Los Angeles fires: Check information about fire department budget

Yes, be political

As a victim of this disaster, let me just say: Politicize the fuck out of it. #EatonFire

— Gwen C. Katz (@gwenckatz.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 12:19 AM

But fact-check your information.

Gov. Gavin Newsom created this new website: California Fire Facts

Supposedly: "last year LA City Council approved the mayor's budget to cut $23 million from the LA Fire Dept, as well as cuts to many other departments, so they could give the LAPD a $138 million increase"

Supposedly: Bluesky

Can't speak to this source, but the article says it was a $23,000,000 cut to FD and a $138,000,000 increase to the PD. patch.com/california/l...

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— anonymoustroll.bsky.social (@anonymoustroll.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 8:56 AM

I don't know if the LA fire department is properly funded or not but the claim that the city cut its budget last year — which is circulating widely on the right — is false. As Politico notes, the budget actually INCREASED by $50 million. A portion of the funding was approved in a separate bill.

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— Judd Legum (@juddlegum.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 9:02 AM

LINK:

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— Judd Legum (@juddlegum.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 9:02 AM

You will read countless times today that the LA mayor cut the LA Fire Department's budget by $23 million. That is a lie. The budget was actually *increased* by $50 million.

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— Mrs. Betty Bowers (@mrsbettybowers.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 10:05 AM

Amanda Smith shares numbers on Bluesky.

Chris Hayes says "it’s still actually not 100% clear to me":

Yes there was an official budget reduction of 2% ($17.5 million, not $23) but it’s unclear if the increases in the contract negotiation add up to a larger amount in total (as article says) or the mayor’s office is basically double counting.

— Chris Hayes (@chrislhayes.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 5:56 PM

As best as we can tell there was a 2% cut that did eliminate a number of administrative positions and overtime. Then in November an additional $76 million of unallocated funds was given to the LAFD as part of the wages package. Which means the total spending for it was up $53 mil yoy.

— Chris Hayes (@chrislhayes.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 6:07 PM

Which means it’s technically true that 1) there were budgets cuts that eliminated positions 2) there was an increase of the total funding the LAFD was given by city council appropriators. More here. abcnews.go.com/US/los-angel...

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— Chris Hayes (@chrislhayes.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 6:09 PM

Put another way. The head of the LAFD can say, truthfully “we had budget cuts” and express concerns about impact of readiness and the mayor and council can say, truthfully “we gave the FD millions more than the previous year.”

— Chris Hayes (@chrislhayes.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 6:15 PM

And put another way, we can say that when police unions managed to make the LAPD into a well paid and armed military force, they sucked up untold resources that are now missing as Southern Cal tries to face global warming. Unbelievably, LAPD got $2.14 billion in funding last year.

— rogergathmann (@rogergathmann.bsky.social) January 10, 2025 at 10:27 AM

It's a narrative.

So sorry. Yet another rant: We are losing the information war in real-time. LA is on fire, and the conservatives are seizing the moment, drafting on the fear, the panic, and the pain to target democratic officials, policies, and power centers and salting the earth along the way. A thread. 🧵

— Yosi Sergant (@a35mmlife.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 11:48 AM

It’s a five-alarm fire alongside an actual five-alarm fire, and the proverbial water is run dry. Listen, it’s hard to put out fires and save ourselves when our neighbors are arsonists. Ignore it, again, at our own peril. But there is a coordinated political attack campaign underway.

— Yosi Sergant (@a35mmlife.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 11:48 AM

Should we be having to spend ANY time defending politicians and policies in the middle of a crisis of this scale and urgency? Fuck no. But, there will be significant fallout from allowing these narratives to fester without checking their shit and quickly.

— Yosi Sergant (@a35mmlife.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 11:48 AM

The narrative that somehow a $17M cut to a massive $800M+ LAFD budget is to blame is insane, illogical and fucked on so many levels but taking root across the media and social media landscape. It's matched by an equally ridiculous narrative about water running out that's equally garbage.

— Yosi Sergant (@a35mmlife.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 11:48 AM

Let's be clear - this is targeted and methodical. Trump, Musk, Shapiro, NYPost, and all the regular conservative talking point amplification networks are echoing the same shit. While Dems, and most normies are out here just trying to do the work of surviving, the GOP is fanning flames of discord.

