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A NASA scientist made an emotional appeal to the world before being arrested, warning how we are heading towards a ‘f**king catastrophe’ if we don’t start listening to scientists about climate change.
Peter Kalmus, a data scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and an associate project scientist at UCLA's Joint Institute for Regional Earth System Science & Engineering, made the desperate plea earlier this year outside a Los Angeles branch of JP Morgan Chase Bank.
His message came as part of a global protest involving more than 1,000 scientists in 25 countries, who risked arrest on 6 April to ‘warn the world’.
“We are doing civil disobedience at JP Morgan Chase Bank – which, out of all of the banks in the world, is the one that has done the most to fund fossil fuel projects,” Kalmus explained beforehand, citing a recent IPCC report that ‘made it very clear that current and planned fossil fuel infrastructure will take us significantly beyond two times beyond the best estimate of what we can still emit and have a coin toss chance at staying under one and a half degrees of global heating’.
The climate scientist then went and stood outside the bank with engineer Eric Gill, both wearing their lab coats.
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“I’m here because scientists are not being listened to,” Kalmus began.
“I’m willing to take a risk for this gorgeous planet – for my sons.
"And we’ve been trying to warn you guys for so many decades that we’re heading towards a f**king catastrophe.
“And we end up being ignored – the scientists of the world are being ignored. And it’s got to stop. We’re going to lose everything. And we’re not joking. We’re not lying. We’re not exaggerating.
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“This is so bad, everyone – that we’re willing to take this risk. And more and more scientists, and more and more people, are going to start joining us.
“This is for all of the kids of the world, all of the young people, all of the future people. This is so much bigger than any of us.”
That day, Kalmus was arrested, along with a physicist, an engineer and a science teacher, for chaining himself to the bank's door.
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He later explained how he was happy to ‘risk’ his career by doing something drastic after struggling to get the message out there.
Speaking to AJ+, he said: “I’ve been trying other ways to get through to the public for 16 years, and none of it worked. I think it’s worth the risk to our careers to try and wake up the public to what’s happening to our planet.”
Kalmus added: “I was very kind of emotional and I was thinking about my sons and the future of life on Earth.”
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Topics: World News, Climate Change
Jess Hardiman