Mysterious Clouds Creeping Out of the Arctic

[babylonsister]

http://www.livescience.com/environment/070628_night_clouds.html

Mysterious Clouds Creeping Out of the Arctic

By Dave Mosher, LiveScience Staff Writer



A new NASA satellite has recorded the first detailed images from space of a mysterious type of cloud called “night-shining” or “noctilucent."

The clouds are on the move, brightening and creeping out of polar regions, and researchers don't know why.

"It is clear that these clouds are changing, a sign that a part of our atmosphere is changing and we do not understand how, why or what it means," said atmospheric scientists James Russell III of Hampton University in Hampton, Virginia. "These observations suggest a connection with global change in the lower atmosphere and could represent an early warning that our Earth environment is being changed."

more...

[Donnachaidh]

1. Ice melt causing Cheney's ship to come to the surface?

Better watch out - he'll have access to more than guns now. :evilgrin:

[TechBear_Seattle]

3. I thought Cheney had an island

It's in the Pacific, about halfway between New Zealand and Chile

[natrat]

2. if ever we needed some pos to blame everything on it's now-impeach imprison

[Mabus]

4. First seen in 1885, two years after Krakatoa

Space Station Crew Photographs Mysterious Clouds that Shine at Night
By Tony Phillips
Science.NASA.gov
posted: 11:30 am ET
19 February 2003

***

"Noctilucent clouds are a relatively new phenomenon," says Gary Thomas, a professor at the University of Colorado who studies NLCs. "They were first seen in 1885" about two years after the powerful eruption of Krakatoa in Indonesia, which hurled plumes of ash as high as 80 kilometers into Earth's atmosphere.

Ash from the volcano caused such splendid sunsets that evening sky watching became a popular worldwide pastime. One sky watcher in particular, a German named T. W. Backhouse, noticed something odd. He stayed outside after the sun had set and, on some nights, saw wispy filaments glowing electric blue against the black sky. Noctilucent clouds. Scientists of the day figured the clouds were some curious manifestation of volcanic ash.

Eventually the ash settled and the vivid sunsets of Krakatoa faded. Yet the noctilucent clouds remained. "It's puzzling," says Thomas. "Noctilucent clouds have not only persisted, but also spread." A century ago the clouds were confined to latitudes above 50 degrees; you had to go to places like Scandinavia, Russia and Britain to see them. In recent years they have been sighted as far south as Utah and Colorado.

***

One reason for the recent spread of noctilucent clouds might be global warming. "Extreme cold is required to form ice in a dry environment like the mesosphere," says Thomas. Ironically, global warming helps. While greenhouse gases warm Earth's surface, they actually lower temperatures in the high atmosphere. Thomas notes that noctilucent clouds were first spotted during the Industrial Revolution--a time of rising greenhouse gas production.

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/strange_clouds_030219.html

[depakid]

10. Just saw some in Oregon last week

Here are some photos:

http://spaceweather.com/nlcs/gallery2007_page4.htm

[Mabus]

11. Beautiful photographs

Thank you for sharing.

This may sound like a strange question but how many people really notice them? Do you hear others talking about them? We spend more time outside than most of our neighbors. We'll take time out during the day to sit on the front porch and get refocused. We've got dogs that we take for nightly walks. We take them to a nearby park and watch the sky. We rarely run into anyone on the streets much less anyone who is looking up.

[damntexdem]

5. Oh, no! In future, they'll be hiding in dark alleys to mug us.

Or planting car bombs in our midst.

No, folks -- it will be far worse than that as we change our atmosphere in ways of which we have no awareness.

[Javaman]

6. It's the Arrowhead project...

:scared:

[Oreo]

7. More here

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2003/19feb_nlc.htm

and here

http://www.spaceweather.com/


NLCs FROM ABOVE: For the first time ever, humans know what a noctilucent cloud (NLC) looks like--from above. NASA's AIM spacecraft took this composite UV-wavelength picture on June 11th from a vantage point 600 km over Earth's north pole:

Launched on April 25, 2007, AIM is on a mission to study these mysterious clouds at the edge of space; the image above represents its first good look. For the next two years, AIM will monitor the life cycle of NLCs, assaying their chemistry and particulate content, and checking to see if space dust plays a role in their genesis.

When NLCs were first sighted in the 19th century, they were confined to polar latitudes, but lately they have intensified and spread with sightings in recent years as far south as Colorado and Utah. "It is clear that these clouds are changing, a sign that a part of our atmosphere is changing and we do not understand how or what it means," says AIM principal investigator James Russell III of Hampton University. Are NLCs a sign of global warming? Or something else? Researchers hope AIM will provide some answers. Stay tuned for updates.

Gallery Here http://spaceweather.com/nlcs/gallery2007_page5.htm

[hunter]

9. Weird.

Noctilucent clouds over Finland. The orange hues near the horizon are ordinary sunset colors, notes Gary Thomas. NLCs, on the other hand, are usually "luminous blue-white or sometimes just pale white," he says. Image credit Pekka Parviainen.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2003/19feb_nlc.htm

Maybe it's just me noticing them more often, but sun pillars seem to be more common in California now than when I was a kid...



http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap060205.html

[Poll_Blind]

8. The stars are right, bitches! We melted R'LYEH!

Just a thought, anyway.

PB