— Yosi Sergant (@a35mmlife.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 11:48 AM

We all know it’s completely dishonest and disingenuous. Budget hawks calling out a 2% decrease in a budget being used as justification for public sacrifice of an elected official. The same people creating DOGE are bemoaning a 2% budget reduction because- own the libs and get points on the board.

— Yosi Sergant (@a35mmlife.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 11:48 AM

Worse yet, it’s not even subtle in its racism, misogyny, and ignorance. One comment in, and you are awash in "DEI hire" nonsense and ‘good old times’ nostalgia for a world that never existed. People posting pictures of the 3 amazing women who run the $800M LAFD as a gotcha... you know, 'cuz - women.

— Yosi Sergant (@a35mmlife.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 11:48 AM

The number of people who are calling out the Mayor of LA being in Ghana who was on a scheduled trip as an official delegate for the US to mark their new Presidents election. Oh the hypocrisy from the folx who justified or were silent when Cruz went to Cancun

— Yosi Sergant (@a35mmlife.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 11:48 AM

… and the ‘running out of water’ thing? We’re fighting wildfires on urban fire systems - in Santa Ana conditions without air support. WT-actual-Fuck don't you get about supply and demand? They were using the water faster than the tanks could refill.

— Yosi Sergant (@a35mmlife.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 11:48 AM

There was an error with an emergency alert.

Good explainer from @colleenhagerty.com about what happened with the inaccurate fire altert in LA. The public’s expectations of government alerting (think Greenland) don’t always line up with reality. www.rollingstone.com/culture/cult...

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— Dr. Samantha Montano (@samlmontano.bsky.social) January 19, 2025 at 6:37 PM

Fun fact: 20 years ago, I wrote about "The Reform of the Public Warning System" as it went digital.

Fact-check other political claims too.

I know, I’m a Fire Commissioner & I’ve been doing my best to tamp down some of the worst, but honestly, it’s impossible. James Woods, famous Maga gadfly,whose house burned down, is blaming Gavin Newsom for not keeping the resevoirs full. So ridiculous.

— Rick Giolito (@aldoinla.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 10:56 PM

"The absolute barrage of garbage being pumped into the brains of people is unbelievable," says @chrislhayes.bsky.social on the LA wildfire misinformation. "It does not help when the guy who owns the so-called digital town square is tweeting about globalist plots and blaming wokeness for the fires."

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— All In with Chris Hayes (@allinwithchris.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 8:49 PM

Watch for disinfo jargon. https://bsky.app/profile/hntdove.bsky.social/post/3lfd46xfmhc2k

Fact-check images.

People think AI images of Hollywood sign burning are real AI generated slop is tricking people into thinking an already devastating series of wildfires in Los Angeles are even worse than they are — and using it to score political points. 🔗 www.404media.co/hollywood-si...

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— 404 Media (@404media.co) January 9, 2025 at 2:40 PM

What it will cost to repair the damage

About a quarter-trillion dollars, the LA Times reports on January 24.

Los Angeles fires: Check on everyone

Check on everyone.

Me going through my list of clients and where they live every time there's something scary in the news, in case I need to check on them and make sure they're OK.

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— T.S. Ferguson (@teeess.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 12:54 PM

Don't expect them to be working their regular jobs.

This should be obvious but sometimes obvious things need to be said out loud: If you're not in the LA area, don't expect much out of folks there for the next several days except that they are going to be busy either surviving or trying to help their neighbors. www.cnn.com/weather/live...

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— John Scalzi (@scalzi.com) January 9, 2025 at 12:06 PM

"It's hellish here. Please be kind." — Jennifer Kretchmer, Bluesky

Some days it just hits me how every one of us--every single person reading this--is braver, tougher, and more generous than any of the billionaires who fancy themselves our superiors, and how ridiculous it is that this handful of cry babies with the luxury of doing ANYTHING THEY WANT choose... this.

