly because you disasters are by their nature overwhelming. It
wasn't overwhelming, We'd call it an inconvenience, not a disaster.
One of the frustrations that I experience is the politicians
(25:37):
over promising what FEMA can do. FEMA is designed by
public policy to write checks that are too small to
too few people, too late, and they do a pretty
good job of that and not even being tried. I mean,
like really truly, it's arguably bad public policy to make
the federal government be insure of all things. But from
a humanitarian standpoint, that kind of stinks.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
So what would be your one piece of advice erin
to people listening to this about how they can be
more prepared as an emergency volunteer yourself.
Speaker 8 (26:10):
So, number one, stop preparing for disasters. There are an
endless number of disasters, and when we focus on disasters,
it creates fear. We can't control the bad things that happen.
If we could, we make sure bad things didn't happen. Instead,
we can prepare for the disruptions they caused. Prepare for
the power outage. It doesn't matter what caused it, just
prepare for the disruptions. And the second is prepare together.
(26:33):
Having a strong social connections. Strong social connections is a
better indicator of both short term survivability and long term
resilience in any other single factor, including working infrastructure of a
seventy two hour.
Speaker 1 (26:45):
Kit erin Thank you, Kim Cobb. What do you think
about that?
Speaker 2 (26:50):
I think that's very wise, so you know, you can
think about what does it take to have a successful plan.
We heard one of the callers talk about the importance
of communication network that are established ahead of time, thinking
about how you're going to manage charging devices that may
be critical to hearing the latest information, to helping people
in your community that need your assistance. So that is
(27:13):
that kind of thing. Is that social network really rings
true from what we've heard of regards to the callers
here already. So I think that's a very important take
home for folks here.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
You know, one thing I read that I think is
a great piece of advice is if you have to
leave your house in a hurry, grab your laundry basket,
because you know you like those clothes you were wearing
them before the laundry cat and your cat.
Speaker 4 (27:36):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
Actually I was talking to somebody about the fires who
said she brought the dog, but the cats could survive
on their own if they had to. Then figure it
out that the dog probably wouldn't. Okay, Sally is calling
from Ashville, North Carolina. There we go, Sally. I assume
you went through Helene.
Speaker 12 (27:54):
I did.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
I did.
Speaker 12 (27:57):
Yep, we went through the whole eighteen days, no life, tricity,
two weeks, snow water. It was a big surprise, but
I was Uh. I just wanted to say, I really
agree with a previous speaker that, I mean, folks here
that that, at least that I know, have been so
(28:19):
thankful for FEMA. There were when the National Guard came
finally you know we're able to come in the power trucks.
I mean, people were crying with tears, just so thankful.
And I know that we had a pretty good experience
with FEMA. But I do agree with the person who
said that I think the expectations are too high. I
(28:41):
think FEMA has done a great job. I think it
would be a huge mistake nationally too. And FEMA and.
Speaker 8 (28:51):
Because you just.
Speaker 12 (28:51):
Don't know where these things are going to happen. And
Ashwell was a place where people came for a climate refuge,
I mean this whole area. So yeah, I just I
think that people have to have realistic expectations for FEMA.
But I know that everybody was so appreciative of all
(29:12):
the help that came, and it there's you know, there's
not a lot of money in some of the areas
and communities, and they would not have survived without all
that help.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Yeah, Sally, thank you. You know Bill where it's interesting
to hear so many people call in and talk about
FEMA because this is not the conversation that it seems
like is going on in Washington about this issue, which
could change very fast.
Speaker 4 (29:35):
Well that's the thing.
Speaker 7 (29:36):
The problem, you know, when one of our major parties
really a plank, it seems in their platform, is to
mistrust governments, you know, don't trust these agencies, that's their
deep staters or whatever the case may be. You don't
want to think about that when your roof is just
blown off or you're you know, the River Arts District
in Nashville is just washed away, and most people are
(30:00):
I have to remind myself in these days that the
book Lord of the Flies, which was required reading through
us in junior high.
Speaker 4 (30:07):
It was written by a manic.
Speaker 7 (30:09):
Depressive racist, Okay, And when a real group of kids
were took a boat out and were abandoned on a
desert island or discovered a year later, they had a
fully functioning society because we are wired to cooperate and
people want to help. In these and the outpouring, you
see the best of human nature. So some of the
(30:29):
worst come out, but that gets the headlines. But the
best of human nature is what I like to focus on.
Look for the helpers, like mister.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
Rodd, Look for the helpers, Taliver. We've been talking about
disaster preparedness, but sometimes people don't listen to the warnings.
Speaker 4 (30:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (30:42):
In the case of the tornado they ripped through Jappla,
Missouri and twenty eleven, many people ignored them. Here's a
clip from a CBS news report.
Speaker 5 (30:50):
The sirens sounded, but many people took no action.
Speaker 11 (30:54):
That is destroyed.
Speaker 5 (30:56):
It was tornado season after all, and residents were apparently
decent ties to warnings. It's among the distressing findings from
a government panel investigating the two hundred mile an hour
twister that leveled entire neighborhoods.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
Winn just took it like that and me and just
turned me about one hundred and eighty degrees and set
me down on the concrete.
Speaker 5 (31:17):
Those interviewed felt the warnings didn't pertain to them or
sought clarification for fore taking action losing precious minutes.
Speaker 4 (31:26):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (31:26):
And of course there were two times during the La
Fires when residents got an accidental evacuation alert on their fire.
Speaker 4 (31:33):
I sure did.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
Yeah, We'll be right back with more of the Middle.
This is the Middle. I'm Jeremy Hobson. We're also available
as a podcast in partnership with iHeart Podcasts on the
iHeart Apple wherever you listen to podcasts, and this hour
we're asking you whether or not you're prepared for the
next natural disaster or whether our country is You can
call us at eight four four four Middle that's eight
four four six four three three five three, or you
(31:55):
can reach out at Listen to the Middle dot com.
My guests are CNN Chief Climate Responded, Bill Weir and
Kim Cobb, director of the Institute A Brown for Environment
and Society. And let's go to Hayden, who's in Cape Coral, Florida. Hayden,
Welcome to the middle Go ahead.
Speaker 8 (32:11):
Oh, Hayden, I'm from Cape Coral.
Speaker 1 (32:15):
Awesome and tell us are you prepared for the next
natural disaster?
Speaker 13 (32:20):
I feel that my family is well prepared. We've been
through about four or five living where we're at, and
we just went through two ur three just this year
with Ian and Helene. I think our family is well
prepared because our fare. We just bought new hurricane proof
windows for our house, even though our house is twenty
(32:40):
years old.
Speaker 1 (32:42):
Wow, and you're talking about your family, are you you're are?
Speaker 4 (32:46):
How old are you?
Speaker 13 (32:48):
I just turned eighteen?
Speaker 4 (32:50):
Wow?
Speaker 1 (32:50):
Okay, so and you've already been through that many hurricanes
in your life. That's amazing.
Speaker 4 (32:55):
Yep.
Speaker 13 (32:56):
My brother was born like five or six days after Trina.
Speaker 4 (33:01):
Wow. Wow uh so.
Speaker 1 (33:03):
And but you feel like you're more prepared now with
your with the kind of the upgrades that your parents
have put on the house.
Speaker 13 (33:10):
Yes, And I feel that like we have more experience
now because we've been through multiple different hurricanes. Even though
each hurricane is different, we know what to expect.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
Do you feel like you're gonna stay once you are
out of the house? Are you going to stay in
a place that's so prone to hurricanes.
Speaker 13 (33:31):
I love Florida, so probably, but if I do decide
to stay, I'm probably gonna buy a house or a
place that's up to code.
Speaker 1 (33:42):
Yeah, all right, Hayden, thank you very much for that call,
Kim Cobb. You know, that just brings up a lot
of things. One of them is that we just hear
about how parents are supposed to talk to their kids
when there's a disaster that's happening. Obviously, Hayden is eighteen there,
but yeah, what do you what do you make of that?
And his is attitude about this.
Speaker 2 (34:02):
Well, you know, it certainly reminds me of my four
children at home this evening and the fact that they've
inherited this world. I would that it weren't so. I
would that we had listened to the science back when
it was clear, crystal clear in the nineteen nineties that
fossil fuels were driving warming that would drive this set
(34:22):
of climate extremes to worse. And here we are. So
that's my first and foremost sentiment. And it pains me
greatly to think that over the next twenty years, over
their lives as young adults, they're going to be witnessing
an escalation in these kinds of disasters. But it also
reminds me that they actually have been born into this.
