Scientists say that America could be challenged by unprecedented medieval style mega-droughts in the future. A mega-drought is defined as very dry conditions that extend from 20 to 50 years. California’s current drought doesn’t compare in the slightest to some droughts in the 12th and 13th centuries, or to what is feared will come in the future.
“These mega-droughts during the 1100s and 1200s persisted for 20, 30, 40, 50 years at a time, and they were droughts that no one in the history of the United States has ever experienced,” said Ben Cook of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies.
Scientists compared tree ring data from the 12th and 13th centuries to understand the magnitude of droughts during that time. Tree rings are wider during wetter years. They also compared the tree ring data to 17 climate models using various indicators for soil moisture to predict moisture levels for the coming decades. The study suggests epochal events unprecedented in the last 1000 years may lie ahead.
Scientists have now compared these earlier droughts with climate simulations for the coming decades based on the assumption that greenhouse gasses would remain at their current levels. They say that higher temperatures causing evaporation and less precipitation because of increased greenhouse gasses will parch the soil in large swaths of the United States.
The NASA study suggests that the sun will scorch cracked earth, baking it dry several feet below the surface over vast regions of the country continuing for decades. Large water reservoirs could become ponds forcing cities to ration water to residents.
“And what the group found was clear and consistent: that after 2050, the Southwest and the Central Plains would likely shift to drier conditions that exceeded even the great drought epochs of the so-called ‘Medieval Climate Anomaly’ in the 12th and 13th Centuries.”
If precipitation is only 80% of what is needed for another couple of decades, Tucson, AZ, which has been in drought since the 1990s, could qualify as having mega-drought conditions. Scientists are saying that there is an 80% risk of a 35-year-long drought by the end of the century.
“And there shall be famines…” Matthew 24:7
“But it shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command thee this day; that all these curses shall come upon thee, and overtake thee… And thy heaven that is over thy head shall be brass, and the earth that is under thee shall be iron. The LORD shall make the rain of thy land powder and dust: from heaven shall it come down upon thee, until thou be destroyed.” Deuteronomy 28:15, 23, 24
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