Satellites reveal sudden Greenland ice melt

Satellites reveal sudden Greenland ice melt

www.bbc.co.uk

Scientists said the "unprecedented" melting took place over a larger area that ever detected in three decades of satellite observation.

Melting even occurred at Greenland's coldest and highest place, Summit station.

The thawed ice area jumped from 40% of the ice sheet to 97% in just four days from 8 July.

(visit the link for the full news article)

Although about half of Greenland's ice sheet normally melts over the summer months, the speed and scale of this year's melting surprised scientists, who described the phenomenon as "extraordinary".

He said that because this Greenland-wide melting has happened before they are not yet able to determine whether this is a natural but rare event, or if it has been sparked by man-made global warming.

Scientists said they believed that much of Greenland's ice was already freezing again.

Until now, the most extensive melting seen by satellites in the past three decades was about 55% of the area.

Very interesting times indeed.

The news comes just days after Nasa satellite imagery revealed that a massive iceberg, twice the size of Manhattan, had broken off a glacier in Greenland.

"This event, combined with other natural but uncommon phenomena, such as the large calving event last week on Petermann Glacier, are part of a complex story," said Nasa's Tom Wagner.

What exactly is going on with the planet? I've been convinced that global warming is a myth, but it's not just the planet, it's the weather, the economy, politics at its most polarizing point in American history, 2012 has been an interesting year and I have a feeling something is on the horizon.

www.bbc.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

Wow that is a lot of ice melt in a short amount of time! There is something I saw once on youtube about a anomaly in Greenland...let me find it.

www.youtube.com...

I saw this maybe a year ago and totally forgot about it. If anyone knows what it is I am sure it someone on ATS.

Perhaps this is the cause of the ice melt. It is said this thing spans the entire country.

Originally posted by Uniceft17
What exactly is going on with the planet? I've been convinced that global warming is a myth, but it's not just the planet, it's the weather, the economy, politics at its most polarizing point in American history, 2012 has been an interesting year and I have a feeling something is on the horizon.

You ought to go slap whoever it was that convinced you that global warming is a myth.

Since it is climate, not weather, it takes time, but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to sort out that pumping a crapload of CO2 into the atmosphere is going to have some affect on how the atmosphere behaves. We have Venus as an example of the potential, and I remember lecturing about the Greenhouse Effect when I taught at university almost 30 years ago. But people put on their blinders, allowed politics to manipulate observed effect, and here we are.

The only question is whether we've reached a tipping point, and whether recovery is at all possible. I am inclined to think that it is not.

I am not a scientist, and thus its impossible for me to evaluate the supposed science behind global warming. I have heard convincing arguments on both sides.

You know what really bothers me? how ideological the argument is. People seem to have their minds made up about global warming based on their favored position on the left-right spectrum. I really wish people could leave politics out of science and we could determine, once and for all, whether or not global warming is underway. But of course in this sick world, wherever money is involved, politics are not far behind. Lots of industries (and indeed entire national economies) stand a great deal to lose if global warming is true; meanwhile, there is a vocal group that stands to gain from schemes like cap-and-trade. Both throw a flurry of money at the issue, creating a lot of propaganda on both sides and totally obscuring the truth.

Let's hope that by the time we reach some kind of consensus on this, its not too late.

No actually they show an ice shelf breaking off. This has happened many times over thousands of years. It's not a mass melt off, it a broken shelf of ice, just the same as Antarctica.

Originally posted by silent thunder
I am not a scientist, and thus its impossible for me to evaluate the supposed science behind global warming. I have heard convincing arguments on both sides.

You know what really bothers me? how ideological the argument is.

That's exactly right, and it can help you to sort out what the truth is most likely to be, by throwing out arguments that are based on ideology, not on science. When a pundit who is allied with the oil industry tells you that Global Warming is nonsense, is he basing that on valid science? Or on what his managers tell him to say?

That's not to say that proponents of climate change might not over emphasize their position, but once again, are they basing it on science? Or on random claims?

Again, think rationally... the Earth existed for millions of years with a very specific group of elements in its atmosphere. How can we suddenly, and radically, change that composition and NOT think it would have some effect? That's lunacy, not rational thought.

reply to post by adjensen


Anthropogenic climate change is in no way real or based off of anything to do with science, it is entirly politically motivated, to try to force the make believe green technologies on us.


Every single day more CO2 is produced from dead vegetation alone than by man in its entire history. Just because it was created by man instead of nature does not mean it isn't exactly the same CO2 that nature makes.

The carbon dioxide in the air is so small that there is barely enough for plants to live off of, why do you think plants were so much larger in prehistoric times?