This is part of their lived experience. We can remember
(34:44):
and talk about when we were small, it wasn't like this,
and how much that challenges our ability to imagine what's
possible with climate change. This generation they get it because
they've lived it, and they've lived those headlines and that's
all they know, and so it it does give me
hope that we can come together lean into the science
(35:04):
of resilience and all that it means for saving lives
and protecting our economy today as well as buttressing for
some of those worst case scenarios that may come to
be by mid century. So that's really just my hope,
and that caller helps me understand what's at risk, but
also the fact that this generation is ready and that
(35:27):
we owe it to them to do all we can
to leverage the vastrobe of treasure of science that we
have to protect them in our economy and our security.
Speaker 1 (35:38):
Let's go to Nate, who's in Milwaukee. Nate, welcome to
the middle Go ahead, Are you prepared for the next
natural disaster?
Speaker 14 (35:45):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (35:45):
Hi?
Speaker 15 (35:45):
Thank you for having me. I would say that, living
in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, I'm lucky enough not to be in
the line of a lot of hurricanes. I was out
in boy Scouts there an the final cloud went over
the campsite poles. So that was certainly an interesting experience
to live through. And you've got to work with people
in order to get through that. One of the things
I would say, And I appreciate that she mentioned fossil fuels,
(36:10):
considering that global warming is partly their fault each of
these disasters it happens, fossil fuels should be paying to
help clean up, or fossil fuel companies.
Speaker 1 (36:23):
Interesting point, Nate bill Weir, what about that?
Speaker 7 (36:28):
Well, he is not alone, and Nate's you're in my
hometown of Milwaukee, so good to hear.
Speaker 4 (36:33):
Ascani.
Speaker 7 (36:36):
There are dozens of lawsuits wanting their way through courts, tribals, courts, cities, states,
counties for just that, seeing big oil in some cases
for basically false advertising, for hiding the hidden dangers of
their products while claiming that they didn't know any better.
And the idea is to use those those settlements the
(37:00):
way tobacco settlement was used for education and health public
health that those settlements would be used to fortify the
city of Charleston, South Carolina, is the one sort of
spot in the red state that is suing with the
hope that they'll help pay for the billion dollar sea
wall they want to build to protect the historic quarter
of that city there. So that could be the next
(37:22):
big I mean, because it doesn't look like it's happening
in the legislator. And the hope that the private sector
was going to take this on that's kind of blown
up in the last couple of weeks. So now there's
a lot of hope. The Supreme Court sort of indicated
that they might take up this Hawaii case that is
in this space, and if they had killed it, it would
kill all the rest of them, would set a precedent.
(37:43):
Then that's what big oil is hoping for, but so
far all of those motions have been denied.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Ruth is calling from Cincinnati. Ruth, welcome to the middle
Go ahead.
Speaker 16 (37:54):
Thank you all right. I I am old, and I
was nervous, and in where I live we have something
called crisis and resilience is a whole way to do things.
The first thing told you, I'm old. The first thing
is that I have a two bad bag that I've
(38:15):
been putting together so he has enough food and water.
I grab all the meds that I have too. Don't
want to forget the meds when you're old or when
you're young, food, water, clothing, probably I haven't gotten it yet,
but something too that if there were a fire, I
could just put one of those little blankety things on. Yes,
it costs a bit of money, you put that together.
(38:36):
I want to have the little pills so that if
the water gets contaminated, I can make the water so
I could drink it. Because you can't, I couldn't have
enough anyway. Then the other thing we do is we
have ways to communicate. A ham radio. We got to
know who in the neighborhood he has one or walkie talkie.
We also want to work together and know who's old
(38:57):
and who needs help, or who is who's got animals
that get them out of here. I mean not that animals,
or certainly children or young people, any kind of people
that need help. And the thing that happens with all
of those things work together is I don't feel anxious
that I used to. I don't have to think about
(39:18):
the disaster. I mean I'm getting prepared. I haven't gotten
it together yet. That makes me feel more calm and
more like I can do something, and it helps tremendously.
We need not to feel so I'm just one other thing.
If you have an electric car, an electric car charger
on your land, on your little property, and I live
(39:39):
in I live in the city. But if you have that,
you can use your electric car somehow, there's a way
to connect to that charger together electricity to.
Speaker 1 (39:49):
Do that, get the electricity out of it, exactly, Ruth.
It sounds like you're very prepared, So thank you very much.
I'm very happy about that, and a lot I did. Yes,
Kim Cobb, what do you take away from that? I
will say, just on the issue of charging. When I
worried that the power was going to go out in
the fires, I was like, oh, at least I have
my computer. I can use that to charge my phone
(40:10):
as well. When the phone dies. I didn't realize, of course,
that the that the hot water would be gone too,
so then there's no shower. It's like, there's a lot
of things you don't think about, but anyway, go ahead
your thoughts.
Speaker 2 (40:19):
Yeah, I mean I think that that caller certainly thought
through a lot of the different layers that need to
be in place to get yourself safely through a disaster.
And I love the call out to keeping the community safe,
to thinking about those more vulnerable members of the community.
And you know, we've talked a lot about flooding, but
extreme heat is something we haven't touched on. Killed hundreds
(40:42):
of people in the Pacific Northwest a couple of years ago,
as we probably all remember, and in those instances, those
are isolated, largely elderly folks who don't have access to
the kind of communication channels that many of us click
into with our phones, and that's the kind of people
that we have to be looking out for in these moments.
So I love that call out, and I wanted to mention,
(41:05):
of course, the only way I got my husband to
sign off on solar panels on my roof was for
the resilience aspects that during a power outage, we'd have
enough power to hold our lower lower power devices and
keep going. So that's a good reason to think about
the renewable energy component here.
Speaker 1 (41:22):
Bill, we're on the issue sort of helping out your neighbors.
What you've talked to people who've been through these disasters.
How much of a responsibility do people feel once they've
figured out how to get themselves out of harm's way,
do they go and knock on every door in the
neighborhood and make sure everybody else is doing the same.
Speaker 4 (41:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (41:41):
I met some guys up in Arcadia who stayed and bought,
you know, fought the fires with buckets essentially, But they
were there, and they were they saved several homes on
their block. One thing struck on me about that last
caller who she Ruth, who was so thorough and thought
through it.
Speaker 4 (41:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (41:58):
I went up to Paradise five years after that amazingly
deadly fire up there, and two thirds of the town
never came back.
Speaker 4 (42:04):
But the third that's there really.
Speaker 7 (42:06):
Wants to be there. And they are the most galvanized,
tightest community, and they want to do it right. They
know how, they want to build around fire, live with
fire in this ecosystem.
Speaker 4 (42:15):
They have a new awareness. But I met this woman.
Speaker 7 (42:18):
Who rebuilt and she gets together with all the other
neighbors that are in her evacuation zone. It's there, you know,
whatever the number is, Zone one, twenty five club, they
meet whatever. A couple of times a month they have
a pot luck.
Speaker 4 (42:32):
Wow.
Speaker 7 (42:32):
And the people who the neighborhoods that do that in advance,
that's just a good reason to meet neighbors you didn't
know you had, Like, hey, everybody, we're getting together are
an evacuation zone to talk things through who's got the generator,
who's got the solar panels? And wow, that goes so far.
And yes, checking on your neighbors knowing who's there. And
also when I sent a new just practical idea. In
(42:54):
addition to charging you're thinking about, there's a company called
bio light that now sells.
Speaker 4 (42:59):
A camp stove or a grill that.
Speaker 7 (43:02):
Converts that heat into a phone.
Speaker 1 (43:04):
Charge or allow charge.
Speaker 7 (43:06):
While you're cooking your food or making your coffee, you
can be charging your phone. And if we start thinking
about energy on those terms, the thermal heat that we waste,
but that could be you know, certainly gathered and used,
especially in a pinch. There's so many ideas out there
like that.
Speaker 1 (43:21):
Tolliver some bill on my.
Speaker 3 (43:23):
Luck, Reggie and Roald Missouri says we're nowhere near prepared.
Having worked on two FEMA teams, I can say that
we as a nation are not even close FEMA has
resources that are available to them that are not available
at a state level at all. And then Ryan and
Pittsburgh says, for my parents' generation, it was the specter
of nuclear war, the dominated questions of are you prepared?
(43:44):
But now it appears that climate change is the existential
threat that commands the attention of those thinking how to
be prepared.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
You can again reach out to us at Listen to
the Middle dot com or on social media. And Matthew
is calling from Durham, North Carolina. Matthew, Welcome to the Middle.
Speaker 14 (43:59):
Your thoughts, Hi, thanks for having me on. I mean,
the one thing I wanted to say on here is that,
you know, I was in my PHG program when Hurricane
Harvey hit in Houston, and during that, you know, learning
the process, also trying to trying to finish grad school
(44:20):
and all that.