— Bree (Nynaeve Era) (@mostlybree.kitrocha.com) January 10, 2025 at 11:03 AM

we're out here paypaling and GFMing the last $25 we have back and forth to infinity while slogging through a labyrinth of ridiculous injustice, and they are freaking out because someone suggested they should have more money than they could spend in 2999 lifetimes instead of 3005 lifetimes.

— Bree (Nynaeve Era) (@mostlybree.kitrocha.com) January 10, 2025 at 11:04 AM

Los Angeles fires: What social media shows me today

From a distance, I see this on socials.

Holy cow. Just woke up to this view from mid-Wilshire looking downtown

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— Lainna Fader (@lainna.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 10:23 AM

These extraordinary photos of the LA fires have been shared widely on social media, often without crediting the photographer. These are all the work of Ethan Swope, an LA-based photojournalist working for AP. You can follow his remarkable reporting here👇 www.instagram.com/ethanswopeph...

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— News Eye (@newseye.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 7:44 AM

L.A. news choppers are better able to survey the damage today vs. yesterday. KABC is flying over parts of the Palisades right now. Block after block is gone. abc7.com/watch/live/

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— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 1:33 PM

This Maxar Technologies sat image with SWIR shows what was on fire in Altadena, California this morning at 10:45 a.m. local time. Nearly everything.

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— Paul P Murphy, CNN (@paulpmurphy.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 8:36 PM

at the end of a 14hr flight into LAX, the pilot told us not to be alarmed if we smelled smoke, the plane wasn’t on fire, just the city

— maura quint (@mauraquint.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 10:31 AM

People outside of LA truly don’t understand how apocalyptic this is. It’s worse than it’s ever been. Entire residential neighborhoods are burning to the ground.

— Kumail Nanjiani (@kumail.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 1:48 PM

With each disaster, it is important to say: This is happening because it makes some people rich, and those people are planning to escape on their own lifeboat without you. www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/lifeboat-c...

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— Hamilton Nolan (@hamiltonnolan.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 11:33 AM

"villainy in action" is too accurate www.newsweek.com/california-i...

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— Peter Butler (@peter-butler.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 2:57 PM

Some of the most valuable real estate on earth burned to ashes today, and billionaires still think they’re gonna be exempt from climate change.

— Lila Byock (@lbyock.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 12:35 AM

Wealthy people

In the seven months since June 1, 2024, LA received a total 0.03” of rain. To put that in perspective — that’s about 1% of what the driest city in America gets per year (Yuma, AZ). Yet, network media ignored climate change in coverage of California wildfires. www.mesoscalenews.com/p/network-me...

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— Rebekah Jones (@georebekah.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 1:00 PM

“Will pay any amount.” Feels like one of those futile pleas we’re going to hear from wealthy people more and more in the era of climate change.

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— Matt Novak (@paleofuture.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 1:16 AM

if the blue check doesn't make this obvious, this guy is a Trump-y CEO who posts about how taxes should be eliminated.

— Joshua Erlich (@joshuaerlich.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 9:26 AM

I mean…

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— Matt Novak (@paleofuture.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 2:03 AM

He also appears to own a Cybertruck and was celebrating “liberal tears” on Election Day, which should come as no surprise.

— Matt Novak (@paleofuture.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 1:51 AM

After losing my third home in a tragic wildfire caused by the George Lincoln Rockwell Foundation Data Center for Industrial Spying, I am opening a seed round for my new firefighting startup, Dousr. It’s an app that trains poor people to run into burning buildings and rescue your valuables

— CHOAM Nomsky (@thielman.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 9:26 AM

Pasadena Humane has seen an influx of over 300 animals due to the fires. People lined up down the block to drop off beloved pets they could not take with them when they fled their homes. Some animals arrived with burns and injuries and are being treated. Donations and fosters are needed NOW.

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— Puff the Magic Hater (@mskellymhayes.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 10:03 PM

SoCal friends: Many animal shelters are overwhelmed from people dropping off beloved pets they can't take with them as they flee. Please consider donating and fostering. Pasadena Humane is one such org. Contact your local animal orgs to see if they need help. pasadenahumane.org/eaton-canyon...

