yuck

by fred
(bobland)

the axxon valdez

Barry's Response - I think you are referring to the Exxon Valdez Disaster of 1989, Fred. I wonder what kind of fish it is? Maybe a whale.

An oil tanker struck a reef off the coast of Alaska. It released up to 3/4 of a million barrels of oil (about half of its load), which affected 1300 miles of coastline.

Causes of the incident include overworked and under-rested crew, inadequate navigation techniques at the time, recent changes in coast guard practices, sailing along a lesser-familiar route, skipped inspection procedures prior to launch, and insufficient maintenance of on-board nav-aids.

Like anything we examine in environmental sciences, things take place as a result of a multitude of factors and cannot generally be simplified to one or two.

Pollution stinks. Alarmism stinks worse.

When our senses rebel, we say "yuck." Is that a rotten fish floating upside down? I hate it. Is there a sulfur geyser in Iceland? Yuck to that too. Is there a smog alert over your city that smells like burnt rubber? Yeah, yuck. We're wired to gag at decay, because bad smells kept our ancestors alive.

There's a twist: not every "yuck" means doom. There are times when nature makes a mess on its own. Despite fossil fuels, certain tides release stink that curls your nose hair. Lightning has sparked forest fires for millennia, leaving scorched landscapes and coughing throats. Those volcanoes? While villages gagged in haze, their eruptions sent sulfur into the stratosphere, dimming the sun and creating sunsets that painters once adored. There's yuck and beauty, side by side.

This is where climate narratives get tricky. You feel "yuck" when you see an oil-soaked bird. The same reaction rarely greets photos of algae blooms or dust storms in the Sahara. The disgust we feel gets curated, targeted at industry, and then turned into political leverage.

There's something subtle about meteorology. There are different wavelengths of disgust. Because your nose detects hydrogen sulphide at one part per billion, it smells like rotten eggs, so they say. The molecules in ozone zap your nerves. The air is brownish-orange because of nitrogen dioxide. "Yuck" isn't just a headline. It's chemistry, meteorology, and physics.

What if we reclaimed "yuck" for teaching? You can slide a dial from mildly gross (city smog during rush hour) to apocalyptic gross (rotten kelp piles venting methane). You learn which gases cause stink, how natural cycles amplify or dampen them, and what really matters for long-term health versus short-term disgust.

Here's something else...

Maybe the "yuck factor" has been weaponized. Alarmists say every stink is humanity's fault, every bloom of scum is industrial sin. Conservatives and skeptics say: slow down...Nature stinks. It's not about panicking, it's about cleaning up where we can while respecting that Earth has her own foul moods. Even if disgust drives donations, integrity means not twisting data for funding or political gain.

Here's the fun part: literature is full of crap. Hell has sulphur pits, according to Dante. London was choked with fog thanks to Charles Dickens. Autumn rot was compared to transience by Japanese poets. It's in the Bible that plagues "stenk in the land." Disgust has always taught lessons.

Let's take "yuck" seriously, but not too seriously. Sometimes it's a real pollution we can fix. Sometimes it's just a natural burp. Politics sometimes smells worse than landfills. In every case, "yuck" opens a door: from gagging to thinking.

👉 What's the grossest smell you've ever smelled? Natural or manmade? Let's compare notes in the comments.

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