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Posted on 02/16/2008 10:26:17 PM PST by neverdem
There's an upside to the extreme cold temperatures northern Canadians have endured in the last few weeks: scientists say it's been helping winter sea ice grow across the Arctic, where the ice shrank to record-low levels last year.
Temperatures have stayed well in the -30s C and -40s C range since late January throughout the North, with the mercury dipping past -50 C in some areas.
Satellite images are showing that the cold spell is helping the sea ice expand in coverage by about 2 million square kilometres, compared to the average winter coverage in the previous three years.
"It's nice to know that the ice is recovering," Josefino Comiso, a senior research scientist with the Cryospheric Sciences Branch of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Centre in Maryland, told CBC News on Thursday.
"That means that maybe the perennial ice would not go down as low as last year."
Canadian scientists are also noticing growing ice coverage in most areas of the Arctic, including the southern Davis Strait and the Beaufort Sea.
"Clearly, we're seeing the ice coverage rebound back to more near normal coverage for this time of year," said Gilles Langis, a senior ice forecaster with the Canadian Ice Service in Ottawa.
Winter sea ice could keep expanding The cold is also making the ice thicker in some areas, compared to recorded thicknesses last year, Lagnis added.
"The ice is about 10 to 20 centimetres thicker than last year, so that's a significant increase," he said.
If temperatures remain cold this winter, Langis said winter sea ice coverage will continue to expand.
But he added that it's too soon to say what impact this winter will have on the Arctic summer sea ice, which reached its lowest coverage ever recorded in the summer of 2007.
That was because the thick multi-year ice pack that survives a summer melt has been decreasing in recent years, as well as moving further south. Langis said the ice pack is currently located about 130 kilometres from the Mackenzie Delta, about half the distance from where it was last year.
The polar regions are a concern to climate specialists studying global warming, since those regions are expected to feel the impact of climate change sooner and to a greater extent than other areas.
Sea ice in the Arctic helps keep those regions cool by reflecting sunlight that might otherwise be absorbed by darker ocean or land surfaces.
If I remember my physics correctly it gets warm in the summer and ice melts. Then it gets cold in the winter and ice forms.
What’s with all this helping and recovering. It’s just ice, not a hospital patient. Besides, the Northwest Passage, closed for over 600 years, remains closed most of the year and international trade pays the bill.
Yes. It’s a New Age thing. Planetary psychology.
Shoot! I was hoping to have a summer vacation place in the Artic!
Only if the Noble Peace Prize Committee asks for the refund of $1,000,000.
Good grief! With all his interference with warming, Al Gore has gotten us into a new ice age!!
I believe you’ve just coined a new phrase to express a lack of concern regarding the fanatical outpourings of climate change whackos: “Whatever floats your bear”.
Great to see you too, its been a while! I’m on an island, so hoping to see a polar bear.
I had to drive inland a ways to pick someone up and saw an Arctic fox in the morning, and oddly enough about 10 caribou that decided to spend the winter here. They migrate south in the winter, and spend the summer here. I’ve heard that occasionally a few will winter here, but become rather weak and usually become bear food in the spring-time.
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See above.
Interesting, I’m watching a History Channel show about Alaska as I type this, in between working on an article.
Went to the SHOT Show in Las Vegas week before last, then spent a week sick with a bronchial infection. I’m okay now, but that’ll teach me to go out among 40,000 people.
Now they are talking about the Iditarod. Cool.
Hope you get to see a Polar Bear. If you see Paul McCartney and his now very rich ex wife up there saving baby seals, or the HSUS folks saving the Polar Bears, take some photos (grin).
How long will you be there? Hope you get to see the big caribou migration this coming summer.
I'd like to make all the "experts" who think extreme cold weather is great spend a winter freezing their extremities off like where I live. It's been cold around here (western Wisconsin). Not as cold as the Arctic, but a lot colder than normal.
Hidden in the article is the above. The reason for much of the melt-back wasn't warmth...it was the icepack moving. On one side it was pushed north, creating open sea, and on the other side it was being pushed south, where it could melt. As usual most of the dramatic examples hysterically cited in the claim of warming aren't evidence of warming at all.
Also, keep in mind that "ever" means "since 1979".
Winter is funny that way..
Congratulations, Al. You singlehandedly saved the world from global warming.
Click on POGW graphic for full GW rundown
New!!: Dr. John Ray's
GREENIE WATCH
The Great Global Warming Swindle Video - back on the net!! (click here)
Ping me if you find one I've missed.
meanwhile, it's quite acceptable to hunt polar bears, hunters from all around the world are shooting bears.
ROTFL!!!
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