EDITORIAL — We needed to save the earth  yesterday

While we steam in the heat and get little in terms of rainwater, other countries in the world are getting more than their fair share of it.

Dubai, which normally stays dry for most of the year, got two years’ worth of rain dumped on it last week. The deluge overwhelmed many areas in a country with a drainage system designed to deal with only little water; as of last Friday the Dubai airport had to cancel 1,000 flights while private homes remained flooded and abandoned cars littered inundated roads.

Three Filipinos workers there died as a result; two women drowned after their car was trapped in floodwaters while another man similarly died after his car fell into a flooded sinkhole.

The world’s climate has indeed gone haywire. While countries like ours receive too little water, countries that don’t usually get it are overwhelmed by volumes they can’t deal with.

Of course, extreme weather isn’t happening just here anymore. After marking 2023 as the hottest year for Europe so far --with parts of Spain, France, Italy, and Greece seeing almost two weeks of extreme heat stress-- the continent is raising alarm over more and more countries facing the threat of unprecedented heat.

They certainly don’t want a repeat of the wildfires in Greece last year that were among the worst in Europe so far.

The signs that something is wrong with the climate can no longer be denied, like the heat, the extreme weather, among others. It is time to make the changes that will take our world from the brink of disaster.

Yesterday just happened to be Earth Day, in case anyone was paying attention. And the truth is that we needed to save the world and act on climate change yesterday.