Weather channel uses augmented reality to show damage of climate change in year 2100
Meteorologists are taking a blunt approach to showing viewers the effects of climate change.
The Weather Channel in the US is transforming its traditional weather reports into immersive and confronting visual experiences.
"For 30 years, weather presentation has been very consistent," Michael Potts, the vice president of design for the Weather Group, told New York Magazine's Intelligencer.
Using video game technology, meteorologist Jen Carfagno was able to look ahead to the year 2100 and show the potential effects of climate change on several cities in America.
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From overlooking Charleston's permanently flooded streets to surface flooding caused by a high tide and slight breeze in Norfolk, Virginia, they made the effects of climate change real.
"Climate change for so long has navigated many threads of comprehension and understanding. It's not an easy subject to dive into.
"What we can do is paint the picture of what the impacts will be."
The meteorologist then visits Greenland's fastest-shrinking glacier, Jakobshavn Glacier, which has lost around 40 kilometres of ice since 1851.
Though the glacier has recently reported growth for the first time in 20 years, the meteorologist explained, "the long-term trend tells a different story". The visual then rebuilds the glacier to depict its original size almost 170 years ago.
This type of augmented reality weather report aims to "engage the audience more and find a way to go deeper into the science of weather," Potts said.
According to Edward Maibach, from the Center for Climate Change Communication, this type of vivid, cinematic experience works "by engaging our senses of sight and sounds - and our tendency to focus on things that move - they earn our full attention".
He told The Verge, these types of audio-visual mediums "are experienced more like real lived experience than like book learning".
This isn't the first time the channel has used augmented reality in its reporting, earlier in the year they used it to promote the dangers of Hurricane Florence in North Carolina. However, this is one of the first times it has been used to educate viewers on the effects of climate change.
The meteorologist signed off her audio-visual segment with a plain and simple warning.
"Temperatures are rising, ice is melting, sea levels are accelerating upward and its going to get worse within our lifetime."