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vukcevic says:
This finding is particularly surprising because it occurred during the last major ice age.
Inflow of warm heavier salty water from the N. Atlantics currents would circulate at some depth below lighter fresh water, while totally frozen surface would prevent any mixing due to tides or storms above; thermo-haline circulation had ideal conditions.
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Steven Mosher says:
yup vuc!
And as we observed this past melt season when the ice is thin storms can induce mixing of the warmer saltier water to the surface where it really does a nice job of melting the ice.
All you have to do is look at bouy data to see the large disturbances the storm caused in the vertical structure of the ocean column.
its not surprising that deeper water would be warmer during that period. no open surface no chance to see what we witnessed this season.
Not sure why people think this is surpising. maybe cause the read the word warmer and didnt follow what happened during this past storm to the vertical structure.
of course, before the storm hit people at nevens were already explaining what would happen.
and, yup, they were right. ekman pumping. cool stuff. amazing what you can learn if you keep an open mind.
here of course people argued that there would not be a storm. argued that it would have no effect and argued that it was common.. then, of course, they changed their minds about all of that.
now they argue that the storm was rare and that all the ice disappeared because of it. go figure.
There is a lesson in their somewhere