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Rubber Ducky
Melting glaciers, and rubber ducks, explained by a real live scientist.
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Greenland: roar of melting glacier sounds climate change alarm
When are we going to hear the roar of the American people demanding Washington Dc wake the hell up and stop touting some bogus 80% by 2050 emissions reduction line when it is obvious that will be too late? However, the price of gas is supposedly going down now so conveniently before 'election' day and with the current global financial crisis so conveniently placed where it is I suppose dealing with climate change will now be an afterthought to governments that really weren't going to do much about it anyway.
To me this all seems surreal. It is like slowing down to watch a car wreck and then speeding up once you get by to continue on your way because the thrill of seeing it is gone because you really didn't care if anyone was hurt, it was just exciting to look at. 'Oh my, the Greenland ice caps are melting... how terrible... look at that video... oh boy, something to talk about today...then... nothing to see here, move on... let's look at pictures of Jamie Lynn Spears breastfeeding instead.' The Earth is speaking to us, crying out to us. The signs are everywhere. And we continue driving down the road turning our radios up so as not to be bothered, thinking someone will take care of that; or, it won't melt enough in my lifetime to make any difference; or, it is all natural or the will of God so why fight it. I just do not know what else can be said anymore.
We need to be scaling more chimneys and unfurling more banners, and standing around more fossil fuel plants, and shouting even louder, and writing relentlessly to newspapers and media and badgering representatives in Dc and elsewhere, and we need to be telling ALL presidential candidates that "clean coal' is not the answer. We need to pull over and get out of the car and do something besides gawking at the tragedy unfolding before our eyes.
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From the article:
Flying low over the vast, white expanse of Greenland's Ilulissat glacier, one of the biggest and most active in the world, the effects of global warming in the Arctic are painfully visible as the ice melts at an alarming rate.
The helicopter lands on a granite cliff overlooking the Ilulissat ice fjord, or Kangia in Greenlandic, offering a magnificent, panoramic view of elaborate ice formations as they float towards the sea at a rate of two meters (yards) an hour, spilling massive icebergs into the open water.
Off in the distance, huge boulders of ice break off of the imposing Ilulissat glacier, more commonly known by its Greenlandic name Sermeq Kujalleq, creating a thunderous roar as the glacier recedes in one of the planet's most striking examples of global warming.
"The ice in some places on the coast is now melting four times faster than before," says Abbas Khan, a Dane who studies the movements of Greenland's glaciers at the Danish Space Centre.
The Ilulissat glacier and icefjord have been on UNESCO's world heritage list since 2004 and is the most visited site in Greenland, its ice and pools of emerald-blue water admired by tourists and studied by scientists and politicians around the world.
The glacier is the most active in the northern hemisphere, producing 10 percent of Greenland's icebergs, or some 20 million tonnes of ice per day.
But the glacier is in bad shape, experts warn.
Recent estimates by US scientists who study NASA's satellite images daily show that it is rapidly disintegrating.
It has shrunk more than 15 kilometres (9.3 miles) in the past five years, and is now smaller than it has ever been in the 150 years of observation and topographical data.
According to professor Jason Box and his team from the department of geography at Ohio State University, the Ilulissat glacier may not have been this small in 6,000 years.
more at the link
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Photo credit:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/danielheaf/1343411263/ When are we going to hear the roar of the American people demanding Washington Dc wake the hell up and stop touting some bogus 80% by ... more -
Scenes From the Ice Age @ Ground Zero
Excavation at the World Trade Center site has uncovered, among other geologic features, a 40-foot glacial pothole.
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NASA deploys rubber duckies to research global warming
Researchers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory have released 90 rubber ducks into Greenland's Jakobshavn glacier in an effort to track how glaciers move and melt in the summer months, and how water moves through the giant sheets of ice. The boffins hope the ducks will surface in the waters around the Baffin Bay area. They've labelled all the ducks with "science experiment" and "reward" and an email address so they can map where the little yellow floaters are found. Researchers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory have released 90 rubber ducks into Greenland's Jakobshavn glacier in an effo... more
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Imja Glacier
A melting glacier in the Himalayas is the only thing protecting a community from a mountain deluge.
