OT: 2024 Weather Thread

[OfCorsiDid]

Simple solution: Just keep increasing the carbon tax. That should solve most issues, including this one.

Carbon tax is a weird one.

I think in a ideal world, corporations (specifically those in high-emissions industries such as manufacturing, oil & gas, trucking) would pay the vast majority with the feds setting a price per tonne of CO2 and ensuring a bit of a rebate kick back for the average Canadian to offset the increase in prices and gas.

However, the lack of productivity and political will has led to a system that is pretty weak on businesses yet punishes the average Canadian due to a direct tax on gasoline.

Also as mentioned earlier, a lot of neglected government funded entities (such as Parks Canada and the military) are woefully underfunded. Either way it's incumbent on someone to figure out how to fund these items while not increasing the tax burden on the average Canadian. I'm not sure what the solution is.

Won't always be able to count on insurance if this stuff keeps up. Insurance is to look after possibilities, not probabilities. And certainly not probabilities that keep happening every 2nd year or so.

Yeah that's what I'm alluding to. Insurance companies still have to make money. If they're losing millions due to increased natural disasters they're not going to continue to insure property or the acquisition cost will be so astronomical that it'll be not practical for most Canadians.

 

[Sra1974]

Carbon tax is a weird one.

I think in a ideal world, corporations (specifically those in high-emissions industries such as manufacturing, oil & gas, trucking) would pay the vast majority with the feds setting a price per tonne of CO2 and ensuring a bit of a rebate kick back for the average Canadian to offset the increase in prices and gas.

However, the lack of productivity and political will has led to a system that is pretty weak on businesses yet punishes the average Canadian due to a direct tax on gasoline.

Also as mentioned earlier, a lot of neglected government funded entities (such as Parks Canada and the military) are woefully underfunded. Either way it's incumbent on someone to figure out how to fund these items while not increasing the tax burden on the average Canadian. I'm not sure what the solution is.



Yeah that's what I'm alluding to. Insurance companies still have to make money. If they're losing millions due to increased natural disasters they're not going to continue to insure property or the acquisition cost will be so astronomical that it'll be not practical for most Canadians.

“Corporations” have their hand in one pocket, the consumer. Tax em all you want, you will get to pay for it. Not saying it shouldn’t happen, but it’s not free.

 

[BlackDogg]

Simple solution: Just keep increasing the carbon tax. That should solve most issues, including this one.

Yep, I'll pay 100% tax if it stops just one fire.

 

[Drivesaitl]

It's pretty astonishing that Parks Canada protects about the same amount of land that the US Parks Service does (~85 million acres or 350,000 sq km) but has nearly 3.5x less budget ($1.3 billion CAD, 2021) and 4.3x less employees (4,666) than the US Parks Service ($4.51 billion CAD, 20,000 employees).

Like what are we doing here?

For whatever reason, there's no real push by any federal party to increase this spending either. It's like the military. I guess it's not sexy enough for federal politics. Meanwhile Trudeau is trying to convince NATO members that he is committed to defense spending despite decades of cuts and Pollivere is too obsessed with making stupid memes rather than presenting a solution to the issues. And Jagmeet, well, who gives a f*** what he has to say.

It's also f***ing ridiculous that the feds can't use federal resources to fight wildfires on national parkland without approval from the provincial government in which the park resides or using the emergencies act. The Politics in this country makes it worse since neither Trudeau or Smith will want to ask for help until it's absolutely needed because they don't want to give each other any support since they're diametrically opposed to each other.

So as a result, the climate warms, towns burn to the ground, and the average Canadian is left to pick up the pieces.

That's what insurance is for.

Or well until insurance stops covering stuff like fires and floods due to climate change.

Major difference being that Canadas Parks, particularly the Mountain Parks make a shitton of revenue and have enormous amounts of visitors compared to per capita the US and their parks. The other is its misleading to look at landmass as Canadian Parks tend to be much bigger and several of them are located in areas up North seldom used or visited. Essentially just being preserves so not much cost to run anything. Wood Buffalo alone being example of that.

In the US the idea of parks tends to be more about putting them in areas that are generally going to see a lot of visitors. In Canada its also a sense of far off isolated preserves being protected. Kind of an apples oranges comparison as far as funding and expenditures.

In anycase Canadian NP's are run like a leaky bucket anyway. They have 6 expensive helicopters in Jasper for search and rescue and they tried using those for the fire fight. lol. The procurement is nuts. I wouldn't trust these people with more money.

 

[Drivesaitl]

Carbon tax is a weird one.

I think in a ideal world, corporations (specifically those in high-emissions industries such as manufacturing, oil & gas, trucking) would pay the vast majority with the feds setting a price per tonne of CO2 and ensuring a bit of a rebate kick back for the average Canadian to offset the increase in prices and gas.

However, the lack of productivity and political will has led to a system that is pretty weak on businesses yet punishes the average Canadian due to a direct tax on gasoline.

Also as mentioned earlier, a lot of neglected government funded entities (such as Parks Canada and the military) are woefully underfunded. Either way it's incumbent on someone to figure out how to fund these items while not increasing the tax burden on the average Canadian. I'm not sure what the solution is.



