Sea water floods a pedestrian walkway in Boston’s North End after a storm. Credit: Anxhela Mile.
Winter days balmy enough for shirtsleeves, followed by record-setting polar-vortex lows. Day after day of blue skies, followed by torrential rains. Jungle humidity, then air so dry that skin feels like sandpaper. Snowfall that melts in a day, then floods. There is an informal term for all these weird back-and-forth weather extremes we’re witnessing: weather whiplash. We’re all seeing it and grappling with its effects, whether it’s dealing with the small inconvenience of a canceled ski trip because there’s no snow or the major trauma of having to rebuild our lives after a flood has washed away our homes or businesses.
Scientists are unequivocal about what has us tossing frisbees in shorts one moment and digging through three-foot snowdrifts the next: climate change caused by the…