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— derek guy (@dieworkwear.bsky.social) January 8, 2025 at 11:34 PM

from me: the lies spreading across social media about the horrifying L.A. fires (which are quite similar to the conspiracies that emerged in the wake of Hurricane Helene) reveal one grim truth about our future—this is just how every coming climate disaster will play out in our info environment

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— Nitish Pahwa (@nitishpahwa.com) January 8, 2025 at 6:31 PM

Here is a Reddit post on the topic (tl;dr preview attached): www.reddit.com/r/self/comme...

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— Kiki (@klkltlkl.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 8:16 PM

Pretty amazing that nonprofit Watch Duty -- which says it has 150 volunteers working around the clock to track wildfires -- has become the most trusted source of information on LA fires. Operated by retired/volunteer firefighters, dispatchers, and reporters. Real people. www.watchduty.org

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— Shannon Osaka (@shannonosaka.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 1:18 PM

I've built a news feed that is aggregating real-time updates from reporters and news organizations covering the Los Angeles wildfires, including the #PalisadesFire, the #EatonFire, the #HurstFire and the #WoodleyFire matthewkeys.net/social/bsky/... Tap "Pin to Home" to turn into a news feed.

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— Matthew Keys (@matthewkeys.net) January 8, 2025 at 2:23 PM

To add to this, Caruso was THE HEAD OF THE WATER BOARD and never said word 1 about storing more water in the Palisades in case of emergency, until the houses he bought for his kids were affected.

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— David Dayen (@ddayen.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 12:08 PM

These fires are a watershed moment, not just for residents of LA, but emblematic of a new era of complex, compound climate disaster. Conditions for a January firestorm in Los Angeles have never existed in all of known history, until they now do. www.theguardian.com/world/2025/j...

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— Eric Holthaus (@ericholthaus.com) January 9, 2025 at 10:47 AM

How I have to go outside for the foreseeable future. All the smoke and ash has made the already not great air quality plummet. I'm scared to have my dog outside for longer than it takes her to do her business because I don't want her breathing it in either.

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— first of all, bitch (@thejournalista.com) January 9, 2025 at 7:50 PM

Not lost on me that it's nonprofit tech, app.watchduty.org, showing up & actually working in the midst of the LA fires (donate to them!) Meanwhile platforms fail to surface key news, vital info is paywalled... As I've been saying, we need a new tech paradigm, yesterday!

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— Meredith Whittaker (@meredithmeredith.bsky.social) January 9, 2025 at 9:13 AM

Just saw a no-longer relevant evacuation notice on instagram from five hours ago and remembered — that’s right, due to hyper-monetization every major social network no longer shows you life-saving breaking news as it happens. They turned it over to an algorithm that finally noticed “he likes fire.”

— Daniel Kibblesmith (@kibblesmith.com) January 10, 2025 at 12:13 AM

Fire perimeter map: Palisades Fire devastates LA County, jumps in size as winds batter Southern California Marissa Wenzke, Matthew Rodriguez, Dean Fioresi, Chelsea Hylton. CBS News. Updated on: January 10, 2025

Throat symptoms: 'Flu' or air pollution?

On self-diagnosis in time of plague.

On 6 March 2020, I felt a slight tickle in my throat. I wasn't coughing, nor did I have any other symptoms of cold. It was barely identifiable as a "symptom" of anything whatsoever, not even a small cold. It happened to arise the same day that Colombia confirmed its first coronavirus diagnosis, so, regardless of whatever symptoms anyone might have had that day, it seemed highly unlikely that any given person in Colombia would also have that virus. So I didn't think it was worth mentioning to anyone as a complaint on any level about anything since it was so minor and barely noticeable.

Over two weeks later, the tickle in my throat was still present. It cannot possibly be coronavirus (symptoms of which peak around day 7 or 8, I hear). Suddenly, I realize what it is.

The air quality in Bogotá has been poor for several weeks. This is a known problem. According to scientific measurements, my neighborhood is affected to a medium degree compared against other neighborhoods in the city. Here are screenshots of data from AQICN.org (visit the website for real-time updates). I placed arrows in the screenshots to indicate the onset of my throat symptoms. The timing corresponds to an increase in pollution.