Yeah that's what I'm alluding to. Insurance companies still have to make money. If they're losing millions due to increased natural disasters they're not going to continue to insure property or the acquisition cost will be so astronomical that it'll be not practical for most Canadians.

The Military and Navy are also shockingly wasteful. For instance the yet another Irwin Shipbuilding contracts for 5 boats costing over 5B that can't float, steer, and are loaded with problems. They've been essentially unusable and one sunk almost on the way to Hawaii and is now parked their until further notice. Repairs possibly costing more than the new rust bucket is worth. The whole Irwin Shipbuilding contracts and saga are a sham on their own. Canada is so damned corrupt you can't trust any of these federal agencies to actually get value on a dollar or even avoid getting robbed. Oh and the Warrantees on the ships are one year and all expired. With the ships being expired soon too in all likelihood. Boondogggle after boondoggle. "Underfunded" How about how many in the military and Navy are overpaid?

 

[Drivesaitl]

I believe they said they evacuated 24K people, that's a lot with limited time and few route options.

This is their approximation. Its way off. Its understated. 5K residents, probably 22K hotel and campground visitors as the park was filled up to capacity. Articles also mention that across the park there are as many as 12 staffer working the parks.

Then, and this wasn't even considered in the counts is that on any given day Highway 16 and icefields parkway have an every day level of visitors that are just day visitors just driving through. In the Summer in July that would be further thousands.

Its quite likely that the actual number that were in Jasper was closer to 50K than the 25K being stated. Easily there would be 40K people in Jasper Park at the time. Thats even assuming even a modest average of 3 people/per available hotel room or campsite in the park. btw that be approx 2300 campsites not even including overflow, and 4-5K hotel rooms in the park.

I haven't even included hostel beds. Or that many of the Jasper residents of course have summer visitors and friends staying with them during summer. Not even factored in.

Its shocking really how little grasp even the town and park staff have of the overall numbers. Theres 2.4M visitors per year in Jasper. This was peak time, high as it gets.

 

[ThreeOfAPerfectPair]

Some info on jurisdiction.

https://x.com/i/web/status/1816556745998893563

 

[Barrsy]

Odd that the Provinces have always been the ones fighting the fires and seemingly took on that responsibility. odd that only at 4 pm Loewen asked for the feds help.

 

[bellagiobob]

Odd that the Provinces have always been the ones fighting the fires and seemingly took on that responsibility. odd that only at 4 pm Loewen asked for the feds help.

Far too much pride and stay out of our business going on. There are times the Feds and Prov need to stop the pissing match and this was one of those times.

 

[Barrsy]

Far too much pride and stay out of our business going on. There are times the Feds and Prov need to stop the pissing match and this was one of those times.

This 100%

 

[Stoneman89]

We had 2 clients insured in Jasper, both in condo units. Amazingly, both are in the destruction zone and were untouched. Directly across the street from them looks like the apocalypse. Incredible. The wind must have been going directly across them instead of toward them.

 

[Drivesaitl]

According to FIRMs satellite tracking map Fire has now breached into Tonquin Valley, an absolute jewel of Jasper, and has reached Cavell lake and has hit Cavell creek and forest around meadows. Absolutely tragic. One of the most beautiful hiking areas in Jasper National Park hit.

For those that remember the last major catastrophe at Mt Edith Cavell was the collapse of the Ghost Glacier that created a tsunami and flooded out Cavell road and area for miles. Looks like the area will be closed again for a longtime. Hostel there probably also hit.

This fire is leaving little untouched.

 

[5 Mins 4 Ftg]

 

[Mr Kot]

Coincidence that people are mentioning the pine beetles and failure of government to respond, then I run into this. Pretty good video breaking the problem down.

 

[OfCorsiDid]

Major difference being that Canadas Parks, particularly the Mountain Parks make a shitton of revenue and have enormous amounts of visitors compared to per capita the US and their parks. The other is its misleading to look at landmass as Canadian Parks tend to be much bigger and several of them are located in areas up North seldom used or visited. Essentially just being preserves so not much cost to run anything. Wood Buffalo alone being example of that.

In the US the idea of parks tends to be more about putting them in areas that are generally going to see a lot of visitors. In Canada its also a sense of far off isolated preserves being protected. Kind of an apples oranges comparison as far as funding and expenditures.

In anycase Canadian NP's are run like a leaky bucket anyway. They have 6 expensive helicopters in Jasper for search and rescue and they tried using those for the fire fight. lol. The procurement is nuts. I wouldn't trust these people with more money.

Overall, NP revenue only accounts for 25% of the cost to run all national parks. The rest comes from the federal budget.

Tasking the same organization that provides campsites and tours with firefighting and forest management is folly in my opinion. There needs to be a federal organization dedicated to forest management and wildfires.

The patchwork of provincial and federal resources that currently exist is bending under the stress of several rough fire seasons and it's unlikely to improve.

 

[Drivesaitl]

Overall, NP revenue only accounts for 25% of the cost to run all national parks. The rest comes from the federal budget.

