Precisely two weeks ago, flash rains turned the intersection of Jakobsoni and Lossi streets in Viljandi into the long-awaited Viljandi water park, washed away a considerable part of Liiva tänav as well as soil that used to support the Õuna tänav stairs and the pavement in front of Ugala Theater.

A day later, I was driving in the vicinity of Kėdainiai in Lithuania when a dark cloud suddenly let loose. While I had experienced downpour of this intensity before, never had it lasted as long. Cars were going no faster than 50 kilometers per hour, but even so the curtain of rain and water sprayed from under wheels limited visibility to the car in front's flashing hazards.

The fun peaked when I reached the Panevėžys ring road where some cars were waiting for the rain to stop parked on the side of the road, while others had simply stopped in the middle of it, blocking traffic. Luckily, this was in the other direction of travel. At the end of last week, central Lithuania experienced similar downpour, which caused an emergency situation to be declared in the Šiauliai region.

Tartu experienced the torrents Tuesday. A pool even greater than in Viljandi formed under the Riia maantee overpass, the ground floor of the Tartu University Hospital was flooded, causing appointments and procedures to be canceled, and the Toome Stairs became a picturesque waterfall.

Of course, it has rained before and rained hard. The aforementioned intersection in Viljandi has been flooded from time to time for a century. We've also experienced drought, heatwaves, cold temperatures, blizzards etc. But all of it is happening more frequently.

Everyone who has been reluctant to believe the UN climate reports and scientists' assurances that the ten hottest years since recordkeeping started in 1850 have all fallen into the past decade can now admit, based on personal experience, that extreme weather that accompanies climate change is a tangible and feet-watering fact, as opposed to a conspiracy theory by globalists and greens.

Representatives of all political parties admitted that climate change is real in interviews given to Sakala prior to European Parliament elections this year. While we can argue over whether and how mankind can stop it, burying one's head in the sand while its flooding runs the risk of drowning.

Even so, we still hear voices that consider climate and environmental matters to be so much ideological nonsense. When it turned out recently that Minister of Climate Yoko Alender (Reform) wants to organize higher climate awareness courses (similarly to Estonia's higher national defense courses), an opinion piece labeled the idea ideologically polarizing and suggested it should not be done.

I don't know whether such courses are needed to raise climate awareness, or whether this can be achieved in other ways, but we have no hope of addressing concerns if we start consciously overlooking polarizing facts. Ignoring problems makes them worse, instead of making them go away. Dear skeptics, the higher climate courses started with a practical exercise in water levels in Tartu this Tuesday, if not a lot sooner.

Top-level thematic courses are primarily aimed at state officials, politicians and other decision-makers to help them in their choices. National defense is not the only field that's covered. Higher civil defense courses on how to manage crises have been held for years.

Refreshing our climate and environmental knowledge is frankly long past due. Even though it's often painted as complicated science stuff about carbon emissions or tree huggers' nonsense, we would do well to remember that the environment simply stands for everyone's living conditions.

Today, many drivers fail to understand even something as simple as not driving into a flooded street, unless they feel like sponsoring an auto repair shop.

Considering drainage capacity, making sure houses stand up to rain and storm winds, insulation and cooling are but a few examples of topics we need to tackle in order to adjust to climate change. Of course, we must also fight the causes of climate change, reduce and even reverse environmental damage, but life is increasingly making it clear that there is no escaping having to adjust.

During a time when we're forced to concentrate on national security and dial back public sector spending, the question of where and how much we should spend is entirely justified. While a lot of money for tackling environmental issues comes from the EU, Estonia will have to contribute. Decisions need to be all the smarter for it, because whether we're talking about the defense or climate budgets, it's always possible to spend an ocean full of cash without doing a drop's worth of good.

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