Dumping a bucket of ice-cold water on your head doesn’t solve any issues in the world. It actually adds to the number of problems involving the serious drought California is facing now.
The recent social media trend of the “Ice Bucket Challenge” is used to raise money and awareness for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).
Someone posts a video of unloading a bucket of ice-cold water on their head, then nominates friends for either the water-dumping challenge or to donate $100 to the ALS charity. Many people chose to do both.
The ALS Association has received $100 million in donations from more than 3 million people who participated in the viral and on-going trend, according to an August article from Time.
Raising money for charity is great, but people don’t need to waste water to do it. Perhaps without drenching your body in ice water, then it wouldn’t be fun to donate to charity, but California is in one of the worst droughts ever recorded, according to the California government website.
Ice water and ALS have absolutely nothing to do with one another. In reality, people could be dared to douse themselves in just about anything that could still raise awareness toward diseases. And, hopefully still be entertaining enough for people to watch, want to participate in and then donate money to charity.
Droughts affect crop production and jobs. Some communities in California that rely heavily on individual wells have actually ran out of drinking water, according to Weather.com.
“An average bucket contains 4 gallons of water, about 5 million gallons of water have dunked heads from coast to coast. That’s the equivalent of about 120,000 baths or, in weather terms, over half an inch of rain falling on a 300 acre slab of land,” according to the Washington Post.
It doesn’t seem like a lot, but the gallons add up and will continue adding up, or rather continue leaking out. California doesn’t have any water to spare so it should not be getting wasted. Gov. Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency in January and officials are preparing ways to cope in the current water shortage.
California has been in a drought since December 2012. It is caused by a high pressure “ridge,” which is not allowing rain to penetrate through, according to the Mercury News.
The San Diego County website offers guidance on how to conserve water in homes such as watering limits and schedules for lawns, restrictions on car washing and even restaurants only filling customers water upon request.
Image Sources
- icebucket_online: Harim Arjon/The Telescope | All Rights Reserved