Speaker 8 (44:20):
The big thing that.
Speaker 14 (44:21):
We have now that I'm actually in industry as an
engineer is that we have hundreds of millions of dollars
of projects. A lot of studies have been done, a
lot of them are sitting on shelves. And I think
this was mentioned a little earlier as well, is that
there's millions of now well most of the time, billions
of dollars of projects and ideas and things that could
get done, but nobody wants to fund them and there's
(44:44):
no money to fund them. You know, you're talking about
you know, cities in East Texas that you know, hey, one
hundred million dollar project could save one hundred thousand houses,
but where are they going to get a hundred million
dollars when they're annual budgets in the in the single
mis right, It's it's a matter of when it was
mentioned before that eighteen year old was really inspiring. But
(45:05):
the thing that we're doing is basically continuing to kick
the can for preparedness and rightiness in terms of how
we're building, how we're designing, how we're planning, and we're
at a point where we are well sunk.
Speaker 4 (45:20):
Right.
Speaker 14 (45:20):
FEMA spends way more money on natural disaster recovery than
they do on grants to mitigate and prevent, and it's
been that way, you know, grossly escalating each year. And
I think we just need to take this conversation to
say that, like, we haven't invested in infrastructure since the nineteen
fifties in that manner, and we really need to revamp
(45:43):
a lot of these aging systems, aging codes, aging planning methods,
so that we can actually get ahead into the twenty thirties,
twenty fifties.
Speaker 1 (45:52):
Yeah, Matthew, thank you, Kim Cobb. A great point I
want to bring to you. As you know, people have said,
let's just take the case of like hurricanes Sandy back
in New York ten years ago or twelve years ago.
They said, if they had just put they'd spent you know,
tens of billions of dollars putting gates in the harbor,
they would have saved much more money from the flooding
that occurred and caused all the kinds of trouble. This
(46:13):
is you could say this in many of these disasters.
Speaker 2 (46:16):
Yeah, you know, pay now or pay one hundred times later.
You know, that's the bottom line the caller was getting at.
And it's so true. And so what I want to
leave folks with is also the idea that you can
be advocates for resilience planning within your township and your city.
You can demand that these plans consider the latest and
greatest science and identify where these investments are most critical
(46:38):
to protect property and lives and economies. You can advocate
at the state level. Every state should have a state
Resilience officer and a state resilience plan that is using
the science and service to the public good. And of
course we can recognize the federal opportunities for investments and resilience.
We may not believe about solar panels and windmills, but
(47:00):
I think we can all get behind the federal government
making strategic, cost effective investments in keeping communities safe from
these worsening climate extremes. And those are places where people
can leverage their voice for good. It's not just enough
to work on an individual home by home level. We
have to begin to get the plans in place at local,
(47:21):
state and federal levels to protect ourselves as much as
possible from the damages that are here and will worsen
going forward.
Speaker 1 (47:28):
Bill Ware, I'm going to give you the last word
because we are running out of time this hour, and
let me ask you this. Maybe this is a slightly
positive note. We are obviously dealing with a lot of
devastation from these disasters around the country, and losing a
home is terrible, and losing your stuff and your memories
is terrible. But are we getting better at keeping the
(47:49):
death toll down in these disasters, that people are getting
the warnings and you should we you know, yeah, getting
out of harm's way.
Speaker 4 (47:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (47:57):
So you look at the statistics over the last century,
even as storms have intensified, you know, thanks to emergency
warning systems, thanks to great medicine, that those casualty rates
go down. But at a certain point you can't adapt
fast enough. If the earth changes beyond our capacity to adapt,
you know, then that's when things.
Speaker 4 (48:17):
Get really rough. But yes, I look at the.
Speaker 7 (48:19):
Devastation in Los Angeles County and I was shocked that
the casualties, you know, the fatalities were in the double digits.
I thought for sure they'd be in the hundreds given
but people heated the warnings, they got out in time,
not enough, sadly the people who were lost at is.
Speaker 4 (48:37):
But we are.
Speaker 7 (48:39):
Getting better at that, but only to a point, right,
and then when the disasters get too big. But I
like to think about it from the old psychology one
on one days of Maslow's pyramid of needs. You know,
if you remember that at the bottom of the pyramid
the stuff that keeps us alive air, water, proper temperature.
The second layer, which is shelter and information and economy.
(49:00):
I took all of those for granted when I was
growing up, and now I'm talking to my kids about
where what is in our air, where does our water
come from? Think about our food chain? You know, do
we have six hours of power if.
Speaker 4 (49:13):
We need it? If everything goes black?
Speaker 7 (49:15):
And it's just a shift in mindset, and then we
can get the top of the pyramid. The love and
esteem needs that we can't imagine getting from therapy and
social media. By plugging in with our neighbors, leaning into
nature and each other, around community and resilience.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
That is a perfect way to end the hour. I
want to thank my guest seeing in Chief Climate correspondent
Bill Weir and Kim cob director of the Institute of
Bround for Environment and Society, Thank you.
Speaker 4 (49:39):
Both so much.
Speaker 7 (49:42):
This is great.
Speaker 1 (49:43):
Next week, tell ever, we're going to be talking about
something that's been the news a lot lately. That is
cryptocurrency like bitcoin and whether it actually has any value
to society at all.
Speaker 3 (49:51):
Just in time for the launch of middle coin. I
got a feeling about this, man. Middle Coin is gonna
be huge. Yeah, as always, you can call in at
a four four four middle that's eight four four four
six four, Fleet three five three, or you can reach
out and listen to the Middle dot com. You can
also sign up for our newsletter.
Speaker 8 (50:06):
There.
Speaker 3 (50:07):
Don't forget to check out our new video podcast on
a YouTube dot com where you can watch us as
well as hear us.
Speaker 1 (50:12):
The Middle is brought to you by Longnok Media, distributed
by Illinois Public Media and Orbana Illinois and produced by
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and Brandon Condritz. Our technical director is Jason Croft. Thanks
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Speaker 2 (00:56):
Time.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
Welcome to the Middle. I'm Jeremy Hobson along with our
house DJ Tolliver and Tolliver. We could do a show
this hour about Elon Musk. We could do a show
about Gaza. We can do a show about tariffs. There
is just so much going on right now.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Jamie, listen, my birthday is this month and all I
want is the gift of boredom. Please no more news, man,
I can't.
Speaker 4 (01:20):
Do it well.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
I will say, actually that we are going to do
or have done, shows on the topics I just mentioned.
But this week we're going to about to talk about
something that didn't start on January twentieth and will not
end when President Trump's term ends. That is the threat
of natural disasters hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, droughts, and of course, wildfires.
The recent fires in southern California cost at least twenty
(01:42):
nine people their lives and damage totals are estimated north
of two hundred and fifty billion dollars. The fires started
and spread in an instant because of extremely dry conditions
and winds nearing one hundred miles per hour. Here's NBCLA
reporter Robert Kavassek who found man fleeing his home in
the Palisades fire. That man was hopping on his bike
(02:05):
with two paintings in hand.
Speaker 5 (02:07):
This is like a hurricane in the middle of a
brush fire.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
You've got people right there is.
Speaker 6 (02:14):
That a homeowner that's trying to leave.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
Is this your house?
Speaker 7 (02:20):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Which is your house?
Speaker 7 (02:22):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (02:22):
This is our house. Backyard's on fire.
Speaker 8 (02:24):
I'm out of here.
Speaker 4 (02:25):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
So what happened?
Speaker 9 (02:27):
Is there anything we can do to help you?
Speaker 5 (02:28):
Sure you can take these paintings. I guess I can't
ride with these.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
Listen, I'll take them for you.
Speaker 5 (02:33):
I work at NBC.
Speaker 6 (02:35):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
I'll make sure you get them. Just unbelievable. And on
that night, the winds were so powerful that firefighters couldn't fly,
they couldn't drop water from the air. As you know,
many people have criticized the firefighting infrastructure, reservoirs, fire hydrant pressure,
available trucks, But as La County Fire Chief Anthony Maroney
explained to sixty Minutes, fire trucks and hydrants are no
(02:58):
match for a firestorm like what occurt.
Speaker 4 (03:01):
There's not enough fire engines for this.
Speaker 10 (03:03):
We think we've lost eight thousand structures, so times three
fire engines each, that requires twenty six thousand fire engines.
I don't think the state of California has twenty six
thousand fire engines.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
So, whether you live in a place that is threatened
by wildfires or hurricanes or tornadoes, or droughts or flooding, which,
by the way, is almost everywhere in the US. About
ninety four percent of Americans live in a county that
has gotten FEMA help for disasters since twenty eleven. We
want to hear from you. We want to know if
you feel you're prepared for a natural disaster or if
you think we are as a country. Tolliver, how can
(03:39):
people reach us?