PM2.5

NO2

O3

Even several days of citywide self-enforced quarantine — which has almost entirely eliminated road traffic on the 8-lane road on which I live, for one example — has not improved the air quality much. The particulates are coming from smoke in other parts of Colombia and Venezuela.

It's nice to know it's not a virus. It's unpleasant that there is general air pollution.

"Hell is so much easier to picture. The recent U.N. report on the climate forecasts, with devastating frankness, worldwide catastrophe, absent a sudden upsurge of yet undetectable stewardship and coöperation. Meanwhile, Trump’s E.P.A. has dismantled an expert panel on air pollution. This is, of course, a disaster. Nobody has a right to feel very optimistic about the outcome, and there’s a vast unfairness at work: even the most ardent recyclers and carbon tiptoers—not to mention those without a wide range of options when it comes to what and how they consume—will feel the burn. But, here, as almost nowhere else in the visible world, the lines of cause and effect, neglect and decay, sin and punishment, are plain. You sow the coal and reap the whirlwind. Heat the air, and let the icebergs roll on righteously, like a mighty stream. First comes the flood, then comes the fire. It matters, very much, what you do." — "How the Idea of Hell Has Shaped the Way We Think: For centuries, we’ve given lavish attention to the specifics of punishment, and left Heaven woefully under-sketched. Vinson Cunningham, The New Yorker, January 14, 2019

Update, March 28, 2020: Here's a map of how European air pollution has reduced during quarantine for coronavirus. One scientist is quoted as giving this context: "the way our economies operate, absent pandemics, has massive hidden health costs, and it takes a pandemic to help see that."

2026 air pollution map

MAP: Track the air quality across the US, Byron Manley, Curt Merrill, Renée Rigdon, Matt Stiles, CNN, July 17, 2026

Over one century of the science of human-caused climate change

How long has science been concerned about greenhouse gases?

Originally posted to Helium Network on Feb. 10, 2013. Updated September 2020.

Public domain image by NASA. Earth's western hemisphere, as seen from space. © Wikimedia Commons.

The metaphor of the Earth's atmosphere as a greenhouse was born in the nineteenth century when it was discovered that atmospheric gases trap heat.  So-called greenhouse gases — including carbon dioxide, water vapor, and methane — permit short-wave radiation from the sun to pass through to the Earth but prevent long-wave radiation from the Earth from departing into space. (The metaphor is a bit of a misnomer, as part of what makes a greenhouse hot is the heating of the glass itself, whereas clearly Earth is not surrounded by glass.)

All other things being equal, the temperature will rise as more greenhouse gases are added to the atmosphere. This is linked to a complex set of natural processes. For example, carbon dioxide, a byproduct of the combustion of carbon-based fossil fuels like coal and oil, is naturally removed from the atmosphere when it dissolves into the ocean or is absorbed into plants which return the carbon to solid form.

The first scientist to speculate that the carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels could heat the planet was Svante Arrhenius of Sweden in 1896. This is discussed in Spencer Weart's book The Discovery of Global Warming (2008).

In the 1930s, scientists knew that the planet had warmed over recent decades, but they didn't know why. The English scientist Guy Stewart Callendar (1898-1964) said it was caused by the greenhouse effect, but his theory, proposed over three decades after Arrhenius's, was not taken seriously. Callendar's archived correspondence is kept today at the library of the University of East Anglia.

In the 1950s, scientists began to investigate the possibility that carbon dioxide was indeed raising the average global temperature. Finally, in 1960, their results showed that the level of atmospheric carbon dioxide was rising each year and that this could indeed explain the rising global temperatures.

Atmospheric carbon dioxide is measured in parts per million (ppm). Scientists can get air samples from millions of years ago by drilling into glaciers that formed in the eras since the dinosaurs roamed the earth (when there was no ice on the planet). Samples obtained in this way indicate that carbon dioxide levels naturally fluctuated between 200 and 280 ppm for millions of years. However, this level has risen steadily since the beginning of the industrial revolution. Today, in 2013, the levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide are at 394 ppm, according to the advocacy group CO2Now. The advocacy group 350.org recommends 350 ppm or lower as a necessary goal. That was the actual level in 1987.

