Before We Lost the Lake is filled with evidence of the seemingly futile hundred-year human struggle to tame Sumas Lake by draining it of water and turning it into fertile prairie, a never-ending battle to build and re-build dikes and infrastructure in the face of recurring flood episodes of varying magnitudes going back centuries. Sumas and areas south of the United States border have experienced so-called 100-year floods in 1908-1909 and 1932. Floods ranked as 35-year events occurred in 1945, 1949,1955,1975, and 1990. At least a dozen others are on the record.
Instead of preparing for the floods, all levels of government, but especially the province of British Columbia along with Ottawa, spent most of the last few decades revving up the long-range aspects of climate change alarm. Instead of promoting the urgency to prepare for the well-understood flood risks, they hyped the long-run but uncertain risks and speculative events forecast for 80 to 100 years in the future.
No comments:
Post a Comment