Speaker 3 (03:40):
You can call us at eight four four for a
middle that's eight four four four six four three three
five three, or you can write in at Listen to
the Middle dot com. And you can also comment on
our new live stream on YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitch.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Let's meet our panel. CNN Chief Climate Correspondent Bill Weir
is with us.
Speaker 7 (03:57):
Bill, great to have you on the show. Jeremy Tolliver,
how are you guys going to be with you?
Speaker 1 (04:03):
Doing great? And Kim Cobb, director of the Institute at
Brown for Environment and Society, is with us as well. Kim,
welcome to you.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
Oh, thanks so much for having me.
Speaker 1 (04:12):
So before we get to the phoes, let's talk about
some of the things that have come up because of
the wildfires Bill where you reported on them. There has
been criticism, as there is after every natural disaster, about
the preparation and response. But this was like a hurricane
of fire because of the wind. What more could have
been done to prepare.
Speaker 7 (04:32):
They are wrestling with that question right now, Jeremy. But
I think it's really it starts with imagination. I think
we lack the capacity to imagine an urban wildfire in
Santa Ana wind season typically that those things don't overlap.
Last year, there was too much water in Los Angeles,
So we're living now on an overheating planet through these
(04:52):
periods of weather whiplash where it's too much or not enough.
And there was a reservoir near the Palisades that was
closed for maintenance.
Speaker 4 (05:00):
There was a cover that had ripped.
Speaker 7 (05:02):
And just the fortuitous timing or unfortuitous timing of that
is being investigated as well. But even if that was full,
experts tell me it would have maybe saved a few
houses around the edges, because once the Palisades and once
the homes of from Sierra Madre almost to Pasadena became
the fuel and you can't fly, there's nothing you know,
(05:26):
ground crews can do. Humans have never stopped the Santa
Anna wildfire. You just have to wait for the winds
to change and for the weather to break. And so
whether it's Leahina or Paradise, California a couple of years ago,
or this one now, which to me was sort of
the combination of both of those and then scaled up,
it starts with realizing that these are not our father's fires,
(05:50):
These are not our grandfather's fires anymore.
Speaker 4 (05:52):
And the infrastructure.
Speaker 7 (05:53):
We've built, the way we built cities, the way we
build fire hydrant systems, has to adapt right now. Well,
you don't have anyhing about right now Altadena is looking
about half of Alta Dina needs to be put in
a landfill like half of a city, right and so
if landfills can't handle the damage of these, we certainly
(06:14):
the fire hydrants can't.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
You don't have another city in this country that you
have this kind of density right next to just wilderness,
you know, hills that are covered in trees and brushed
and everything else. Kim Cobb. President Trump has blamed water management.
He even claimed falsely that there's some sort of valve
to turn the water to southern California on that was
(06:37):
turned off and to prove his point, he told the
Army Corps of Engineers to release billions of gallons of
water into the farms of central California that was being
saved up for the dry season. But from your perspective,
what is the right lesson to learn about water management
forest management from these fires?
Speaker 2 (06:55):
Yeah, I mean California has been a place that has
been under acute drought pressure decades and that has resulted
in a very close coordination of water resources. Accordingly so
managed by city, but largely state and federal entities who
have to make very carefully calibraty decision about how that
very precious resource is used. And so, of course we
(07:18):
have heard that there is no pipe linking the water
release that Trump let go from those very precious reservoirs
which are designed for emergency use by farmers in the
dry summer months. There's no way that connects to LA
There's simply no connection point. And so this was a
massive waste of billions of dollars of water that may
(07:39):
be sorely needed, and we'll have damaging effects later on
this year. Of course, we can look at the design,
as Bill was talking about, of our critical infrastructure that's
not designed to respond to our present climate state, let
alone of the climate states that we know are coming
down the pike under continued warming for at least the
(07:59):
next decades. Let's hope we can turn it around before
then by reducing fossil fuel emissions. But we are woefully
prepared for our climate of now. And that's not just
for water resources and emergency firefighting efforts in LA. That
is also for coastal cities around the country. We saw Ashville,
of course, revisiting some of co decisions and zoning decisions.
(08:22):
This is an A to Z type of opportunity for
us to think critically about what does planning look like
for short and long term and how do we attack
emergency planning in response to respond to this climate emergency.
Speaker 1 (08:36):
And we're on in Nashville, so I wonder if we're
going to hear from somebody who went through a hurricane
Aleen Bill weird. The other thing that's come up from
Washington is that FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which
has been around since the late nineteen seventies, should be
done away with. Do people think, and you've been reporting
on many of these disasters, do people that you've spoken
with think that FEMA is not doing a good job.
Speaker 7 (08:59):
Well, it depends on the disaster, depends on the timing.
There's sort of this natural five stages of grief people
go through after the whole life has been upended, and
one of those stages is anger, and a lot of
times it's anger at officials, it's the response. There's plenty
of people to be angry at in these but for
(09:20):
the most part, I see them bringing critical services at
times when they're most needed. And it all comes down
to the commanders. It comes down to the boots on
the ground, how they do it. I saw really wasteful
efforts after Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico where a runway
full of bottle waters was left or rot in the
sun because they had no way to distribute it there.
(09:42):
But then I've seen other places disasters or FEMA is
right there and people are really.
Speaker 4 (09:47):
Grateful to have them.
Speaker 7 (09:49):
The idea that states can handle these on their own
is that's the one that's going to sort of catch
a lot of political headwind because as you were talking
of two hundred and fifty billion dollars for one set
of wildfires, I mean, these are and when you get
into states. You know, in the Gulf States, they can't
afford these. Mexico City, Florida, which got hit by Hurricane
(10:11):
Michael I was walking around with the mayor. He said
the cleanup would be ten times his annual budget for
this little beachside town. So everybody's got to kick into
these in a way that spreads the risk.
Speaker 4 (10:24):
And the pain.
Speaker 7 (10:25):
But FEMA is not the cavalry, and so and even
I've been hearing this from many FEMA administrators that the
idea that they're going to come riding over the hill
and make you hole again is not accurate. They'll they'll
get you a head start, but the more prepared, you know,
the communities that have the most trust in each other
and the science are the ones that come out the
most unscathed on the other side, and FEMA is a
(10:48):
bonus to them in those cases.
Speaker 4 (10:49):
Will instant follow that start interrupt Jeremy.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
So if FEMA is done away with, what does like
disastro responds look like after that? They're the only, you know,
government agency I know that deals with that kind of thing.
Speaker 4 (11:01):
That's it.
Speaker 7 (11:01):
It would be state by state, I suppose, you know,
I don't.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
There's Trump has talked about just sort of reimbursing the
states but letting them handle everything.
Speaker 4 (11:10):
Letting them handle it.
Speaker 7 (11:11):
Sure, but when after a hurricane, I will I will
stand on you know, in the Florida, Keys or somewhere
with this and just watch the line trucks from from
fifty states come rolling pie watch the first responders, the
fire trucks, the heavy equipment from all over the country.
It really is an all hands on deck situation nationally.
(11:33):
And there's you know, mutual aid systems around the country.
Maybe those could be propped up with federal funding. I
don't know, but but it feels like in the middle
of you know, we're being bombarded by these disasters at
every front. The idea of gutting FEMA in the middle
of this instead of maybe reforming it and trying to
prop it up seems counterintuitive.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
You know, the three states that have gotten the most
money because of disasters are Louisiana, Florida, and Texas. All
of course in Hurricane Alley, I guess we would call
it Tolliver. This week in New Orleans is hosting the
Super Bowl, but it was twenty years ago this summer
that Hurricane Katrina devastated.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
The city Yeah, still the most expensive hurricane in US history.
Here's President George W. Bush addressed in the nation from
New Orleans after the storm.
Speaker 6 (12:23):
In the life of this nation, we have often been
reminded that nature is an awesome force, and that all
life is fragile. Were the heirs of men and women
who lived through those first terrible winters at Jamestown in Plymouth,
who rebuilt Chicago after a great fire, and San Francisco
after a great earthquake, who reclaimed the prairie from the
dust bowl of the nineteen thirties. Every time the people
(12:47):
of this land have come back from fire, flood, and
storm to build anew.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
I had forgotten about the winters at Jamestown, Tolliver. Yeah,
we'll be right back with more of your calls on
the Middle. This is the Middle. I'm Jeremy Hobson. If
you're just tuning, in the Middle is a national call
in show. We're focused on elevating voices from the middle geographically, politically,
and philosophically, or maybe you just want to meet in
(13:13):
the middle. This hour, we're asking you are you prepared
for the next natural disaster? And are we as a country?
And by the way, if you've been through a natural disaster.
