Earth Strikes Again

During the month of February, one huge iceberg loose off Antarctica’s Coast. There was once big iceberg that separated from the rest of the ice land and joined another one that was already floating in the ocean. The collision of these two ice pieces created a loose iceberg the size of Luxembourg, around 97 kilometers long. The first iceberg separated from the ice land because of the warm water currents that had reach it since several years ago. Reading this shocking news made me realize that global warming is not near, it’s here.

I think Earth has tried to warn us throughout the past years about the catastrophes that could happen. Let’s just take a look about what happened with the Hurricane Katrina, the tsunami of 2004, and most recently what happened in Haiti and in Chile. I think mother Earth gave all the possible warnings that we should take this planet seriously.

All these natural disasters can affect our way of life in each and every sense. Scientists say that if this huge iceberg melts down, the sea level will rise and parts of the world that are barely above sea level may disappear. Also, he said that the iceberg melting will change sea currents and the amount of oxygen in the sea, affecting all types of marine species. This could affect the economy of many countries in which the sea provides a large part of their GDP. The supply of the product will decrease affecting the equilibrium.

I find very interesting what we saw at the last class about considering the effect on the environment in economics. If we had considered nature before, maybe today we wouldn’t be suffering all these natural disasters. The companies that take into account the effect of their actions on nature, are very responsible because they don’t only care about themselves and money but also about the world they are living in. We should all consider the effect on nature of all of our action. Think twice before throwing oil on water, or before throwing plastic bags into the garbage.

We humans can do better. We were given a powerful brain to do whatever is best for us. I hope we realize that we are only harming ourselves by not caring about the world. We should do everything we can do now. Maybe tomorrow will be too late to start caring about our seas, our land and our air. Who knows where mother earth will strike next.