We’ve known that climate change is getting worse. We’ve known that we are going to see more serious effects of climate change in the United States. Nonetheless, the wind, the rain, the flooding, the damage, the deaths caused by Hurricane Helene, followed less than two weeks later by Hurricane Milton, still caught many of us by surprise. Somehow it was more than we were ready for, even if our only exposure was through the news media.

Helene, with winds in excess of 140 mph, ranks as one of the most powerful hurricanes to ever strike the U.S. Milton, another monster storm, apparently not as bad as it might have been, still spawned nearly 40 tornadoes, caused widespread destruction, and left more than 4 million people without power.

The numbers associated with these storms can be mind-boggling. I’ve decided to only try to remember one number with regard to Hurricane Helene: the number 30, and two connections to it. Apparently some areas near Asheville, in western North Carolina got more than 30 inches of rain in a few days. Can you imagine?

One of the rivers in the Asheville area crested at more than 30 feet above its usual level. Pick any river you know, even a small one, and imagine the water 30 feet above the usual surface of the water. Clearly in this mountainous terrain there was nowhere for the water to go. It went down some of the ravines like a 30-foot-high wall of water.

Those of us in western Massachusetts, who were not in the path of these hurricanes, face the difficulty of deciding how much attentionwe should put on this kind of distressing news (about hurricanes, war, elections, or climate change). To put some attention on it is part of being fully human — having empathy and standing in solidarity with those who are suffering. Having at least some information about it may be necessary for informed decision-making.

On the other hand, putting too much attention on such news can be debilitating — draining our energy for action and making it difficult to focus on other issues that matter to us. I strongly recommend that we take a disciplined approach to this issue, limiting our news consumption and resisting the persistent attempts of many media sources to keep us scared, fascinated and, frankly, addicted.

I think it’s useful to talk and listen to others when we encounter emotion-laden news. I try to find a few stories about people’s compassion and courage in the face of a disaster that I can share with people — like the volunteer at a storm shelter who used an AED machine — a defibrillator — for the first time ever to save a woman’s life while waiting for an overburdened ambulance crew.

A church group took supplies to a town cut off by floodwaters and cracked roads. They drove as far as they could, climbed the last way on foot, and got baby formula to a family with a crying, hungry baby. Elsewhere, volunteers cut away downed trees that were blocking roads and staffed ad hoc shelters and food kitchens. There have been countless small acts of kindness — people sharing food and clothes and hugs as they help each other pull through the disaster.

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I’m often looking for ways to engage people’s minds around climate change. So, I’ve also been sharing something I read that outlines four ways that climate change makes hurricanes more severe. Yale Climate Connections explains that climate change increases the damaging wind speeds of hurricanes today: “Hurricanes are heat engines that take heat energy out of the ocean and convert it to the kinetic energy of their winds.” Climate change has made the oceans hotter.

Second, global warming increases hurricane rainfall. Warming is causing more ocean water to evaporate into the air, increasing the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere, dramatically increasing the amount of rain that falls during a hurricane. Third, global warming is causing large hurricanes to intensify much more rapidly than previously. Hurricane Helene’s wind speeds increased more than 40 mph in the 24 hours before landfall. This intensification “can catch forecasters and populations off guard, risking inadequate evacuation efforts and large casualties.”

Fourth, sea level rise resulting from climate change increases storm surge damage. Hurricane Helene set all-time records for high water at half of the tide gauges along the west coast of Florida. In summary, again from Yale Climate Communications: “Climate change makes the strongest hurricanes stronger, increases rainfall, increases storm surge damage through sea level rise, and increases the probability of rapid intensification events.”

There’s not much we can do in the short run about hurricanes, but there’s a lot we can do to get more and more people demanding governmental action on climate change. Let’s keep talking to our neighbors and friends about that.

Russ Vernon-Jones of Amherst is a member of the Steering Committee of Climate Action Now (CAN). The views expressed here are his own. His column appears in the Gazette on the third Friday of each month. He blogs regularly on climate justice at russvernonjones.org and can be reached there.