Campaign issue: North Pole May Be Ice Free for First Time This Summer

[zulchzulu]

Hello? This is NOT front page news?

"We're actually projecting this year that the North Pole may be free of ice for the first time ," David Barber, of the University of Manitoba, told National Geographic News aboard the C.C.G.S. Amundsen, a Canadian research icebreaker.

Firsthand observations and satellite images show that the immediate area around the geographic North Pole is now mostly annual, or first-year, ice—thin new ice that forms each year during the winter freeze.

Such ice is much more prone to melting during the summer months than perennial, or multiyear, ice, which is thick and dense ice that has lasted through multiple cycles of thawing and refreezing.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/06/080620-north-pole.html

[Renew Deal]

1. That's great news

More water to swim in.


:silly:

[zulchzulu]

2. This forecast is years ahead of what Gore predicted in "Inconvenient Truth"

I was watching the flick again last night. It mentions how the Arctic Circle was a few years from melting and this indication is a few years ahead of what was predicted...

[BigDaddy44]

3. The article is wrong

It wouldn't be free of ice for the first time. We've only been looking for 100 years or so. Its been free of ice before. Its just been a long looooooong time ago.

[zulchzulu]

5. You have no idea what you're talking about

Sorry, but it's true.

The illustration (based on satellite photos) shows how the ice has melted since 1979. This summer, there will be no ice.

Covering 1.59 million square miles (4.12 million square kilometers), this summer's sea ice shattered the previous record for the smallest ice cap of 2.05 million square miles (5.31 million square kilometers) in 2005—a further loss of sea ice area equivalent to the states of California and Texas combined.

"The sea ice cover this year has reached a new record low," says Mark Serreze, senior research scientist at the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo. "It's not just that we beat the old record, we annihilated it."

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=the-north-pole-is-melting

Where do you think the melted ice goes? Why did it melt?

[crankychatter]

4. can Santa swim? am I the first "recommend?"

an issue?

A post not about Bill Clinton's second childhood, MSM gossip, Party infighting, candidate's spouses, Michelle's dress, Obama's matching tie?

I might have to READ something and think about it?

no way... you must be cwazy.

[cbc5g]

6. I wonder what this means for the upcoming winter?

Less ice...more moisture?

[zulchzulu]

8. More water in the seas... and it's also a very severe example of the symptom

The damage of more water that melted in the seas as well the actual symptom that the ice has melted points to how all the other problems that happen with climate change and the effects of warming temperatures in the environment.

If we needed to have proof that there IS global warming, this is it. McCain's flip-flopping on oil drilling is exactly showing how continuing to want to continue fossil fuel production is exactly the wrong way to go.

As for this winter, it may certainly be warmer in many places and may also bring lots of moisture in the mix.

[zulchzulu]

7. Some video simulations

http://mfile.akamai.com/18566/wmv/etouchsyst2.download.akamai.com/18355/wm.nasa-global/environment/AMSR_E_SeaIce2.asx

http://mfile.akamai.com/18566/wmv/etouchsyst2.download.akamai.com/18355/wm.nasa-global/environment/iceAlglobal2.asx

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/seaice_conditions_media_prt.htm