It looks like you're using an Ad Blocker.
Please white-list or disable AboveTopSecret.com in your ad-blocking tool.
Thank you.
Some features of ATS will be disabled while you continue to use an ad-blocker.
The Arctic has lost more sea ice this year than at any time since satellite records began in 1979, Nasa says.
Scientists involved in the calculations say it is part of a fundamental change.
What is more, sea ice normally reaches its low point in September so it is thought likely that this year's melt will continue to grow...
...The thickness of the sea ice is also declining, so overall the ice volume has fallen far - although estimates vary about the actual figure.
Joey Comiso, senior research scientist at Nasa's Goddard Space Flight Center, said this year's ice retreat was caused by previous warm years reducing the amount of perennial ice - which is more resistant to melting. It's created a self-reinforcing trend.
"Unlike 2007, temperatures were not unusually warm in the Arctic this summer. [But] we are losing the thick component of the ice cover," he said. "And if you lose [that], the ice in the summer becomes very vulnerable."
Walt Meier, from the National Snow and Ice Data Center that collaborates in the measurements, said: "In the context of what's happened in the last several years and throughout the satellite record, it's an indication that the Arctic sea ice cover is fundamentally changing."
Professor Peter Wadhams, from Cambridge University, told BBC News: "A number of scientists who have actually been working with sea ice measurement had predicted some years ago that the retreat would accelerate and that the summer Arctic would become ice-free by 2015 or 2016.
"I was one of those scientists - and of course bore my share of ridicule for daring to make such an alarmist prediction."
But Prof Wadhams said the prediction was now coming true, and the ice had become so thin that it would inevitably disappear...
..."Implications are serious: the increased open water lowers the average albedo [reflectivity] of the planet, accelerating global warming; and we are also finding the open water causing seabed permafrost to melt, releasing large amounts of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, to the atmosphere."
Opinions vary on the date of the demise of summer sea ice, but the latest announcement will give support to those who err on the pessimistic side.
A recent paper from Reading University used statistical techniques and computers to estimate that between 5-30% of the recent ice loss was due to Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation - a natural climate cycle repeating every 65-80 years. It's been in warm phase since the mid 1970s.
But the rest of the warming, the paper estimates, is caused by human activity - pollution and clearing of forests...
Global warming is only a small part, co2 is the goverments excuse to tax us and make people think they are actually doing something, rediculous
The Arctic has lost more sea ice this year than at any time since satellite records began in 1979, Nasa says.
Originally posted by mee30
The Arctic has lost more sea ice this year than at any time since satellite records began in 1979, Nasa says.
Wait... This is "proof" of "global warming"? And it is also proof that man has caused this?
Did everyone skim past the part that says since 1979... This is a nano second in relation to the history of the earth! This would be like measuring your heartbeat for a nano second and then using that data as evidence as to your long term health! You may well be dead according to the "data"... LOL
This proves absolutely nothing! The fact people are jumping on it as proof kinda shows desperation...
True and i agree, what i mean, is that the blame at the moment is put on co2 alone, and i refuse to believe thats the only reason, that is more a money maker than a problem solver.
Imo the main reason for the wierd weather is what i linked in the document above, but you can't solve that problem, to much have been build and created or destroyed allready.
I just wish we could get some honesty form the politicians and unfettered reports from scientists, so that we can at least be aware and prepared for climate catastrophe.
Originally posted by mee30
The Arctic has lost more sea ice this year than at any time since satellite records began in 1979, Nasa says.
Wait... This is "proof" of "global warming"? And it is also proof that man has caused this?
Did everyone skim past the part that says since 1979... This is a nano second in relation to the history of the earth! This would be like measuring your heartbeat for a nano second and then using that data as evidence as to your long term health! You may well be dead according to the "data"... LOL
This proves absolutely nothing! The fact people are jumping on it as proof kinda shows desperation...
Originally posted by Legion2024
melting ice, well once the ice is all gone that would mean its the end of the last iceage . Nothing to do with us.