You could get the sense that something has gone wrong with the weather. One heat wave after another has struck the West Coast, which is now on fire. Western Europe has been deluged by rain, killing hundreds. Across Asia, temperature records are falling and cities in China have been flooded by heavy rainfall. Is this confluence of catastrophes is being caused by climate change? On one level, yes: Climate change puts more heat into the atmosphere, which directly causes high temperatures and indirectly increases the intensity of rainstorms by allowing air to hold more water vapor. But the scary question we should be asking is whether our activity is making these weather events more frequent and longer-lasting by kinking up the jet stream. ~ Ned Kleiner, Ph.D. candidate at Harvard studying atmospheric science