the new normal

Hotter, drier, and more volatile — the story of a changing climate by Kate Scott

As per usual, cricket plays in the background of the Boxing Day BBQ. Your uncles,brothers and cousins cheer on every thwack of ball against bat. As an ad break begins, breaking news presenters read the headline: “Climate Change major contributor to Bushfire disaster”. Your uncle takes a swig of his Corona and grimaces, “Australia’s always had bushfires.” he calls out to the TV, “this is normal!”

You remember the first time you saw a severe weather event. You were four years old. That day, you danced around the sprinkler in your aunt and uncle’s front yard. Bright pink zinc smeared across your nose and your feet poked by bindis in the wet grass. When the dark storm clouds appeared on the horizon, the sprinkler was turned off and you were ushered inside. It wasn’t long before pieces of ice “the size of golf balls” fell from the sky. You had gone to Sunday school and were certain that this was the end of the world, that the rapture was coming. Your mum ran inside from her banged up car, slipping on the ice. She ended up needing a bag of peas for the growing welt on her head and bruises on her shoulders.

It’s years before you see hail again — outdoor furniture ripped to shreds and the car taken to repairs for dents and cracks. But as you get older, hail becomes a staple of summer, no longer a rare occasion. Now every time those thunderstorms roll over the horizon, you are waiting. Arms filled with old outdoor cushions and towels, you wait for that first piece of ice to hit the ground. And then you run, racing to cover the cars on the street with enough padding before they get damaged. And as your toe gets banged up by a rogue piece of hail, you swear this wasn’t always the norm.

In high school, you learn about energy production and mining. You learn about how it can release gases that keep heat in the atmosphere like a greenhouse. That summer, the school tells students with asthma to stay home one Wednesday because of bushfire smoke. You come back to Sydney before Christmas last year. You thought the lights you saw outside the aeroplane window were towns, but the orange glow gave them away. You see the map of fires on your phone and are filled to terror. On the news you see charred rubble where towns used to be. You see families in water up to their waists and the sky a blazing red. You see animals covered in burns and bandages. You try to fall asleep at night but feel like you’re choking on the smoke, and gasp for air.

And yet, the Prime Minister assures that “we’ve had bushfires before.’’

But we haven’t, not like this. We haven’t had over 17 million hectares burned in a single fire season, so close to civilisation. We haven’t seen smoke so vast it could be smelled in South America. This isn’t normal. It is the violent throes of climate that is changing, becoming hotter, drier, and more volatile. We’ve known this since Scientists predicted it way back in the 80’s.

Yet people like your uncle put on their tinfoil hats and disregard those “leftie snowflake scientists.” They argue that it is normal, or blame the collective efforts of hundreds of arsonists when only 24 individuals have been charged with committing arson this bushfire season.