Have you come back from it? Telliver what's the number
to call in?
Speaker 3 (13:25):
It's eight four four for Middle that's eight four four
four sixty four three three five three. You can also
write to us to listen to the Middle dot Com,
or you gain us on social media.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
I'm joined by Kim Cobb, director of the Institute at
Brown for Environment in Society, and CNN Chief Climate correspondent
Bill Weir. And the phones are lighting up. Let's go
to Scotty, who's in Augusta, Georgia. Scotty, Welcome to the Middle.
Speaker 9 (13:45):
Go ahead, Hello the rolling Pete Matab, Central Georgia.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
So have you been through a natural disaster? Do you
feel prepared?
Speaker 9 (13:56):
Pellene survivor Yes, I was somewhat prepared thanks to getting
back into camping, but nowhere near as prepared as I
needed to be and will not be caught in that
position again.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
What do you mean? How are you not prepared and
how are you prepared?
Speaker 8 (14:10):
Now?
Speaker 9 (14:12):
Living two hundred and fifty miles inland and facing a
storm that was twice the size of Trina and a
category higher stronger than it was when it made landfall,
we were just no one was. It was unprecedented events
in caps, cataclysmic throughout in southeast, not just where I'm that.
Speaker 1 (14:31):
And now, what have you done to get yourself better prepared?
Speaker 9 (14:37):
Portable power, food and water stores, you know, just communication,
plans of action, Everything different one eighty turns from what
it had been because we just never expected we would
ever have to be dealing with that two agencies. I've
never figured I'd interact with FEMA and Red Cross I
used to work for. Now, I can't say that I've
interacted with both of them. I never thought I'd be
(14:58):
doing that because of a natural disaster here.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
And do you feel good about your interaction with them?
Speaker 9 (15:05):
Mostly do that. I think they got a bad rap
on it. I think they do an, especially in our case,
humongous job and did the best they can. I was
always treated well, even though you might have hours and
hours wait. You know, they were very helpful and did
the most that they could to help you understand the
process and get through it.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
Scotty, thanks for that call, Kim Cobb. One of the
things Scotty brings up there has been reported on recently,
which is the fact that these hurricanes are hitting inland,
that some of the worst problems that come from them
is not happening because of the storm surge. It's happening
further inland with flooding.
Speaker 2 (15:42):
Well, that's right, and I have to give a shout
out to Georgian somebody who lived in Atlanta recently for
eighteen years and had to live through some of those
hurricanes that made it way too far inland and caused
such destruction. And I think you're really alluding to the
fact that these are unthinkable coincidences that we're seeing with
(16:05):
fronts converging and extreme rainfall happening in places due to
these storms going much further, much wetter than they ever
have before, and it's challenging our imagination. We have no
lived experience with this kind of climate extreme that's again
fueled by fossil fuels. Science tells us that these links
are very strong, and so I really want to call
(16:26):
out what the color was talking about in terms of
individual preparedness, and we also have to recognize the role
for science and keeping people safe from these events. We
have to rely on the National Weather Service. We take
it for granted. We should not in this era. It
is under attack as it sits under the National Oceanic
and Atmospheric Administration, but paying attention to the science and
(16:48):
listening to how extremes are being fueled by climate change
and the science of those physical links is a critically
important part of challenging your imagination across the southeast, ross
the drought and wildfire stricken Western United States, and even
up into New England where we saw catastrophic flooding in
recent years, for example across Vermont and last year here
(17:10):
in Rhode Island of all places.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Well, and just to push on what you just said
about the fact that it's under attack, you're worried about
what Elon Musk and his people are doing in terms
of going after the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and
what that may mean for our science and weather and
climate situations.
Speaker 2 (17:30):
Yeah, we already know, for example, that this administration is
openly hostile to climate science and climate scientists. They would
disregard the threat of global warming and diminish it, and
with a drill baby, drill agenda, charge forward in a
world where they can pretend to deny the science of
(17:50):
climate change. And it doesn't care who's in the White House,
It's going to march forward. It represents a clear and
present danger to every single American to our health and
well being, in safety, to our economy, into our national security.
And so I think we need to recognize that these
incredible federal servants who have been saving so many lives
(18:12):
across these suite of horrific extremes we've all writtenessed in
recent years, and they deserve a prominent shout out and
they deserve the credit that we all take. So for granted, let's.
Speaker 1 (18:23):
Go to John, who's in Kansas City. John, welcome to
the middle Are you prepared for the next natural disaster?
Speaker 11 (18:31):
I am now, but I definitely wasn't five years ago
when I was hit by e F three tornado in
the middle of the night in Nashville. What happened and well,
I had about five minutes to get the kids to
the hallway before it literally was on top of us,
and I was laying on top of my seven year
(18:51):
old daughter as it tried to suck us out of
the house. And luckily there wasn't a scratch on us,
but all the walls were gone, roof was gone, and
it was just it was like a movie scene and
just something you never thought you would go through. And
I wasn't ready, and so now you know I've made
steps to be ready this time.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
Well, just tell me quickly, what kind of steps have
you made to be ready this time?
Speaker 11 (19:16):
So when I went to bed that night, I didn't
even look at the weather. I didn't pay attention to
the weather or anything like that. So now before I
go to bed, I pay attention to the weather. I
have an app on my phone that would wake me up,
because you get that little notification from the Weather Service
saying there's a tornado, but it's it's not very loud,
and it won't necessarily wake you up unless you get one.
Speaker 4 (19:37):
Of those apps.
Speaker 11 (19:38):
So I'd get one of those apps. And I'm just
a lot more like knowledgeable about what tornadoes are and
when they may occur, so I can get my family
to safety sooner. And now we have a basement. That's
good too.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
Yeah, always good to have a basement in a tornado situation. John,
thank you very much. Bill, we are We've now just
heard from two people who do not live a long
the coasts and have been dealing with real disasters. Nobody
would say to them, well, you shouldn't build your house
there again, because the tornado might head at a second time,
or you know, the flooding might come one hundred miles inland.
Speaker 7 (20:12):
That's interesting. You hear that a lot about managed retreat
on the coast. Why are we paying to rebuild these
you know beach towns. Well, it's everywhere now, you know,
it's in the heartland. The science on tornadoes around climate
change is the spottiest because they don't spend a lot
of time on the ground the way hurricanes you can
study them for a long time. But it seems like
the tornado alley is shifting from the Great Plains.
Speaker 4 (20:34):
Sort of towards the southeast.
Speaker 7 (20:35):
There so people in regions that we would never thought
about that before. It's just something to loom from the
wisdom of those folks who have been through it before.
And you know, I did a story recently on where
are the climate havens? I actually wrote a book to
my son about how to live on this planet we
broke by accident.
Speaker 4 (20:54):
For him, it starts like where do you live? What
are the places?
Speaker 7 (20:57):
And there's science that's you know, scientists who said forty
seventh parallel like the north the line that goes like
through Buffalo and Duluth and across to.
Speaker 4 (21:06):
The course West, the sweet.
Speaker 7 (21:08):
Spot up there, and there's plenty of middle fresh water
and the Great Lakes and all of that. But then
there's but that is, that's no guarantee of what could
happen in any of these places. And so it's it's
it's the boy scout motto, you know, be prepared wherever.
Speaker 3 (21:24):
I had a quick question for you, Jeremy. I'm sorry
I keep jumping because I want to get to zecles,
but I wanted to ask you. So we're talking about
Hurricane Alley, what are some things like infrastructurally that the
government can do to prepare people for hurricanes. I know,
like a lot of these things already happening, but I
just don't know personally, so I would like to know.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
Yeah, So I think when we think about the landscape
for preparedness, we have to think about the many different
layers that have to go into that. So, you know,
first you're talking about zoning. You know, where are we building,
how are we leveraging this science of what we know
about extremes and the fact that they're getting work into
that infrastructure planning. Again, we can talk about the water
(22:03):
resources and out west, or we could talk about floodplaine
regions in the southeastern United States. So that goes to zoning.
Then you go to code, which is often set you know,
could be set by state or local officials. What standards
are we building too? We see, we see some incredible
striking examples. We all saw about Hurricane Michael ripping through
(22:25):
the Panhandle of Florida. Some houses left perfectly intact because
they were built to a beyond code in recognition of
that particular owner being concerned about wind thrust and storm
search survived, So that goes to code, and then we
can go to insurance.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
My goodness, how much does that?
Speaker 2 (22:47):
Yeah? Yeah, forest store emerging from the palisades of course
in Altadena, people left under insured by the shifting landscape
under their own feet. And so, mark my words, we're
going to see more of these kinds of storre worries.
