DETROIT – This summer has seen no shortage of extreme weather events: Hurricane Ida ripped through Louisiana and Mississippi before the storm’s remnants slammed the Northeast this week, bringing devastating floods, winds, and tornadoes that left at least 47 people dead and millions without power across the eastern U.S. In the West, the Caldor Fire — one of the largest in California history — has burned at least 200,000 acres of land along the California and Nevada border and won’t be fully contained for weeks.
For CBS News meteorologist and climate specialist Jeff Berardelli and CBS News’ senior national and environmental correspondent Ben Tracy, this year’s weather is a new phenomenon.
Berardelli said there’s no doubt that Earth’s warmer atmosphere is caused by human activity, and the extreme weather in recent years is a direct result of that.
