I’ve spent the past few days very worried about my chickens.
I’m from Wilmington, and I’ve been waiting anxiously for updates about the storm that made landfall on the southeastern coast of North Carolina early this morning. My mom and sister ended up heading to Atlanta to stay with my dad and wait out the storm, with two large dogs and one unhappy cat in tow. But they had to leave our chickens behind. My mom did some research and came to the conclusion that leaving them to free-range in our backyard, keeping the coop door open, was the safest option. I’m not sure I entirely agree with that. There are a lot of trees in our backyard. What if a branch falls on them? What if raccoons sneak into their coop at night and eat them? What if their coop floods (which is what happened last time we had a lot of rain)? What if the heavy winds knock the coop over and crush them?
Hurricanes like Katrina and Harvey and Maria and Florence are a sobering reminder of technology’s limits when it comes to harnessing Mother Nature. We invented air conditioning to keep us cool, but the energy used is slowly warming the rest of the planet. We’ve got seismometers and laser beams that track tectonic plate movement, but we still can’t accurately predict volcanic eruptions or earthquakes. We have weather balloons and satellite images and “hurricane-tracking,” but despite these efforts, the predicted route of Hurricane Florence has changed three times in the past three days. Our power to predict nature is limited. Our power to control it? Nonexistent.
Another thing to consider is how the relationship between technology and weather has changed over the years. The explosion of industry in the past century has led to increased carbon emissions which has led to global warming. The warmer climate means a longer hurricane season and more frequent, more severe hurricanes. Further, the expansion of infrastructure and the increase in demand for beachfront properties means that when hurricanes do hit, they are far more damaging.
The wind just picked up outside my dorm window. I see leaves swirling violently outside. I’m safe and warm inside my room, but that doesn’t reassure me. It only reminds me of the 500,000 people without power right now thanks to the storm, the photos I’ve seen of toppled trees in my neighborhood and flooded streets at the beach. (The seventh photo in that album is of the street I live on.)
It is poignantly telling that everything we have built, everything that we’ve spent money and manpower to create, is fragile enough to be destroyed by water and wind.
*In case you were wondering, my chickens are all alive and safe as of 10:00 am this morning, and though a few trees in my neighborhood have fallen and are blocking the road, my house is still standing. Hopefully it stays that way.