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Greenland glacier breakup suggests imminent disintegration
New satellite images reveal that a massive ice chunk recently broken away from one of Greenland's glaciers, which researchers say will continue to disintegrate within the next year.
Scientists at Ohio State University monitoring daily NASA satellite images of Greenland's glaciers discovered that an 11-square-mile (29-square-kilometer) piece of the Petermann Glacier broke away between July 10 and 24. The chunk was about half the size of Manhattan. New satellite images reveal that a massive ice chunk recently broken away from one of Greenland's glaciers, which researchers say... more -
Germans try to slow glacier melt with giant screen
German researchers trying to slow melting glaciers have set up a large screen in the Swiss Alps that they hope will trap cold air over the icy mass, Johannes Gutenberg University said Thursday.
"We hope our installations will bring about a net cooling of the area. And if the melt is not stopped, that it is at least slowed," the project's leader, geography professor Hans-Joachim Fuchs, said in a statement.
The structure, 15 metres long and three metres high (49 feet by 10 feet), was raised in the middle of the Rhone glacier in Switzerland's southwestern Valais region by 27 students from the German university.
The purpose of the screen -- which sits at an altitude of 2,300 metres -- is to keep cold winds over the glacier.
Already successfully tested in a laboratory, the experiment will be studied on site until August 21, according to the university, located in the Swiss city of Mainz.
... well at least its something. German researchers trying to slow melting glaciers have set up a large screen in the Swiss Alps that they hope will trap cold air over... more -
Ice dam breaks apart early
A huge ice dam on Argentina's Perito Moreno glacier is about to break apart for the first time during the southern hemisphere winter.
The 60 metre high wall of ice which holds back a portion of Lake Argentina, breaks apart in annual cycles but always in summer. A huge ice dam on Argentina's Perito Moreno glacier is about to break apart for the first time during the southern hemisphere win... more -
Polar Bears and Rough Ice
Renowned polar explorer Will Steger, leader of the GlobalWarming101 Ellesmere Island Expedition ( http://www.globalwarming101.com ), expected the Arctic to throw all it had at his team.
The Arctic delivered.
See the story of the team and their polar bear encounters as they traveled through the rough ice, littered with seal pups.
Learn more about the expedition and their eyewitness account of the effects of climate change on the northern Canadian ice shelves at http://www.globalwarming101.com Renowned polar explorer Will Steger, leader of the GlobalWarming101 Ellesmere Island Expedition ( http://www.globalwarming101.com ), e... more -
The photographic evidence of climate change
Global warming at the extremes of the earth. Habitats and cultures everywhere react to climate's rapid changes.
"In my view, climate change is the most severe problem that we are facing today -- more serious even than the threat of terrorism."
With this warning to an international science meeting in February 2004, David A. King, Chief Scientific Advisor to the British Government, brought the issue of global warming into sharp focus.
The World View of Global Warming project is documenting this change through science photography from the Arctic to Antarctica, from glaciers to the oceans, across all climate zones. Rapid climate change and its effects is fast becoming one of the prime events of the 21st century. It is real and it is accelerating across the globe. As the effects of this change combine with overpopulation and weather crises, climate disruptions will affect more people than does war. Global warming at the extremes of the earth. Habitats and cultures everywhere react to climate's rapid changes. ... more -
NASA Captures Up Close View Of Melting Glaciers
This is the inconvenient truth up close. This is the effect of burning fossil fuel and spewing Co2 emissions at the rate of 70 million tons a day. This is the inconvenient truth up close. This is the effect of burning fossil fuel and spewing Co2 emissions at the rate of 70 million... more
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PALAOA - Transmitting live from the Ocean below the Antarctic Ice
