Posted on 02/11/2014 5:12:28 PM PST by Sub-Driver
Ice Expert Predicts Lake Superior Will Completely Freeze Over This Winter
February 11, 2014 - 3:22 PM
By Barbara Hollingsworth
(CNSNews.com) – Lake Superior hasn’t completely frozen over in two decades.
But an expert on Great Lakes ice says there’s a “very high likelihood” that the three-quadrillion-gallon lake will soon be totally covered with ice thanks to this winter’s record-breaking cold.
The ice cover on the largest freshwater lake in the world hit a 20-year record of 91 percent on Feb. 5, 1994.
Jay Austin, associate professor at the Large Lakes Observatory in Duluth, Minn., told CNSNews.com that he expects that record will be broken this winter when the most northern of the Great Lakes becomes totally shrouded in ice.
The thickness of the ice on Lake Superior “varies tremendously,” from a very thin sheet in some areas near the coast to several feet thick in other spots, Austin says. The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reports that the mean thickness of the lake ice is 26 cm, or a little over 10 inches.
Austin attributes the large amount of ice on the lake to the “extraordinary cold winter we’ve had,” pointing out that Duluth recently experienced an all-time record of 23 straight days of below-zero temperatures.
The previous record of 22 days was set in 1936 and tied in 1963, according to the National Weather Service.
Austin, who studies the effect of lake ice, predicts that it will have a “very strong influence” on the regional climate this summer, with the “air conditioning [lake] effect” more pronounced than usual.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnsnews.com ...
Ice on Lake Superior!
FReep mail me if you want on, or off, this Wisconsin interest ping list.
Yup.
Erie freezes up all the time because it is shallow.
Probably a once in a lifetime deal for me. Unfortunately didn’t have a camera with me. It was on a commercial prop plane so flying lower and slower than typical jet, had a superb view.
Al Gore said the polar ice cap would be gone in 2014.
Little did anyone realize that it had just moved to Lake Superior.
I remember folks walking across Erie from Cleveland to Canada back in that real cold 78 winter.
Yup.
Erie freezes up all the time because it is shallow.
There had to be Massive falls ABOVE Huron and Superior at some time in the past
Who’s gonna be the first to drive across?
♫ The legend is told from the Chippewa on down,♪
Of the ice rink they call gitche gumee.♪
There will be a major fish die off on the inland lakes this year. They’ve been sealed under the ice since before Christmas and will be pretty oxygen depleted by the thaw.
Awesome!
It was COOOOOLLLD then.
Yes it was. I remember 78 and 94 both as real cold stretches.
Dang Navy won’t let me hot link the photo!
And it will be blamed on human-induced climate change.
This year is a bad one, but it is NOT abnormal.
"Son, the glaciers picked them up and dropped them all here."
"Daddy? Where did the glaciers go?"
"To get more rocks, son."
/johnny
Agree, we just call it “real winter” LOL
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