It's Getting Worse, Fast, and We're Not Getting Ready

"It" refers to severe storm events of the type that flooded Toronto and Calgary in 2013 and that deluged Burlington just days ago. Environment Canada's senior climatologist David Phillips warns that governments need to plan for a lot more of these wild weather events.

"These [once in] 50-year floods are occurring every 10 years, because our climate has changed," he said.

Phillips added that planning for weather based on the past 100 years "masks" recent events that have dramatically changed how much rain falls. He said in the aftermath of the Toronto floods of August 2013, a look into the last 25 years of rainfall showed that there were three 100-year storms, and six 50-year storms.

Phillips said that in the past few decades, precipitation across Canada has increased 12 per cent, and the "predictable" storms of the past, which used to sweep across southern Ontario, have transformed into "little cells that affect a neighbourhood, a small area."

"It's like these are bull's-eyes," Phillips said. "The reality is that our infrastructure is aging, it's breaking down.… We need to take into consideration the new climate," Phillips said.

Canada is burdened with federal politicians who show no interest in preparing our nation for what's already here and what is yet to come. There's not one, save for Elizabeth May, even willing to have the conversation our government needs to have with the Canadian people. When it comes to this enormous threat looming over our heads, they're a pack of shirkers and shrinkers. Whether it's the Conservatives, the Liberals or the New Democrats in power, we're on our own and good luck with that.

MoS, the Disaffected Lib