Providing an acoustic live stream of the Antarctic underwater soundscape is a formidable challenge. After all, more than 15000 km lie between Antarctica and our institute in Germany. Underwater sound is recorded by means of two hydrophones by PALAOA, an autonomous, wind and solar powered observatory located on the Ekström ice shelf (Boebel et al., 2006). The data stream is transmitted via wireless LAN from PALAOA to the German Neumayer Base. From there, a permanent satellite link transmits the data to the AWI in Germany. A constant hiss pervading the signal is the natural, isotropic background noise made audible here through the use of ultra sensitive hydrophones. Additional broad band noise caused by wind, waves and currents adds to it on occasion. Due to the limited bandwith of the satellite link, jamming of the WLAN link due to storms, or energy shortage, the connection might temporarily be down or scrammed. In this case, please dial in later! Providing an acoustic live stream of the Antarctic underwater soundscape is a formidable challenge. After all, more than 15000 km lie ... more
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Catching Glacial Retreat In The Act: Extreme Ice Survey
Extreme Ice Survey is an ambitious project to capture global warming-induced glacial retreat in the act. Beginning in December 2006, photographer James Balog and his colleagues set up 26 solar-powered cameras at glaciers in Greenland, Iceland, Alaska, the Alps, and the Rocky Mountains. Each unit will take a photograph every daylight hour until fall 2009. In 2008, Balog's team began to return to each of the camera sites to collect images. In the end, they will have more than 300,000 images to analyze and stitch together to produce more dramatic videos like this one. This kind of multiyear effort, says Balog, is necessary to 'radically alter public perception of the global warming issue.'" Extreme Ice Survey is an ambitious project to capture global warming-induced glacial retreat in the act. Beginning in December 2006, p... more
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Antarctica is Gone
A very sizeable chunk of ice has begun to break away from Antarctica.
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Western Antarctic ice chunk collapses
A chunk of Antarctic ice about seven times the size of Manhattan suddenly collapsed, putting an even greater portion of glacial ice at risk, scientists said Tuesday.
Satellite images show the runaway disintegration of a 160-square-mile chunk in western Antarctica, which started Feb. 28. It was the edge of the Wilkins ice shelf and has been there for hundreds, maybe 1,500 years.
This is the result of global warming, said British Antarctic Survey scientist David Vaughan. A chunk of Antarctic ice about seven times the size of Manhattan suddenly collapsed, putting an even greater portion of glacial ice at... more -
Huge Antarctic ice chunk collapses
"A chunk of Antarctic ice nine times the size of Manhattan has suddenly collapsed, putting an even larger glacial area at risk.
Satellite images show the runaway disintegration of a 220-square-mile chunk in western Antarctica.
British scientist David Vaughan says it's the result of global warming.
The rest of the Connecticut-sized ice shelf is holding on by a narrow beam of thin ice and scientists worry that it too may collapse. Larger, more dramatic ice collapses occurred in 2002 and 1995."
They've corrected the size to 7 times the size of Manhattan. That's still pretty big if ya ask me, no?
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jnjYmtmAnaPQ4YWKA6Wp... "A chunk of Antarctic ice nine times the size of Manhattan has suddenly collapsed, putting an even larger glacial area at risk. ... more -
Al Gore To Climate Conference in Faroes
Al Gore, Nobel prize winner and former Vice-President of the USA, will be the main speaker at the TransAtlantic Climate Conference in the Faroe Islands, on 7 and 8 April, an event focusing on climate change in the North Atlantic and on the new challenges faced by countries in the region.
NORA, a Nordic Council of Ministers' cross-border committee on regional policy, is one of the organisers of the event. Climate change is high on the Nordic co-operation agenda, especially within the framework of the new initiative designed to help the Region face up to the challenges posed by globalisation. By involving several countries around the North Atlantic, it is hoped that the conference will provide a boost to trans-Atlantic co-operation on climate change in the marine environment.
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Busy man. ;-). Now we need to get busy. Al Gore, Nobel prize winner and former Vice-President of the USA, will be the main speaker at the TransAtlantic Climate Conference in ... more -
UN warns: say goodbye to glaciers
The UN announced today that in 2006 glaciers around the world shrank at a record rate and could all disappear within decades. This data provides fresh evidence that the climate crises is increasing. In 206 alone, the average glacier shrank by 4.9 feet, while one in Norway dropped by 10.2 feet.
Isn't it time we wake up and act?????????????
Read more on this at the associated link. The UN announced today that in 2006 glaciers around the world shrank at a record rate and could all disappear within decades. This dat... more -
Glacier
Adam Yamaguchi travels to Alaska to witness some of the dramatic effects of climate change.
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