Scientific issues related to climate change and its effects include the melting of the ice caps and the rising of sea levels; ocean saltiness and circulation patterns; greenhouse gases, measured at the tailpipe or at their natural sources; possibly mitigating factors like aerosols, the ozone layer and its depletion, and clouds; the capability of forests and oceans to store carbon; the archaeological climate record, analyzed through fossil shells or ice bubbles trapped in glaciers; ecosystem observations; temperature changes; and animal behavior trends, including reproduction and migration, as a response to temperature changes.

One of the most complicated issues is feedback loops by which a small amount of warming could generate more warming. For example, if warming causes plants to die, reflective snow to melt, and water to evaporate, then all of these occurrences will contribute to further warming. The resulting warming trend would be largely out of human control.

Individual governments contribute to research. Sam Bodman, then U.S. Deputy Secretary of Commerce, said before a Climate Change Science workshop in Dec. 2002: "Overall, we have spent more than $20 billion since 1990 on climate research — three times as much as any other country." (Bodman later served as U.S. Secretary of Energy from 2005-2009.)

However, because the greenhouse effect concerns the planet as a whole, a full understanding of it would mean nothing less than a full understanding of the planet. Scientists from diverse nations and disciplines have to share information to form a more complete picture.

Periodic reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), established by the UN in 1988, synthesize previously published research with this purpose in mind. The IPCC's Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) will be delivered in stages between September 2013 and October 2014.

Under the George H.W. Bush administration, the US joined the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, or UNFCCC. Now, in 2026, Donald Trump wants to leave it.

Other famous international climate treaties include the Kyoto Protocol in 1997 and the Copenhagen Accord in 2009.

There are business interests there, too. "The Arctic is melting faster than almost anybody expected. It has just been reported that the area of sea ice has never been smaller," the "Banyan" columnist wrote for The Economist on September 1, 2012, noting that northeast Asian countries would be eager to obtain the Arctic's newly exposed resources of "coal, iron, uranium, gold, copper, rare earths, gemstones, and much more, including, of course, fish," as well as the "30% of the world's undisocvered reserves of natural gas, and 13% of the undiscovered oil," as estimated by the U.S. Geological Survey. Most of China's energy imports arrive via the Strait of Malacca near Singapore, which is a vulnerability for China, and thus "China has invested both financially and diplomatically in the Arctic."

The greenhouse effect is natural and self-regulating. There is supposed to be some carbon dioxide, water vapor, and methane in the atmosphere. It is what makes the planet warm and habitable. The risk, however, is that industrial contributions of greenhouse gases might tip the natural cycles off balance. Indeed, there is evidence that this is already happening. There might be a threshhold at which the self-regulating patterns are entirely interrupted and derailed. Scientists are not yet sure what that threshold might be, whether tailpipe emissions are likely to bring the world to that point, or indeed whether they already have.

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"The young scientist had discovered that chlorofluorocarbons, or CFCs, then widely used in the manufacture of refrigerators, air-conditioning units and spray cans, had a significant greenhouse effect. Ramanathan had briefly encountered these industrial chemicals in his first job at a refrigeration company. Like carbon dioxide, CFCs trapped heat in the atmosphere. In fact, Ramanathan’s calculations suggested, they were more potent: One molecule of a CFC could have the same warming effect as up to 10,000 molecules of carbon dioxide. For three months, he repeated the calculations looking for an alternative explanation. He found none.

“I was just a postdoc immigrant from India. I didn’t know if I should tell NASA about this or not. I just sent the paper off,” Ramanathan recalled.

The journal Science published the findings, and his work made the front page of The New York Times in 1975. The idea that CFCs could potentially be such a powerful force in global warming was also met with disbelief, not in the least from Ramanathan himself, who embarked on the project purely out of curiosity at a time when climate change was not a pressing concern.

Ultimately, Ramanathan established the now widely accepted fact that greenhouse gases other than CO2 are a major contributor to global warming, vitally important knowledge that underpinned the first successful climate mitigation policy."

— Katie Hunt, The accidental climate scientist who uncovered an unexpected force of global warming, CNN, Jan 30, 2026