Arctic sea ice drops to second lowest level on record
Published Tuesday, August 26, 2008
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Stumble It!ANCHORAGE -- Arctic Ocean sea ice has melted to the second lowest minimum since satellite observations began, according to scientists at the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
Sea ice melt on Monday exceeded the low recorded in 2005, which had held second place.
With several weeks left in the melt season, ice in summer 2008 has a chance to diminish below the record low set last year, according to scientists at the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
Environmental groups said the ice melt was another alarm bell warning of global warming.
"It's an unfortunate sign that climate change is coming rapidly to the Arctic and that we really need to address the issue of global warming on a national level," said Christopher Krenz, Arctic project manager for Oceana.
"This is not surprising but it is alarming," said Deborah Williams, a former Interior Department special assistant for Alaska. "This was a relatively cool summer, and to have ice decrease to the second lowest minimum on record demonstrates that global warming's ongoing impact is profound."
The National Snow and Ice Data Center, based at the University of Colorado, reported the ice Monday melted below the 2005 minimum of 2.05 million square miles set on Sept. 21 that year. Exact figures will be released Wednesday.
Through the beginning of the melt season in May until early August, daily ice extent for 2008 closely tracked the values for 2005, the center said.
In early August 2005, the decline began to slow. In August 2008, however, the decline has remained steadily downward at a brisk pace.
The most recent ice retreat primarily reflects melt in the Chukchi Sea off Alaska's northwest coast and the East Siberian Seas off the coast of eastern Russia, according to the center.
The Chukchi Sea is home to one of two populations of Alaska polar bears.
Federal observers flying for a whale survey on Aug. 16 spotted nine polar bears swimming in open ocean in the Chukchi Sea. The bears were 15 to 65 miles off the Alaska shore. Some were swimming north, apparently trying to reach the polar ice edge, which on that day was 400 miles away.
Polar bears are powerful swimmers and have been recorded on swims of 100 miles but the ordeal can leave them exhausted and susceptible to drowning in high seas.
Sea ice is the primary habitat of polar bears. They depend on it to hunt their primary prey, ringed seals, which create lairs on ice for breeding maintain breathing holes with powerful claws.
Summer sea ice last year shrank to about 1.65 million square miles, nearly 40 percent less than the long-term average between 1979 and 2000. Most climate modelers predict a continued downward spiral, possibly with an Arctic Ocean that's ice free during summer months by 2030 or sooner.
Krenz said the announcement Tuesday showed that last year's record low sea ice was not an anomaly. As ice covers fewer square miles of ocean, he said, warming will accelerate.
"It's going to accelerate climate change through changes in the reflectance of the Arctic," he said. "It's going from bright ice to a much darker ocean."
More square miles of dark ocean will absorb more heat. More warmth will accelerate melting of Arctic permafrost, allowing organic matter now frozen to melt and add to the greenhouse gas problem, he said.
"That allows for the breakdown of that by bacteria and other organisms that release CO2 or methane, depending on how the breakdown occurs," he said.
The effects faced by people in the Arctic eventually will reach the rest of the nation and the world, he warned.
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On the Net:
National Snow and Ice Data Center release: http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
Community Discussion
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And exactly how long have you global warming FOOLS been keeping records? 10 years? 30 years? 4,400 years since the flood? Idiots!! Educated Idiots!! High IQ's...No common sense.
they have plenty of sense. they know enough how to look for facts that fit their agenda and disregard or obfiscate any that don't.
ho hum. BORING. Change happens. Anyone who expects things to always stay the same must not see reality. There's a word for that.
"...they know enough how to look for facts that fit their agenda..."
What exactly are you doing, polarmark? How many years in a row does the ice need to significantly disappear before you begin to wonder if there is something happening about which we should care? One doesn't need to be an alarmist to be curious about major changes--and the possible disappearance of summer ice is quite a change. Even if it isn't a bad change or a human-caused change, we're going to want to know how things are different. This data matters.
Oh no don't you get it? We should be paying more for everything to fight Gorebal Warming! If we don't all of our children are going to die from heat stroke and the polar bears will too!
Meanwhile one of the coldest summers in S/Central, and oh, what about the ships stranded in the sea ice 60 miles west of Barrow --in JULY???
The 30 per cent increase was calculated by counting pixels which contain colors representing ice. This is a conservative calculation, because of the map projection used. As the ice expands away from the pole, each new pixel represents a larger area - so the net effect is that the calculated 30 per cent increase is actually on the low side.
So how did NSIDC calculate a 10 per cent increase over 2007? Their graph appears to disagree with the maps by a factor of three (10 per cent vs. 30 per cent) - hardly a trivial discrepancy.
The Arctic did not experience the meltdowns forecast by NSIDC and the Norwegian Polar Year Secretariat. It didn't even come close. Additionally, some current graphs and press releases from NSIDC seem less than conservative. There appears to be a consistent pattern of overstatement related to Arctic ice loss.
How exciting! We have more sea ice this year than last year. Our climatologists have been keeping long term sea ice records now for 30 years. We can extrapolate that the pattern over the last four years is a trend and not just an enomoly. During the past four years the ice is going from less to more to less to a little more. What great science that requires many years of higher education to fully understand that the earth is not stable in terms of climate. We should all pitch in and get Al Gore a weather rock for his birthday.
I think the real reason people want to argue against global warming is because they are too selfish to change their lifestyle. The scientists that say we are seeing signs of global warming say that it is our consumption of fossil fuels which is causing a greenhouse effect, which is warming the planet. One way or the other, fossil fuels are going to become more scarce and more expensive.
So whether you believe in global warming or not really doesn't matter. Unless we cut our consumption of fossil fuels, we are going to have less disposable income in the future and an environment which is going to get progressively less enjoyable to live in.
When the first oil embargo hit in the early 70's people were arguing about how much oil was left in the world. We chose to keep on our same reckless course of consumption. Now we are paying the price. I think it is better to be wrong about global warming and to do something to change our lifestyle, than to continue consuming fossil fuels and ruin our atmosphere and economy.
Nicely said truthinnews, we are polluting our atomosphere and water too. De Niel isn't only a river in Africa, you know.
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