Mount Shasta Glaciers Defy Global Warming, Grow (by 30%....incl. video)

CBS 13.com ^ | September 3, 2007 | John Iander

[Stoat]

Mount Shasta Glaciers Defy Global Warming, Grow

 

John Iander
Reporting

(CBS13) MOUNT SHASTA The debate over global warming has taken a pretty odd twist in Northern California. Up on Mount Shasta, the glaciers are not behaving like you'd expect.

Big mountains often produce their own weather patterns. Mount Shasta, at 14,162 feet seems to have a mind of its own these days. Shasta has seven glaciers. The biggest is the one on the middle, Whitney Glacier. What has surprised scientists about the glacier is that if the theories about global warming are true, the glacier ought to be shrinking, but it's not.

“Unlike most areas around the world, these glaciers are advancing, they are growing. Thirty percent in the last fifty years,” says scientist Erik White.

White and mountain climber Chris Carr are Shasta experts.

"Every year it's a little bit different. But the glacier changes dramatically, year to year," says Carr.

So why are the glaciers larger today than they were a century or more ago?

"Mount Shasta is right at the very northern end of areas influenced by El Nino and were at the southern end of areas affected by La Nina. So between the two we get to see the benefits of that which means more snow and rain in this area," says White.

Snow scientists have been tracking the glaciers' size by comparing photos from a century ago to those taken decades later, and then using satellite data and computer modeling to determine the rate of growth.

Those models predict Shasta will continue to receive more than normal snowfall, but if the temperature continues to rise, the glaciers will begin to recede.

For now, the growing glaciers are good news to the town of Mount Shasta which hosts the thousands of tourists who come to here to experience the thrill of ice climbing.

You can climb mountain Shasta all the way to the glaciers to see for yourself, but, you'd better have good hiking equipment and be in good shape too!

[#1CTYankee]

"Where do I sign up for my research grant?"

Sorry, but you can sign up here to have your weather station compiling data.

http://www.wxqa.com/SIGN-UP.html

Make sure you locate it close to the pavement, near an air conditioning unit and a chimney.

Or if you live near a private airport try positioning your weather station like the one in this photo.

[Amerigomag]

Glacial melting rates are primarily a function of solar energy on the surface of the glacier, not ambient temperature. If atmospheric dimming rates exceed temperature rise, glaciers will expand, all else being equal in mid northern latitudes.

[secretagent]

What percentage of the world’s glaciers show a decline?

[Stoat]

What percentage of the world’s glaciers show a decline?

Neither the article nor the video answer that, but probably enough to keep Algore in the media spotlight for a while.

[traviskicks]

bookmark

[Clovis_Skeptic]

I just took this picture of Mt. Shasta on Friday, August 31st. This is from the north side.

[Grampa Dave]

Excellent. This has been stolen, er, borrowed for future Carbon Credits.

[Grampa Dave]

Pray that Al Gorebull Warming runs for President in 08 on his Gorebull Warming BS.

Pray that Al Gorebull Warming runs for President in 08 on his Gorebull Warming BS.

[Osage Orange]

WE have weather stations recording the increasing temperature nearly every day.

Every day?

What's the temp there now...150 F?

[cogitator]

Glaciers Media Will Never Report

See my comments at number 10.

Newbusters is currently down; I'd like to see the whole article Sheppard wrote on this. The final comment I can see above (regarding El Nino and La Nina) is pretty strange and twisted in terms of actual reality.

[#1CTYankee]

"What's the temp there now...150 F?"

That depends on if the exhaust from the aircraft is hitting the stations temerature sensor.

[Osage Orange]

I thought it was the AC units?

Ha!!

[#1CTYankee]

"I thought it was the AC units?"

"Ha!"

Pretty sad these stations are being used to monitor weather temp, rainfall etc. accross the U.S. Many are not installed , serviced etc. per the rules.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

I saw what I believe was Mount Shasta earlier this year, near Weed, California. It was nicely covered in snow.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

This morning, my professor (a professor in marketing I might add) was preaching about global warming.

That is as absurd and un-professional as cogitator preaching about marketing (instead of AGW). :-)

[TenthAmendmentChampion]

Send me methane some credits for my pet moose and I'll e-mail you my credit card number.

Just keep the moose away from my sister is all I ask.

[TenthAmendmentChampion]

Wow, that is gorgeous! Any chance you’ve posted a high-definition version anywhere online? I would love a copy of it for my screen background.

[cogitator]

lots of panic-button alarmists don't like to acknowledge the role of Los Ninos (El Nino and La Nina) in the climate fluctuations they claim are global warming.

I agree. However, as discussed many times, a huge amount of emphasis is placed by the skeptics on the 1998 El Nino, because that was the warmest year (globally, by far) ever recorded. My profile has a back-of-the-envelope calculation which demonstrates that based on the current warming trend, the global temperature of 1998 wouldn't be expected, based on the TREND, until about 2013.

Yet skeptics still claim that the globe is cooling because it hasn't gotten warmer than 1998. So who's not acknowledging the role of El Nino in this case?