Definition of
The Coming Global Superstorm
from Wikipedia Website
 

 

The Coming Global Superstorm is a 1999 book by Art Bell & Whitley Strieber which predicts that global warming might produce sudden and catastrophic climatic effects. The 2004 movie, The Day After Tomorrow is based in part on this book.

The book posits the following theory:

  • First, that the Gulf Stream and North Atlantic drift generates a cordon of warm water around the north pole, which in turn creates a cordon of warm air that holds in a frozen mass of arctic air.

  • Second, that if the Gulf Stream were to shut down, that barrier would fail, releasing a flood of frozen air into the northern hemisphere, effecting a sudden and drastic temperature shift.

The book discusses a possible cause of the failure of the gulf stream: that the melting of the polar ice caps could drastically affect the salinity of the North Atlantic drift by dumping a large quantity of freshwater into the world's oceans.

Bell and Strieber explain the possibility that such current destabilizations have occurred before. Among their citations is the island city of Nan Madol - the claim is made that its construction, with exacting tolerances and extremely heavy basalt materials, necessitates a high degree of technical competency.

 

Since no such society exists in the modern record - or, even, in legend - this society must have been destroyed by dramatic means. While other explanations beside a global meteorological event are possible, a correlating evidence set is presented in the woolly mammoth.

 

Strieber and Bell assert that, since mammoths have been found preserved with food still in their mouths and undigested in their stomachs, that these animals must have been cut down quickly, in otherwise normal conditions, and been preserved so well by quick freezing. This is taken as evidence of a rapid onset of a global blizzard or similar event.

Interspersed with the analytical parts of the book are a series of interlinked short stories, describing what might transpire today, should a destabilization of the North Atlantic Current occur.

 

These fictional accounts of "current events" as the meteorological situation deteriorates provided background and inspiration for the 2004 science-fiction film The Day After Tomorrow and, indeed, some events from the book are portrayed in the film with little modification.

 



WHAT IS A GLOBAL SUPERSTORM?
from GlobalSuperStorm Website

A global superstorm is a severe consequence of global warming. The theory behind it is a complex theory of events triggered each by the one before it. It starts off with global warming melting the polar ice caps. This was first argued to cause a complete climate flip and deserts would turn to rainforests and rainforests to nothing but a memory.

 

The actual facts state that the Earth goes through a cycle unknown to man until recently. As you might know, the Earth has been hit with ice ages many, many times before. Now science knows why. Earth foregoes a dangerous cycle which includes hundreds of thousands of years of ice and glaciers known as an ice age until the Sun is finally able to force the glaciers back and a climate similar to the one we know now comes to the places where glaciers once ruled.

 

This period of warmth is brief in the actual scheme of the planet. It ends when there are enough greenhouse gases in the planet’s atmosphere to trigger another ice age, introduced by a superstorm. These greenhouse gases are put into the atmosphere naturally and accustom themselves with the cycle of the planet. No problem there.

 

Another ice age starts, ends, and the warmth comes back. This is where humans come in. Millions of factories have sped up this precious cycle by such a great amount of time that predictions for the next ice age were left in the dark with those who predicted them. Now we are living in the precious few moments before another ice age begins.

 

Although an ice age doesn’t have to happen, (fossil records show that around 7,000-10,000 years ago, a superstorm hit in the summer and the ice could melt before winter struck and placed more snow on the already existing snow) they are more like an after-taste, the main feature being the reckless storm crushing down hard-packed snow on top of half the world.

 

Once the ice melts up north, the fresh water will disturb the fragile combination of salt and fresh water that make up the North Atlantic Current (NAC).

 

The NAC, as soon as it failed, would allow freezing air to come swooping down from the arctic. This air would collide with the warm air moving up from the south, where it was heated. The collision would produce a storm we cannot imagine. The movie “The Day After Tomorrow” illustrates the storm in the formation of a hurricane with an eye (Although a storm would be produced, I cannot say for myself that it would have an eye, or even be hurricane like, yet I have not concluded studies on it).

 

This eye would be like a gateway to the above atmosphere in which air would fall to the Earth, dropping the temperatures by 100°F and further. The theory of global warming tells us that the greenhouse gases would trap heat from leaving our planet. This means that the above atmosphere isn’t receiving the heat it used to and so the temperature is dropping about 50°F a year, therefore providing those extreme temperatures that would fall down the eye and smother the people of the northern hemisphere, freezing them instantly.

A global superstorm overall, is not something you want to experience, and even if it is, you must have a soft spot for the lives of others. The key thing is that it is still delayble, although never preventable.

 

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