It's going to be a fever pitch. It already is
in some of these devastated communities. People are going to
be pushed out of generational homes. This is still going
(23:09):
to be recalibrating for quite some time. There's a federal
rolehill to play, of course, there's also state and local
roles here. To play to keep community safe and keep
people house.
Speaker 7 (23:18):
Frankly, one of my favorite stories if I could JOm
ahead and Jeremy, I'm sorry. The one of my favorite
stories of somebody turning anxiety into action. Because Kim brought
up Hurricane Michael. Was a woman named Annette Rubin who
was an NFL wife. She met her husband, who played
for the Seahawks and Seattle had never been through a hurricane,
was a new mom. When Michael came, it shook her
(23:38):
up so much that the next day she says, I
can't do this six months a year.
Speaker 4 (23:43):
What are you guys crazy? You guys went to bed,
what is the you know?
Speaker 7 (23:47):
She was googling what is the building code hurricane strength
that my house can take and she realized it was
not up to code even though she was in this
brand new house. So with no experience in construction, she
went down a rabbit hole looking for what houses survived
and what were they made of. And she ended up
starting a company that she imported this technology from Italy
that uses sprayable stone basically the kind of you know,
(24:09):
gunite that you would use to make a swimming pool.
You put it on these insulated panels, and the thing
is it can stand two hundred and fifty mile on
hour winds. It's bomb proof, it's earthquake proof. And she's
trying to spread the gospel of preparedness in you know,
the Gulf Coast of Florida, where people don't think about this,
don't think about shelter in these ways.
Speaker 4 (24:30):
But insurance is sure thinking about it this way.
Speaker 7 (24:32):
So market forces are going to force these sorts of ideas.
Speaker 4 (24:36):
The houses I saw in the Palisades that.
Speaker 7 (24:39):
In the middle of a burned out block look like
they're right out of architectural Digest because they're designed in
the fireroom specific, right, And it's so striking when you
see that. And one of the more people see that, boy,
that architect's phone is ringing off the hook.
Speaker 4 (24:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:52):
Although I will say one of the things I've been
reading is that if you outfed a house to be
kind of fireproof, it might actually be the opposite of
what you want to deal with earthquakes in the exact
same location. Just that's what is good for earthquakes and
bad for fires.
Speaker 4 (25:07):
And let's go to exactly.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
Let's get to a call. Aaron is in Longmont, Colorado,
Aeron Welcome to the middle go ahead.
Speaker 8 (25:16):
Yeah. Yeah. So I'm a disaster volunteer also the author
of How to Prepare For Everything, and I'm definitely not prepared,
mainly because you disasters are by their nature overwhelming. It
wasn't overwhelming, We'd call it an inconvenience, not a disaster.
One of the frustrations that I experience is the politicians
(25:37):
over promising what FEMA can do. FEMA is designed by
public policy to write checks that are too small to
too few people, too late, and they do a pretty
good job of that and not even being tried. I mean,
like really truly, it's arguably bad public policy to make
the federal government be insure of all things. But from
a humanitarian standpoint, that kind of stinks.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
So what would be your one piece of advice erin
to people listening to this about how they can be
more prepared as an emergency volunteer yourself.
Speaker 8 (26:10):
So, number one, stop preparing for disasters. There are an
endless number of disasters, and when we focus on disasters,
it creates fear. We can't control the bad things that happen.
If we could, we make sure bad things didn't happen. Instead,
we can prepare for the disruptions they caused. Prepare for
the power outage. It doesn't matter what caused it, just
prepare for the disruptions. And the second is prepare together.
(26:33):
Having a strong social connections. Strong social connections is a
better indicator of both short term survivability and long term
resilience in any other single factor, including working infrastructure of a
seventy two hour.
Speaker 1 (26:45):
Kit erin Thank you, Kim Cobb. What do you think
about that?
Speaker 2 (26:50):
I think that's very wise, so you know, you can
think about what does it take to have a successful plan.
We heard one of the callers talk about the importance
of communication network that are established ahead of time, thinking
about how you're going to manage charging devices that may
be critical to hearing the latest information, to helping people
in your community that need your assistance. So that is
(27:13):
that kind of thing. Is that social network really rings
true from what we've heard of regards to the callers
here already. So I think that's a very important take
home for folks here.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
You know, one thing I read that I think is
a great piece of advice is if you have to
leave your house in a hurry, grab your laundry basket,
because you know you like those clothes you were wearing
them before the laundry cat and your cat.
Speaker 4 (27:36):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
Actually I was talking to somebody about the fires who
said she brought the dog, but the cats could survive
on their own if they had to. Then figure it
out that the dog probably wouldn't. Okay, Sally is calling
from Ashville, North Carolina. There we go, Sally. I assume
you went through Helene.
Speaker 12 (27:54):
I did.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
I did.
Speaker 12 (27:57):
Yep, we went through the whole eighteen days, no life, tricity,
two weeks, snow water. It was a big surprise, but
I was Uh. I just wanted to say, I really
agree with a previous speaker that, I mean, folks here
that that, at least that I know, have been so
(28:19):
thankful for FEMA. There were when the National Guard came
finally you know we're able to come in the power trucks.
I mean, people were crying with tears, just so thankful.
And I know that we had a pretty good experience
with FEMA. But I do agree with the person who
said that I think the expectations are too high. I
(28:41):
think FEMA has done a great job. I think it
would be a huge mistake nationally too. And FEMA and.
Speaker 8 (28:51):
Because you just.
Speaker 12 (28:51):
Don't know where these things are going to happen. And
Ashwell was a place where people came for a climate refuge,
I mean this whole area. So yeah, I just I
think that people have to have realistic expectations for FEMA.
But I know that everybody was so appreciative of all
(29:12):
the help that came, and it there's you know, there's
not a lot of money in some of the areas
and communities, and they would not have survived without all
that help.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Yeah, Sally, thank you. You know Bill where it's interesting
to hear so many people call in and talk about
FEMA because this is not the conversation that it seems
like is going on in Washington about this issue, which
could change very fast.
Speaker 4 (29:35):
Well that's the thing.
Speaker 7 (29:36):
The problem, you know, when one of our major parties
really a plank, it seems in their platform, is to
mistrust governments, you know, don't trust these agencies, that's their
deep staters or whatever the case may be. You don't
want to think about that when your roof is just
blown off or you're you know, the River Arts District
in Nashville is just washed away, and most people are
(30:00):
I have to remind myself in these days that the
book Lord of the Flies, which was required reading through
us in junior high.
Speaker 4 (30:07):
It was written by a manic.
Speaker 7 (30:09):
Depressive racist, Okay, And when a real group of kids
were took a boat out and were abandoned on a
desert island or discovered a year later, they had a
fully functioning society because we are wired to cooperate and
people want to help. In these and the outpouring, you
see the best of human nature. So some of the
(30:29):
worst come out, but that gets the headlines. But the
best of human nature is what I like to focus on.
Look for the helpers, like mister.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
Rodd, Look for the helpers, Taliver. We've been talking about
disaster preparedness, but sometimes people don't listen to the warnings.
Speaker 4 (30:42):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (30:42):
In the case of the tornado they ripped through Jappla,
Missouri and twenty eleven, many people ignored them. Here's a
clip from a CBS news report.
Speaker 5 (30:50):
The sirens sounded, but many people took no action.
Speaker 11 (30:54):
That is destroyed.
Speaker 5 (30:56):
It was tornado season after all, and residents were apparently
decent ties to warnings. It's among the distressing findings from
a government panel investigating the two hundred mile an hour
twister that leveled entire neighborhoods.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
Winn just took it like that and me and just
turned me about one hundred and eighty degrees and set
me down on the concrete.
Speaker 5 (31:17):
Those interviewed felt the warnings didn't pertain to them or
sought clarification for fore taking action losing precious minutes.
Speaker 4 (31:26):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (31:26):
And of course there were two times during the La
Fires when residents got an accidental evacuation alert on their fire.
Speaker 4 (31:33):
I sure did.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
Yeah, We'll be right back with more of the Middle.
This is the Middle. I'm Jeremy Hobson. We're also available
as a podcast in partnership with iHeart Podcasts on the
iHeart Apple wherever you listen to podcasts, and this hour
we're asking you whether or not you're prepared for the
next natural disaster or whether our country is You can
call us at eight four four four Middle that's eight
four four six four three three five three, or you
(31:55):
can reach out at Listen to the Middle dot com.
My guests are CNN Chief Climate Responded, Bill Weir and
Kim Cobb, director of the Institute A Brown for Environment
and Society. And let's go to Hayden, who's in Cape Coral, Florida. Hayden,
Welcome to the middle Go ahead.
Speaker 8 (32:11):
Oh, Hayden, I'm from Cape Coral.
