The Omega Letter Intelligence Digest
Vol: 46 Issue: 14 - Thursday, July 14, 2005
The Disaster Years . . .
Those of us living in the 'Hurricane Zone' along the Gulf Coast and mid-Atlantic region are bracing for what forecasters are calling another 'historic' hurricane season.
"NOAA's prediction for the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season is for 12 to 15 tropical storms, with seven to nine becoming hurricanes, of which three to five could become major hurricanes," said retired Navy Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Ph.D., undersecretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator at a recent news conference in Bay St. Louis, Miss.
"Forecaster confidence that this will be an active hurricane season is very high," he said.
This season has already shattered records, with more named storms so far this year than at any time since record-keeping began, and forecasters are predicting that this year could see twenty or more. On average, a 'busy' hurricane season is one in which there are between twelve and fifteen named storms.
The Atlantic hurricane season began June first and ends November 30th.
Hurricanes form once ocean surface temperatures reach 80-82 degrees, and are then carried along across the Atlantic by prevailing winds. In most years, it takes several weeks of summer for the ocean surfaces to get that warm.
This year, it got warmer than usual, earlier than usual, and is expected to get even warmer. Last weekend, water temperatures fifty miles off the North Carolina coast were as high as 84 degrees in some places where the water temps seldom get out of the high 70s.
Further exacerbating the problem is the unusual heat wave gripping the Great Lakes area. Mike, who lives in Canada on the Niagara Peninsula between Lakes Erie and Ontario, told me that hit 102 in the shade in his backyard the other day.
Forecasters say the Great Lakes heat wave's effects will put new hurricanes up the Atlantic Coast by August, giving Florida and the Gulf Coast a break but shifting the landfall threat northward from Georgia to Virginia.
According to NOAA, every year since 1995 except for two existing records for extremes of heat, rain, hurricanes and cyclones world-wide were shattered.
Assessment:
There can be little doubt that there is some kind of earth-changing event, whether it be global warming or not, that is affecting global weather patterns. The summer of 2003 was the hottest summer in Europe in more than 250 years.
That was the year that a total of 412 tornadoes ravaged eight US states, breaking all existing records for the month of May. In January, 2003, record cold claimed 670 lives in northern India. In June, a heatwave in India was responsible for more than 1,500 heat-related deaths.
2004 saw Florida all but flattened by a record number of successive hurricanes that then roared up the southeastern US, leaving billions of dollars and dozens of deaths in its wake.
Weather patterns have been shifting measurably since the 1960's and the patterns are responsible for an increasingly unstable climate.
Noted the UN's World Meteorological Organization on July 2, 2003, “New record extreme events occur every year somewhere in the globe, but in recent years the number of such extremes have been increasing.”
In addition, there has been a corresponding spike in interest (and fear) of an impending meteor strike somewhere on the earth. Literally billions of dollars have already been spent preparing for the next 'Big One' -- although the last Big One, according to secular science, hit the earth some 85,000 years ago.
(Put another way, 79,000 years before Adam. Doesn't it strike you as somewhat peculiar that suddenly, in the past few decades, it has become a major issue?)
In 2003, an unusual period of solar activity, or sunspots, baffled astronomers and scientists. Scientists know that sunspots occur in cycles. An 11-year cycle of sunspot activity seems to emerge from the detailed records of the 21 sunspot cycles observed since 1755.
But solar maximum period concluded in the year 2000 and the sun should now be in its minimum active phase. There should be little to no solar activity until 2012 or later. Instead, scientists say this is one of the most turbulent periods of solar activity since 1940, during a solar maximum event.
On March 6, 2003 the largest, most active sunspot ever seen had solar scientists around the world poised to warn of impending flare effects on Earth.
The unusual spot created a new, giant flare almost daily, saturating the space between the Sun and Earth with solar X-rays, gamma rays, and protons, and creating surging waves in the solar wind that disturbed the Earth's magnetic field with unprecedented regularity.
Richard Wilson, a NASA researcher, authored a study for the Goddard Space Institute about the strange activity in the sun.
"Historical records of solar activity indicate that solar radiation has been increasing since the late 19th century. If a trend, comparable to the one found in this study, persisted throughout the 20th century, it would have provided a significant component of the global warming the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports to have occurred over the past 100 years."
We've discussed this in the past, and that fact that the weather is the subject of headline news again this season only lends credence to what we've been seeing, relative to Bible prophecy for the last days.
Jesus gave signs that would signal His soon return. When He outlined those signs, He said they would be like 'birth pangs' -- increasing in both frequency and intensity as the end of the age approached.
He spoke of wars and rumors of wars, famines, earthquakes, pestilences and a climate of deception, on an ever increasing scale. He spoke of Israel as a literal place in the last days, and foretold Jerusalem's rise to global prominence at the appointed time. He said Jerusalem would remain in Gentile hands until the times of the Gentiles were fulfilled.
All this is headline news for this generation. And THEN He said;
"And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; Men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken. And then shall they see the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. And when these things BEGIN to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh." (Luke 21:25-28)
"So likewise ye, when ye see these things come to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand. Verily I say unto you, THIS GENERATION SHALL NOT PASS AWAY TILL ALL BE FULFILLED." (Luke 21:31-32)
Can't say it much plainer than that.
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