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Tropical Storm Beryl Bears Down upon New England

In the Atlantic, Tropical Storm Beryl appeared to be heading toward New England at the end of the week, as tropical storm warnings in effect for North Carolina were rescinded. Meanwhile, across the 48 contiguous states of America, a heat wave has caused health problems and wreaked havoc with air conditioning systems attempting to cope with the increased temperatures. While Bush Administration officials are likely to not blame the natural warming trends associated with global warming, the possibility cannot be missed during an intensely warm American summer that the country is hotter than usual.

The Southwestern United States is used to the warm temperatures, and even the coast of New England and elsewhere along the eastern seaboard is subject to intense heat at times which, when combined with high humidity, leads to deaths, power outages, and weather anomalies. The warmer temperatures out to sea are part of a cyclical pattern that will result in increasingly active storm systems, such as the one that turned into last year?s Hurricane Katrina, which wreaked havoc along the U.S. coast of the Gulf of Mexico.

New Orleans, Louisiana is still recovering and rebuilding from Katrina, and recent elections led to the re-election of Mayor Ray Nagin to another term. Nagin received headlines for his criticism, which many saw as justified, of the federal government in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, although he and Louisiana?s governor received flack for not doing enough to warn or evacuate Louisianans as Hurricane Katrina approached.