Ecological Disasters

“Thank God men cannot fly, and lay waste in the sky as well as the earth.” These intelligent words said by Henry David Thoreau are extremely relevant today when we consider our current environmental state. Unless we take the time to better protect our environment, global warming will take over and cause our ecological situation to worsen by killing off our own species’, by human error destroying habitats, and by disease eventually spreading and killing off organisms that are no longer strong enough to fight it.
Polar bears are among the most beloved animals the world; unfortunately they are one of the first species to become endangered because of global warming and climate change. One of the greatest factors of climate change is caused by the greenhouse effect. This is due to human activity such as burning gasoline to drive vehicles, burning oil, coal or wood to produce electricity for heating and cooling and burning forests to clear land. The greenhouse effect has the potential to reach levels of heat that our world has never seen before; our polar bears live in the arctic where they rely on the cold Canadian weather to survive. As a result of our selfish and careless behavior polar bears have nowhere to go because the icecaps that they live on are melting and they are drowning given that they are forced to swim longer to find more icecaps that have not already melted and by that time they either die of starvation or drown. Unless we put effort into saving our arctic bears we will kill an entire species because in this situation pollution is a murderer.
As human beings we are well intentioned and have our hearts in the right place, however human error has played a devastating role on our planet. There have been several oil spills however the most harmful disaster was the British Petroleum (BP) oil spill on April 20th, 2010 until July 15th 2010. For a total of 87 days more then 200 million gallons of oil was forced into the Gulf of Mexico, which made it the largest oil spill in US history. The consequences of a mistake like this are so small, yet so big. Over 8000 animals were reported dead only 6 months after the spill, 11 platform workers were killed and 17 were reported injured the morning of the explosion. The BP oil spill caused numerous problems for marine life for example birds were covered in oil and were unable to fly. ­­ would then try to lick themselves clean and would eat the oil, which caused kidney damage, eventually following death. Killer whales would end up dying from intoxication when they would consume fish that swam through the oil spill. If Killer whales didn’t die from intoxication they would sometimes die from shortness of breath when the oil would block the killer whale’s blowholes - through which they breathe. Not only did the BP oil spill destroy the marine life, it also ended up harming humanity. Most seafood was made toxic by the oil and when consumed by a person damaged the immune system. After the platform exploded masses of smoke were released into the air and when inhaled by people in the area the smoke damaged the respiratory system. Careless human errors such as the British Petroleum oil spill are how we are unintentionally destroying our own home.
Diseases are continuing to develop and change as civilization does and climate change is beginning to increase the threat of infectious disease. For example diseases such as Malaria, or the West Nile Virus are carried by mosquitoes, which then slowly spread. However in a First World country like Canada we are very hygienic, and a disease like this is not necessarily life threatening to us, as it would be for a homeless boy in Africa with no access to any medical system. As we continue to pollute our earth and climate change rises and rises, we in Canada are beginning to see stranger weather patterns like more rainfall and stronger humidity and heat, these are both two key factors for the mosquito survival. Mosquitoes can digest faster in hotter temperatures, therefore allowing them to infect at a greater ratio of people. Rain also plays a major role in the survival of the mosquito because they typically breed in freshwater bodies and if rainfall patterns increase, as expected, mosquitoes will breed at a much faster rate then ever before giving them a greater chance of infecting people with a much stronger virus.
Our earth is pure like an aquarium; with the exception that after it has been polluted you can’t just put a filter inside and expect it to clean it self. The way we are treating our planet is almost cruel. After centuries of pollution and poor treatment our earth is finally screaming for help and it’s about time we started taking better care of it. Unless put effort into better protecting our environment, we through global warming will put our ecological state in the point of no return.
“Thank God men cannot fly, and lay waste in the sky as well as the earth.”
Unless we take the time to better protect our environment, global warming will take over and cause our ecological situation to worsen

Polar bears are among the most beloved animals the world; unfortunately they are among one of the first species to become endangered because of global warming and climate change.
Greatest factor of climate change – greenhouse effect
Because of human activity such as burning gasoline to drive vehicles, burning oil, coal or wood to produce electricity for heating and cooling and burning forests to clear land.
The greenhouse effect has the potential to reach levels of heat that our world has never seen before;
Our polar bears live in the arctic where they rely on the cold Canadian weather to survive.
As a result of our selfish and careless behavior polar bears have nowhere to go because the icecaps that they live on are melting and they are drowning given that they are forced to swim longer to find more icecaps that have not already melted and by that time they either die of starvation or drown. Unless we put effort into saving our arctic bears we will kill an entire species because in this situation pollution is a murderer.