Speaker 1 (32:15):
Awesome and tell us are you prepared for the next
natural disaster?
Speaker 13 (32:20):
I feel that my family is well prepared. We've been
through about four or five living where we're at, and
we just went through two ur three just this year
with Ian and Helene. I think our family is well
prepared because our fare. We just bought new hurricane proof
windows for our house, even though our house is twenty
(32:40):
years old.
Speaker 1 (32:42):
Wow, and you're talking about your family, are you you're are?
Speaker 4 (32:46):
How old are you?
Speaker 13 (32:48):
I just turned eighteen?
Speaker 4 (32:50):
Wow?
Speaker 1 (32:50):
Okay, so and you've already been through that many hurricanes
in your life. That's amazing.
Speaker 4 (32:55):
Yep.
Speaker 13 (32:56):
My brother was born like five or six days after Trina.
Speaker 4 (33:01):
Wow. Wow uh so.
Speaker 1 (33:03):
And but you feel like you're more prepared now with
your with the kind of the upgrades that your parents
have put on the house.
Speaker 13 (33:10):
Yes, And I feel that like we have more experience
now because we've been through multiple different hurricanes. Even though
each hurricane is different, we know what to expect.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
Do you feel like you're gonna stay once you are
out of the house? Are you going to stay in
a place that's so prone to hurricanes.
Speaker 13 (33:31):
I love Florida, so probably, but if I do decide
to stay, I'm probably gonna buy a house or a
place that's up to code.
Speaker 1 (33:42):
Yeah, all right, Hayden, thank you very much for that call,
Kim Cobb. You know, that just brings up a lot
of things. One of them is that we just hear
about how parents are supposed to talk to their kids
when there's a disaster that's happening. Obviously, Hayden is eighteen there,
but yeah, what do you what do you make of that?
And his is attitude about this.
Speaker 2 (34:02):
Well, you know, it certainly reminds me of my four
children at home this evening and the fact that they've
inherited this world. I would that it weren't so. I
would that we had listened to the science back when
it was clear, crystal clear in the nineteen nineties that
fossil fuels were driving warming that would drive this set
(34:22):
of climate extremes to worse. And here we are. So
that's my first and foremost sentiment. And it pains me
greatly to think that over the next twenty years, over
their lives as young adults, they're going to be witnessing
an escalation in these kinds of disasters. But it also
reminds me that they actually have been born into this.
This is part of their lived experience. We can remember
(34:44):
and talk about when we were small, it wasn't like this,
and how much that challenges our ability to imagine what's
possible with climate change. This generation they get it because
they've lived it, and they've lived those headlines and that's
all they know, and so it it does give me
hope that we can come together lean into the science
(35:04):
of resilience and all that it means for saving lives
and protecting our economy today as well as buttressing for
some of those worst case scenarios that may come to
be by mid century. So that's really just my hope,
and that caller helps me understand what's at risk, but
also the fact that this generation is ready and that
(35:27):
we owe it to them to do all we can
to leverage the vastrobe of treasure of science that we
have to protect them in our economy and our security.
Speaker 1 (35:38):
Let's go to Nate, who's in Milwaukee. Nate, welcome to
the middle Go ahead, Are you prepared for the next
natural disaster?
Speaker 14 (35:45):
Oh?
Speaker 4 (35:45):
Hi?
Speaker 15 (35:45):
Thank you for having me. I would say that, living
in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, I'm lucky enough not to be in
the line of a lot of hurricanes. I was out
in boy Scouts there an the final cloud went over
the campsite poles. So that was certainly an interesting experience
to live through. And you've got to work with people
in order to get through that. One of the things
I would say, And I appreciate that she mentioned fossil fuels,
(36:10):
considering that global warming is partly their fault each of
these disasters it happens, fossil fuels should be paying to
help clean up, or fossil fuel companies.
Speaker 1 (36:23):
Interesting point, Nate bill Weir, what about that?
Speaker 7 (36:28):
Well, he is not alone, and Nate's you're in my
hometown of Milwaukee, so good to hear.
Speaker 4 (36:33):
Ascani.
Speaker 7 (36:36):
There are dozens of lawsuits wanting their way through courts, tribals, courts, cities, states,
counties for just that, seeing big oil in some cases
for basically false advertising, for hiding the hidden dangers of
their products while claiming that they didn't know any better.
And the idea is to use those those settlements the
(37:00):
way tobacco settlement was used for education and health public
health that those settlements would be used to fortify the
city of Charleston, South Carolina, is the one sort of
spot in the red state that is suing with the
hope that they'll help pay for the billion dollar sea
wall they want to build to protect the historic quarter
of that city there. So that could be the next
(37:22):
big I mean, because it doesn't look like it's happening
in the legislator. And the hope that the private sector
was going to take this on that's kind of blown
up in the last couple of weeks. So now there's
a lot of hope. The Supreme Court sort of indicated
that they might take up this Hawaii case that is
in this space, and if they had killed it, it would
kill all the rest of them, would set a precedent.
(37:43):
Then that's what big oil is hoping for, but so
far all of those motions have been denied.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Ruth is calling from Cincinnati. Ruth, welcome to the middle
Go ahead.
Speaker 16 (37:54):
Thank you all right. I I am old, and I
was nervous, and in where I live we have something
called crisis and resilience is a whole way to do things.
The first thing told you, I'm old. The first thing
is that I have a two bad bag that I've
(38:15):
been putting together so he has enough food and water.
I grab all the meds that I have too. Don't
want to forget the meds when you're old or when
you're young, food, water, clothing, probably I haven't gotten it yet,
but something too that if there were a fire, I
could just put one of those little blankety things on. Yes,
it costs a bit of money, you put that together.
(38:36):
I want to have the little pills so that if
the water gets contaminated, I can make the water so
I could drink it. Because you can't, I couldn't have
enough anyway. Then the other thing we do is we
have ways to communicate. A ham radio. We got to
know who in the neighborhood he has one or walkie talkie.
We also want to work together and know who's old
(38:57):
and who needs help, or who is who's got animals
that get them out of here. I mean not that animals,
or certainly children or young people, any kind of people
that need help. And the thing that happens with all
of those things work together is I don't feel anxious
that I used to. I don't have to think about
(39:18):
the disaster. I mean I'm getting prepared. I haven't gotten
it together yet. That makes me feel more calm and
more like I can do something, and it helps tremendously.
We need not to feel so I'm just one other thing.
If you have an electric car, an electric car charger
on your land, on your little property, and I live
(39:39):
in I live in the city. But if you have that,
you can use your electric car somehow, there's a way
to connect to that charger together electricity to.
Speaker 1 (39:49):
Do that, get the electricity out of it, exactly, Ruth.
It sounds like you're very prepared, So thank you very much.
I'm very happy about that, and a lot I did. Yes,
Kim Cobb, what do you take away from that? I
will say, just on the issue of charging. When I
worried that the power was going to go out in
the fires, I was like, oh, at least I have
my computer. I can use that to charge my phone
(40:10):
as well. When the phone dies. I didn't realize, of course,
that the that the hot water would be gone too,
so then there's no shower. It's like, there's a lot
of things you don't think about, but anyway, go ahead
your thoughts.
Speaker 2 (40:19):
Yeah, I mean I think that that caller certainly thought
through a lot of the different layers that need to
be in place to get yourself safely through a disaster.
And I love the call out to keeping the community safe,
to thinking about those more vulnerable members of the community.
And you know, we've talked a lot about flooding, but
extreme heat is something we haven't touched on. Killed hundreds
(40:42):
of people in the Pacific Northwest a couple of years ago,
as we probably all remember, and in those instances, those
are isolated, largely elderly folks who don't have access to
the kind of communication channels that many of us click
into with our phones, and that's the kind of people
that we have to be looking out for in these moments.
So I love that call out, and I wanted to mention,
(41:05):
of course, the only way I got my husband to
sign off on solar panels on my roof was for
the resilience aspects that during a power outage, we'd have
enough power to hold our lower lower power devices and
keep going. So that's a good reason to think about
the renewable energy component here.
Speaker 1 (41:22):
Bill, we're on the issue sort of helping out your neighbors.
What you've talked to people who've been through these disasters.
How much of a responsibility do people feel once they've
figured out how to get themselves out of harm's way,
do they go and knock on every door in the
neighborhood and make sure everybody else is doing the same.
Speaker 4 (41:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (41:41):
I met some guys up in Arcadia who stayed and bought,
you know, fought the fires with buckets essentially, But they
were there, and they were they saved several homes on
their block. One thing struck on me about that last
caller who she Ruth, who was so thorough and thought
through it.
Speaker 4 (41:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (41:58):
I went up to Paradise five years after that amazingly
deadly fire up there, and two thirds of the town
never came back.
