Hurricane Dorian was a Category 5 hurricane, but United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres said he believes it was a “hurricane category hell”.
“But it was not powered by the devil. It was powered by climate change,” Gutteres said on Saturday, during his tour and assessment of the destruction left by Hurricane Dorian in Abaco, which was aired in a United Nations video.
“It’s impossible not to be horrified with the destruction in Abaco after Hurricane Dorian. I’ve never seen such a dramatic devastation anywhere else in the world.”
Gutteres added that the hurricane was powered by human action.
“Nature is angry. We need to show nature that we respect it. We need to be able to change course and to adopt the policies and the measures that are necessary for climate action to prevail,” he said.
Next week, the United Nations will host its 74th General Assembly in New York and climate change will be the focus.
In addition to the UN General Assembly, the Climate Action Summit will be the highlight of the meeting
According to the UN, Guterres wants world leaders to come to New York withconcrete,realistic plans to enhance their nationally determined contributions by 2020, in line with reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 45 percent over the next decade and to net zero emissions by 2050.
“Global emissions are reaching record levels and show no sign of peaking. The last four years were the four hottest on record and winter temperatures in the Arctic have risen by three degrees Celsius since 1990. Sea levels are rising, coral reefs are dying and we are starting to see the life-threatening impact of climate change on health, through air pollution, heat waves and risks to food security,” the UN said.
“The impacts of climate change are being felt everywhere and are having very real consequences on people’s lives. Climate change is disrupting national economies, costing us dearly today and even more tomorrow. But there is a growing recognition that affordable, scalable solutions are available now that will enable us all to leapfrog to cleaner, more resilient economies.”