Also it has been proven many times through years that their climate models are complete crap. There is no way that one claim with a straight face to be able to tell the weather 100 years from now when they can't even tell what will happen next week. Keep your comments about climate and weather being different. They are not, they are both based off the exact same modeling techniques, that are widely known to be crap.

Man has no idea what actually is happening, claiming otherwise is falasy and equals epic fail!

Having been college educated, I would have thought your reasoning skills to be much more developed than buying into any of the crap they have been shoveling since THE GORICLE tried the chicken little about global cooling in the 70s.

Honestly, there is no proof of any type that says anthropogenic climate change is real. There is however a lot of evidence that says its crap. They don't allow it in the MSM because it doesn't further the green agenda.

reply to post by inverslyproportional


the atmosphere in the past actually had much higher concentration of oxygen and lower pressure

This video should fill your mind with much needed information of the cycles. Will it happen again. Also, the last ice ages and melt offs, were they caused by humans as well?

Originally posted by adjensen

Originally posted by Uniceft17
What exactly is going on with the planet? I've been convinced that global warming is a myth, but it's not just the planet, it's the weather, the economy, politics at its most polarizing point in American history, 2012 has been an interesting year and I have a feeling something is on the horizon.

You ought to go slap whoever it was that convinced you that global warming is a myth.

Since it is climate, not weather, it takes time, but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to sort out that pumping a crapload of CO2 into the atmosphere is going to have some affect on how the atmosphere behaves. We have Venus as an example of the potential, and I remember lecturing about the Greenhouse Effect when I taught at university almost 30 years ago. But people put on their blinders, allowed politics to manipulate observed effect, and here we are.

The only question is whether we've reached a tipping point, and whether recovery is at all possible. I am inclined to think that it is not.

I should have said man made global warming, I believe there is global warming but nothing i've seen so far tells me that it isn't just part of a natural cycle, i believe man as only mad minute contributions not enough to majorly stir up the natural cycle.

reply to post by coven83


Is it just me or has the image been taken off Google Earth?

Originally posted by inverslyproportional
Honestly, there is no proof of any type that says anthropogenic climate change is real. There is however a lot of evidence that says its crap. They don't allow it in the MSM because it doesn't further the green agenda.

The sad part is few/a lot people claiming that humans don't affect climate is complete flabbergast to me.

I am from South America and saw first hand what Amazon deforestation can do to the climate in that area. Complete/Large areas that were green/dense forest with lot rain after deforestation with time that area got less and less rain each year... And I am talking about the 80-90s way before the global warming becoming hot topic of discussion.

So of course human affect climate, only blind people, who probable lives in big cities and far away from nature, would say otherwise.

Its not a sudden ice melt , in another post it was mentioned that scientists have been monitoring this crack developing for 2 years

reply to post by Uniceft17


I just read this and searched to see if it was covered here. Can you believe this ?

People, the signs are here. This is NOT just Summer being Summer.

Originally posted by adjensen
Again, think rationally... the Earth existed for millions of years with a very specific group of elements in its atmosphere. How can we suddenly, and radically, change that composition and NOT think it would have some effect? That's lunacy, not rational thought.

Please explain how many "new elements" we have introduced into the global ecosystem?

Please explain how we have long term observational data that we have affected any climatic system, including the root causes, measurements and comparisons.

Here's a few trick questions:
What is the actual CO2 concentration in the atmosphere?
What is the highest it has been in recorded history?
How on earth is that radical?

Please, do think rationally.

EDIT:
Oh we are fortunate, some people who know how to think have looked at these same images and said:

“Ice cores from Summit show that melting events of this type occur about once every 150 years on average. With the last one happening in 1889, this event is right on time,” says Lora Koenig, a Goddard glaciologist and a member of the research team analyzing the satellite data.

WattsUpWithThat

Rational thinking FTW.

I agree the planet is warming.
I agree it is not man made.

All other planets in the solar system are also experiencing a warming trend to a similar degree (pun intended) as Earth.

Therefore the rational conclusion is that the sun is getting hotter. In my opinion the proper path to pursue the understanding of the current global warming trend is to study what the cause of the sun's behavior is.

After saying all this, we should take better are of Earth as a whole.

God Bless,

I noticed that the following quote was intentionally left out!

ce cores from Summit show that melting events of this type occur about once every 150 years on average. With the last one happening in 1889, this event is right on time," said Lora Koenig, a glaciologist from Nasa's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland and a member of the research team analysing the satellite data.

I see HARRYHALLER noticed this too.

i would like to see all of the people that say "man" is not detrimental to the pollution of the earths atmosphere, to please move you and your family next to a coal burning factory, or next to a chemical factory.
this is why i think these people are as dumb as a box of rocks and their arguements are not even worth listening to.

I never said that man was not detrimental. I simply replied about a specific event.