In the North, the radiator is lighted

By Denis Delbecq • June 19th, 2008 in 9:36 · Category: Actuality

Bets are opened. After winter richer in sea ice, waters of the Arctic seem to warm themselves up with a quicker rhythm than last year. Mid-June, the expanse of the floe found weak level of last year at the same time, according to the American national Centre of data on the snow and the ice (NSIDC). In 2007, the floe had established a new record of weakness, with a little more than 4,2 million square kilometres covered with at least 15 % of ice, against 7,8 million kilometres ensconced themselves in 2000. If situation persists this year, a new record should be established next September.

According to NSIDC, the minimal surface of ice diminishes from now on by 10 % every ten years, the upper rhythm in what envisage the climatic models. The progressive putting in operation of a new satellite of measure should not change observations considerably. "Old" DMSP F13, who begins giving signs of weakness, works in unison with his substitute, F15, so as to test measures. The distance between both instruments should not exceed thirty thousand square kilometres, for surfaces which measure in million square kilometres.

As last year, the very quick disappearance of sea ice this spring is to put in the credit of conditions of abnormal temperatures. On most Arctic, distance is of +1°C in +3°C, but it achieves 6°C in the Baffin bay. Progressively, the thickness of sea ice is reduced year by year, to the point of attaining the melting point. The re-formed ice the winter on zones in free waters is too slim to resist spring and a hotter summer than a normal. A long succession of cold winters and cool summers would be needed so that the floe re-forms in a lasting way.

One week ago, the Centre of atmospheric researches of Boulder (the United States, Colorado) had shown that the meteorological modifications led by the disappearance of sea ice watch each other from now on up to one thousand five hundred kilometres inside lands. Notably because the disappearance of the floe changes the absorption of the solar radiation (the water is a radiator of the Earth, the ice a fridge) and exchange rate at the same time the cloud cover and the regimes of wind.

Picture: © Shari Gearheard, National Snow and Ice Data Center.

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