MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Rapidly eroding ice cap and thickness makes the Arctic even more vulnerable
Arctic has lost more sea ice this year than at any time since satellite records began in 1979, Nasa says. Scientists involved in the calculations say it is part of a fundamental change. What is more, sea ice normally reaches its low point in September so it is thought likely that this year's melt will continue to grow. Read full article
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Disclaimer & comment rulesWadhams is still clinging to his discredited submarine claims,
Aug 28th, 2012 - 09:44 am - Link - Report abuse 0”Measurements from submarines have shown that it has lost at least 40% of its thickness since the 1980s, and if you consider the shrinkage as well it means that the summer ice volume is now only 30% of what it was in the 1980s,“ he added.
His claim goes back to 1999-2001, when he came up with a conclusion that, from 29 locations where records could be compared, average thickness was reduced 43%, hence, far more rapidly than 3% per decade areal reduction. The claim was rebutted in 2001, by Holloway and Sou, of the Institute of Ocean Sciences, BC, Canada and they showed that the apparent ice loss was only a shifting location of ice within the Arctic such that the sampling pattern of the submarines missed the shift. Large-scale wind patterns are ever changing, and the Arctic ice pack is readily rearranged. This is what has happened recently as an exceptionally large storm brock up a lot of the pack ice into smaller pieces, which satellites can't pick up. Satellites also can't accurately measure shoreline ice either.
The conclusion in 2001 was
“Everywhere the environment always changes, and ability to sample those changes is limited. Inferences from limited observations can be misleading. Numerical ice-ocean modelling together with re-analyses of atmospheric forcing can help refine inferences. In the case of submarine-inferred rapid loss of Arctic sea ice, combined modelling and data argue that a more physically plausible inference is that the ice was not ”lost“ but only shifted within the Arctic. The pattern of submarine sampling happened to miss the shift. Observations to date, together with model physics, imply only that the loss of sea ice volume is not inconsistent with the 3% per decade loss of ice area, a modest rate itself not inconsistent with multi-decadal natural variability.”
Wadhams still is quoted on his incorrect conclusion and 10 years ago he said the Arctic would be ice free in 2011.
#1 So is everything fine then? Whats your advice for saving theplanet - lets all stick our heads in the sand and hope it will all work out perhaps?
Aug 28th, 2012 - 12:26 pm - Link - Report abuse 0Surely CFK is the world leader in policies to combat climate change? Shouldn't we just all leave it for her to sort out?
Aug 28th, 2012 - 01:36 pm - Link - Report abuse 0British Kirschnerist
Aug 28th, 2012 - 07:30 pm - Link - Report abuse 0So you are happy that people lie and distort information to promote an agenda? It is the Wadhams, the Manns, and the Hansen's of this world , who have made careers out of foretelling disaster that hasn' t come, by adjusting and fudging the data that they control. The planet is not in danger, except from the fools who promote the idea that it is. And people like you who desperately want to believe them, no matter what.
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