Speaker 4 (42:04):
But the third that's there really.
Speaker 7 (42:06):
Wants to be there. And they are the most galvanized,
tightest community, and they want to do it right. They
know how, they want to build around fire, live with
fire in this ecosystem.
Speaker 4 (42:15):
They have a new awareness. But I met this woman.
Speaker 7 (42:18):
Who rebuilt and she gets together with all the other
neighbors that are in her evacuation zone. It's there, you know,
whatever the number is, Zone one, twenty five club, they
meet whatever. A couple of times a month they have
a pot luck.
Speaker 4 (42:32):
Wow.
Speaker 7 (42:32):
And the people who the neighborhoods that do that in advance,
that's just a good reason to meet neighbors you didn't
know you had, Like, hey, everybody, we're getting together are
an evacuation zone to talk things through who's got the generator,
who's got the solar panels? And wow, that goes so far.
And yes, checking on your neighbors knowing who's there. And
also when I sent a new just practical idea. In
(42:54):
addition to charging you're thinking about, there's a company called
bio light that now sells.
Speaker 4 (42:59):
A camp stove or a grill that.
Speaker 7 (43:02):
Converts that heat into a phone.
Speaker 1 (43:04):
Charge or allow charge.
Speaker 7 (43:06):
While you're cooking your food or making your coffee, you
can be charging your phone. And if we start thinking
about energy on those terms, the thermal heat that we waste,
but that could be you know, certainly gathered and used,
especially in a pinch. There's so many ideas out there
like that.
Speaker 1 (43:21):
Tolliver some bill on my.
Speaker 3 (43:23):
Luck, Reggie and Roald Missouri says we're nowhere near prepared.
Having worked on two FEMA teams, I can say that
we as a nation are not even close FEMA has
resources that are available to them that are not available
at a state level at all. And then Ryan and
Pittsburgh says, for my parents' generation, it was the specter
of nuclear war, the dominated questions of are you prepared?
(43:44):
But now it appears that climate change is the existential
threat that commands the attention of those thinking how to
be prepared.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
You can again reach out to us at Listen to
the Middle dot com or on social media. And Matthew
is calling from Durham, North Carolina. Matthew, Welcome to the Middle.
Speaker 14 (43:59):
Your thoughts, Hi, thanks for having me on. I mean,
the one thing I wanted to say on here is that,
you know, I was in my PHG program when Hurricane
Harvey hit in Houston, and during that, you know, learning
the process, also trying to trying to finish grad school
(44:20):
and all that.
Speaker 8 (44:20):
The big thing that.
Speaker 14 (44:21):
We have now that I'm actually in industry as an
engineer is that we have hundreds of millions of dollars
of projects. A lot of studies have been done, a
lot of them are sitting on shelves. And I think
this was mentioned a little earlier as well, is that
there's millions of now well most of the time, billions
of dollars of projects and ideas and things that could
get done, but nobody wants to fund them and there's
(44:44):
no money to fund them. You know, you're talking about
you know, cities in East Texas that you know, hey, one
hundred million dollar project could save one hundred thousand houses,
but where are they going to get a hundred million
dollars when they're annual budgets in the in the single
mis right, It's it's a matter of when it was
mentioned before that eighteen year old was really inspiring. But
(45:05):
the thing that we're doing is basically continuing to kick
the can for preparedness and rightiness in terms of how
we're building, how we're designing, how we're planning, and we're
at a point where we are well sunk.
Speaker 4 (45:20):
Right.
Speaker 14 (45:20):
FEMA spends way more money on natural disaster recovery than
they do on grants to mitigate and prevent, and it's
been that way, you know, grossly escalating each year. And
I think we just need to take this conversation to
say that, like, we haven't invested in infrastructure since the nineteen
fifties in that manner, and we really need to revamp
(45:43):
a lot of these aging systems, aging codes, aging planning methods,
so that we can actually get ahead into the twenty thirties,
twenty fifties.
Speaker 1 (45:52):
Yeah, Matthew, thank you, Kim Cobb. A great point I
want to bring to you. As you know, people have said,
let's just take the case of like hurricanes Sandy back
in New York ten years ago or twelve years ago.
They said, if they had just put they'd spent you know,
tens of billions of dollars putting gates in the harbor,
they would have saved much more money from the flooding
that occurred and caused all the kinds of trouble. This
(46:13):
is you could say this in many of these disasters.
Speaker 2 (46:16):
Yeah, you know, pay now or pay one hundred times later.
You know, that's the bottom line the caller was getting at.
And it's so true. And so what I want to
leave folks with is also the idea that you can
be advocates for resilience planning within your township and your city.
You can demand that these plans consider the latest and
greatest science and identify where these investments are most critical
(46:38):
to protect property and lives and economies. You can advocate
at the state level. Every state should have a state
Resilience officer and a state resilience plan that is using
the science and service to the public good. And of
course we can recognize the federal opportunities for investments and resilience.
We may not believe about solar panels and windmills, but
(47:00):
I think we can all get behind the federal government
making strategic, cost effective investments in keeping communities safe from
these worsening climate extremes. And those are places where people
can leverage their voice for good. It's not just enough
to work on an individual home by home level. We
have to begin to get the plans in place at local,
(47:21):
state and federal levels to protect ourselves as much as
possible from the damages that are here and will worsen
going forward.
Speaker 1 (47:28):
Bill Ware, I'm going to give you the last word
because we are running out of time this hour, and
let me ask you this. Maybe this is a slightly
positive note. We are obviously dealing with a lot of
devastation from these disasters around the country, and losing a
home is terrible, and losing your stuff and your memories
is terrible. But are we getting better at keeping the
(47:49):
death toll down in these disasters, that people are getting
the warnings and you should we you know, yeah, getting
out of harm's way.
Speaker 4 (47:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 7 (47:57):
So you look at the statistics over the last century,
even as storms have intensified, you know, thanks to emergency
warning systems, thanks to great medicine, that those casualty rates
go down. But at a certain point you can't adapt
fast enough. If the earth changes beyond our capacity to adapt,
you know, then that's when things.
Speaker 4 (48:17):
Get really rough. But yes, I look at the.
Speaker 7 (48:19):
Devastation in Los Angeles County and I was shocked that
the casualties, you know, the fatalities were in the double digits.
I thought for sure they'd be in the hundreds given
but people heated the warnings, they got out in time,
not enough, sadly the people who were lost at is.
Speaker 4 (48:37):
But we are.
Speaker 7 (48:39):
Getting better at that, but only to a point, right,
and then when the disasters get too big. But I
like to think about it from the old psychology one
on one days of Maslow's pyramid of needs. You know,
if you remember that at the bottom of the pyramid
the stuff that keeps us alive air, water, proper temperature.
The second layer, which is shelter and information and economy.
(49:00):
I took all of those for granted when I was
growing up, and now I'm talking to my kids about
where what is in our air, where does our water
come from? Think about our food chain? You know, do
we have six hours of power if.
Speaker 4 (49:13):
We need it? If everything goes black?
Speaker 7 (49:15):
And it's just a shift in mindset, and then we
can get the top of the pyramid. The love and
esteem needs that we can't imagine getting from therapy and
social media. By plugging in with our neighbors, leaning into
nature and each other, around community and resilience.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
That is a perfect way to end the hour. I
want to thank my guest seeing in Chief Climate correspondent
Bill Weir and Kim cob director of the Institute of
Bround for Environment and Society, Thank you.
Speaker 4 (49:39):
Both so much.
Speaker 7 (49:42):
This is great.
Speaker 1 (49:43):
Next week, tell ever, we're going to be talking about
something that's been the news a lot lately. That is
cryptocurrency like bitcoin and whether it actually has any value
to society at all.
Speaker 3 (49:51):
Just in time for the launch of middle coin. I
got a feeling about this, man. Middle Coin is gonna
be huge. Yeah, as always, you can call in at
a four four four middle that's eight four four four
six four, Fleet three five three, or you can reach
out and listen to the Middle dot com. You can
also sign up for our newsletter.
Speaker 8 (50:06):
There.
Speaker 3 (50:07):
Don't forget to check out our new video podcast on
a YouTube dot com where you can watch us as
well as hear us.
Speaker 1 (50:12):
The Middle is brought to you by Longnok Media, distributed
by Illinois Public Media and Orbana Illinois and produced by
Harrison Fatiino, Danny Alexander, Sam Burmisdas, John barth On, Kadeshler,
and Brandon Condritz. Our technical director is Jason Croft. Thanks
to the more than four hundred and twenty public radio
stations that are making it possible for people across the
country to listen to The Middle, I am Jeremy Hobson
and I will talk to you next week.
Host
Jeremy Hobson
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