Climate change! How much time do we have?

Sitting at a beach resort near the shores of Ghana, I observed a very interesting truth about the sea and the threat it poses to the future of the human race.

Throughout the afternoon, it was a beautiful scene of sea waves slapping the rocky beach, of fishing boats slowly moving over the wobbly waters, large cargo ships heading for the port of Tema, and exciting breezy winds sweeping across the resort garden.

In the afternoon however, proof of the ocean's anger and a clear warning that, soon the sea will take over and show us who is in charge emerged. About two hundred meters stretch of tail-looking rock, sticking out in the horizon.

Ominously visible, even, in the dark night, this rock, washed clean by constant aggressive action by the sea is a grim reminder of how little time we have to prepare a reasonable response to climate change.

The size and stability of this rock suggest it once was part of a natural defence system which has been overwhelmed by strong waves.

What can we build, much more solid than this rock that would halt the raging tides? How much time do we have to save future generations from what the Bible describes as "the fear of the raging tides"?

I sat behind the wall overlooking the ocean with my bottle of fruit drink a plastic table, my blackberry phone blinking in the dark as I chewed a delicious mean spiced up and packed on a stick, oblivious of the fact that the sea was busy trying to tell me and perhaps the resort owners to get out of its way.

Suddenly, my phone rang and I dropped the glass so I could answer it. But wait, I felt a slap from the right side of my body; suddenly I was all wet with cold sea water.

It feels like war, how could the waves climb what is a very high altitude to hit me. Certainly, the sea is angry because of our stubborn attitudes, our destructive tendencies.

I think it is about time to pause and consider the magnitude of the danger we face. The oceans occupy more than seventy percent of the planets surface area and are evidently growing in volume, due to global warming. The story of the rock discussed earlier, shows how hard and fast the sea is fighting to takeover. But it also shows how hopelessly little we have done over the centuries to counter the threat.

If 'mother nature' has no stronger defence up its sleeves, we would need to brace for a terribly gloomy future.

by: Andy Owusu

source: goarticles.com