Tasking the same organization that provides campsites and tours with firefighting and forest management is folly in my opinion. There needs to be a federal organization dedicated to forest management and wildfires.

The patchwork of provincial and federal resources that currently exist is bending under the stress of several rough fire seasons and it's unlikely to improve.

Banff and Jasper combined have more visitation and collect more revenue than the rest of the parks in the nation combined. However much of this revenue does not stay in the two most important parks its allocated to the rest of the Park System and one that has had a missive to basically overreach and try to make more parks and preserves than can be funded, that are even possible to fund and maintain.

 

[Sra1974]

According to FIRMs satellite tracking map Fire has now breached into Tonquin Valley, an absolute jewel of Jasper, and has reached Cavell lake and has hit Cavell creek and forest around meadows. Absolutely tragic. One of the most beautiful hiking areas in Jasper National Park hit.

For those that remember the last major catastrophe at Mt Edith Cavell was the collapse of the Ghost Glacier that created a tsunami and flooded out Cavell road and area for miles. Looks like the area will be closed again for a longtime. Hostel there probably also hit.

This fire is leaving little untouched.

Where are you even seeing firms data? Their homepage has a disclaimer they don’t have any imagery there for days due to smoke and cloud cover. Last update I saw was from around Tuesday night I think.

 

[Drivesaitl]

Where are you even seeing firms data? Their homepage has a disclaimer they don’t have any imagery there for days due to smoke and cloud cover. Last update I saw was from around Tuesday night I think.

Correct. I just got the disclaimer today. First day I've been getting that disclaimer. I backtracked and seems like it hasn't updated since Wednesday. Still, even from Wednesday data Cavell road and area is besieged. As well as the Cavell creek and treeline leading to meadows.

 

[SupremeTeam16]

Tasking the same organization that provides campsites and tours with firefighting and forest management is folly in my opinion. There needs to be a federal organization dedicated to forest management and wildfires.

The patchwork of provincial and federal resources that currently exist is bending under the stress of several rough fire seasons and it's unlikely to improve.

why would NP be responsible for forest management? Shouldn’t that be handled by the Canadian forest services which is an arm of resources Canada?

The issue is that this federal government is beholden to eco nuts who scream bloody murder any time a tree is cut down and who don’t understand how critical programs like selective logging are.

Feds had been getting warned for years about this exact situation but they never acted because they knew if they did they’d have a bunch of their dwindling base of voters coalescing in Jasper chaining themselves to trees to protest logging in a national park.

 

[Sra1974]

Correct. I just got the disclaimer today. First day I've been getting that disclaimer. I backtracked and seems like it hasn't updated since Wednesday. Still, even from Wednesday data Cavell road and area is besieged. As well as the Cavell creek and treeline leading to meadows.

Thanks was just curious. By the time we get an update it’s going to be too late since it’s looking for active fires I think. There is going to be a ton of devestated landscape for sure. Does look like marmot may have escaped based on the parks Canada map but who knows(I know you aren’t a skier but matters to my family).

 

[Drivesaitl]

Thanks was just curious. By the time we get an update it’s going to be too late since it’s looking for active fires I think. There is going to be a ton of devestated landscape for sure. Does look like marmot may have escaped based on the parks Canada map but who knows(I know you aren’t a skier but matters to my family).

I wonder how hard Whistlers, Wapita and Wabasso Campgrounds were hit. On the ground details it seems will take very long. Its too bad Parks Canada prevent any usage of drone cameras. Would actually be quite helpful and also is in spotting spot fires and such. Its so odd how they don't use present technology and resource.

 

[doulos]

It's amazing how Replacement is an expert on literally every topic that ever gets brought up and thinks he knows better....lol. Never change old man.

 

[Sra1974]

I wonder how hard Whistlers, Wapita and Wabasso Campgrounds were hit. On the ground details it seems will take very long. Its too bad Parks Canada prevent any usage of drone cameras. Would actually be quite helpful and also is in spotting spot fires and such. Its so odd how they don't use present technology and resource.

Very hard to imagine they weren’t hit hard, but these fires are weird as they make massive leaps due to throwing embers. For example Alpine cabin is saying they lost 25 of 55 cabins. There would’ve been no firefighting there I’m sure, how even one survives just seems so random.

As for drones I think they do get used by services in appropriate situations.

 

[brentashton]

I wonder how hard Whistlers, Wapita and Wabasso Campgrounds were hit. On the ground details it seems will take very long. Its too bad Parks Canada prevent any usage of drone cameras. Would actually be quite helpful and also is in spotting spot fires and such. Its so odd how they don't use present technology and resource.

Parks Canada

Canadian Women’s Soccer Team

 

[93LEAFS]

We had 2 clients insured in Jasper, both in condo units. Amazingly, both are in the destruction zone and were untouched. Directly across the street from them looks like the apocalypse. Incredible. The wind must have been going directly across them instead of toward them.

having family there, they are amazed my cousins apartment survived, but my uncles house went. My uncle thought aspects of it were related to trees and catchable things near by. He was in the zone in the map you see that is all red. But, he said his neighbors survived, and it may have been the two big trees in his lawn that helped fuel it.