Comedians made some hilarious jokes about climate change. Were they right? – the Washington Post

Comedy is a lot like dumpster diving. You look at things in a different light than most people.
Stand-up comedians have long cast an amusing lens on our society, crafting observations about everything we might encounter, such as family, divorce, travel, a second divorce, pets and, more recently, climate change….
A First: Category 5 Storms Have Formed in Every Ocean Basin this Year – the Washington Post

Hurricane Lee intensified with breakneck speed Thursday over record-warm Atlantic waters, its peak winds catapulting from 80 to 160 mph in just 18 hours. Lee is now a top tier Category 5 hurricane, according to the National Hurricane Center, and will probably strengthen even more…
Lee rapidly intensifies into a Category 5 hurricane over Atlantic – the Washington Post

Hurricane Lee intensified with breakneck speed Thursday over record-warm Atlantic waters, its peak winds catapulting from 80 to 160 mph in just 18 hours. Lee is now a top tier Category 5 hurricane, according to the National Hurricane Center, and will probably strengthen even more…
How sea level rise made Idalia’s storm surge worse – the Washington Post

In mid-November 2021, a great storm begins brewing in the central Pacific Ocean north of Hawai‘i. Especially warm water, heated by the sun, steams off the sea surface and funnels into the sky.
A tendril of this floating moisture sweeps eastward across the ocean. It rides the winds for a day until it reaches the coasts of British Columbia and Washington State. There, the storm hits air turbulence, which pushes it into position—straight over British Columbia’s Fraser River valley….
Why a sudden surge of broken heat records is scaring scientists – the Washington Post

New precedents have been set in recent weeks and months, surprising some scientists with their swift evolution: historically warm oceans, with North Atlantic temperatures already nearing their typical annual peak; unparalleled low sea ice levels around Antarctica, where global warming impacts had, until now, been slower to appear; and the planet experiencing its warmest June ever charted, according to new data. And then, on Monday, came Earth’s hottest day in at least 125,000 years. Tuesday was hotter…
Seas have drastically risen along southern U.S. coast in past decade – the Washington Post

Multiple new studies highlight a rate of sea level rise that is ‘unprecedented in at least 120 years’ along the Gulf of Mexico and southeastern U.S. coast.
Scientists have documented an abnormal and dramatic surge in sea levels along the U.S. gulf and southeastern coastlines since about 2010, raising new questions about whether New Orleans, Miami, Houston and other coastal communities might be even more at risk from rising seas than once predicted…
There are 21,000 pieces of plastic in the ocean for each person on Earth – the Washington Post

And plastic pollution has been doubling every six years.
Humans have filled the world’s oceans with more than 170 trillion pieces of plastic, dramatically more than previously estimated, according to a major study released Wednesday.
The trillions of plastic particles — a “plastic smog,” in the words of the researchers — weigh roughly 2.4 million metric tons and are doubling about every six years…
Retreat in Rodanthe Interactive Feature – the Washington Post

Along three blocks in a North Carolina beach town, severe erosion is upending life, forcing hard choices and offering a glimpse of the dilemmas other coastal communities will face…
Early last year, a house crumbled into the sea in this small Outer Banks community, home to some of the most rapid rates of erosion and sea level rise on the East Coast.
Not long after, another house fell. And then another…
His family fished for generations. Now he’s hauling plastic out of the sea – the Washington Post

One catch at a time, Lefteris Arapakis is cleaning the Mediterranean.
It was Lefteris Arapakis’s first expedition on a fishing boat, and he didn’t expect what the nets would pull up.
There were scorpionfish, red mullet and sea bream. But there was also a bright red can of Coke…