The 2013 climate change wake-up call Is an extreme heatwave
enough for people to start taking the science of climate change
seriously in Australia? Dr Paul Willis hopes so. The hot weather
that has besieged the nation since the beginning of the year and
the associated bushfire threat has, I hope, been something of a
cathartic experience for Australia. Finally an event that can be
linked to climate change has been of such magnitude and impact
that many people are now sitting up and taking notice. Even so,
we have been slow off the mark to discuss the linkage between
extreme weather events and climate change and those discussions
were still limited in extent. I'm hoping that the extreme
heatwave is a 'shot across the bow' notice that we need to take
climate change seriously — but already the climate denial camp
are viewing these extreme events as business as usual. The USA
had a similar experience last year with Superstorm Sandy: a
nasty, unprecedented weather event of horrendous impact that was
also in line wi