A Wyoming meteorologist is taking exception to claims that the historic flooding in Yellowstone National Park this week is the result of climate change.
Don Day, the founder and CEO of Day Weather, on Tuesday scoffed at the statement of a Los Angeles Times reporter that warm weather on the East coast, wildfires in the southwest and the Yellowstone floods are proof of the weather phenomena.
“This is what climate change looks like,” Sammy Roth, an LA Times energy reporter, said in an emotional tweet.
Day, in an interview with Cowboy State Daily, differed with Roth’s conclusion.
“If these people had any understanding of weather history or what has happened in the past with weather and climate across the globe, then they would have an appreciation that things like this happen all the time and they happened all the time before the Industrial Revolution,” Day said.
No matter what the weather, Day said, some people will will blame climate change for everything.
According to proponents of the concept, Day said, in the absence of climate change, there would be no floods, no fires, no heat waves, no blizzards and no extreme cold.
“That doesn’t make any sense,” Day said. “These are totally sensationalistic and emotional statements.”
Yellowstone was closed and evacuated Monday in what at least one former federal official said was the park’s first complete closure in its 150-year history.
Park officials were prompted to take the action by flooding of area rivers swollen to levels not seen for decades by torrential rain and melting snow.
The flooding wiped out roads in the northern part of the park and damaged water and wastewater systems. Superintendent Cam Sholly has said it will be at least Saturday before the southern half of the park can be reopened.
