One square mile of contaminated area is not a good thing, but isn’t what I’d call an ‘environmental catastophe’, so no they don’t contradict each other. A minor, localized incident, that doesn’t require country wide action, and no loss of life is not a ‘catastrophe’, especially when we’re talking about it in the context of nuclear powers shooting at each others military vehicles.
I consider it a catastrophe when there’s flour all over the floor of the kitchen. YMMV.
And thus we see the meta-problem.
Many folks have been conditioned by the relative simplicity and trouble-free nature of modern Western life to use words like “catastrophe” to describe trivial non-events.
The consequence of this will be societal paralysis and panic when actual non-trivial events eventually occur. be they natural disasters, man-made disasters, or political upheaval.
Especially when the severity of whatever it is will be massively cheer-led by the media.
Sense of proportion, people. Please get some.
Describing something as a “non-event” conveys just as little information as describing something as a “catastrophe.” If someone spread plutonium over a square mile in your town, you’d probably be describing it as a “catastrophe” and hating on that guy from Spain on the internet describing it as a “non-event.”
My advice would be to just let the reader decide what the writer meant, rather than clutching pearls over the breakdown of language leading to “societal paralysis.” :rolleyes: