NASA: Strange and sudden ice melt in Greenland

[teko]

WASHINGTON – Nearly all of Greenland's massive ice sheet suddenly started melting a bit this month, a freak event that surprised scientists.

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AP
NASA images show the extent of surface melt over Greenland's ice sheet on July 8, left, and July 12, right. Nearly every part of the massive Greenland ice sheet suddenly and strangely melted a bit this month in a freak event that scientists had never witnessed before. NASA says three different satellites saw what it calls unprecedented melting from July 8 to July 12.
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AP
NASA images show the extent of surface melt over Greenland's ice sheet on July 8, left, and July 12, right. Nearly every part of the massive Greenland ice sheet suddenly and strangely melted a bit this month in a freak event that scientists had never witnessed before. NASA says three different satellites saw what it calls unprecedented melting from July 8 to July 12.

Sponsored LinksEven Greenland's coldest and highest place, Summit station, showed melting. Ice core records show that last happened in 1889 and occurs about once every 150 years.

Three satellites show what NASA calls unprecedented melting of the ice sheet that blankets the island, starting on July 8 and lasting four days. Most of the thick ice remains. While some ice usually melts during the summer, what was unusual was that the melting happened in a flash and over a widespread area.

"You literally had this wave of warm air wash over the Greenland ice sheet and melt it," NASA ice scientist Tom Wagner said Tuesday.

The ice melt area went from 40 percent of the ice sheet to 97 percent in four days, according to NASA. Until now, the most extensive melt seen by satellites in the past three decades was about 55 percent.

Wagner said researchers don't know how much of Greenland's ice melted, but it seems to be freezing again.

"When we see melt in places that we haven't seen before, at least in a long period of time, it makes you sit up and ask what's happening?" NASA chief scientist Waleed Abdalati said. It's a big signal, the meaning of which we're going to sort out for years to come."

About the same time, a giant iceberg broke off from the Petermann Glacier in northern Greenland. And the National Snow and Ice Data Center on Tuesday announced that the area filled with Arctic sea ice continues near a record low.

Wagner and other scientists said because this Greenland-wide melting has happened before they can't yet determine if this is a natural rare event or one triggered by man-made global warming. But they do know that the edges of Greenland's ice sheets have already been thinning because of climate change.

Summer in Greenland has been freakishly warm so far. That's because of frequent high-pressure systems that have parked over the island, bringing warm, clear weather that melts ice and snow, explained University of Georgia climatologist Thomas Mote.

He and others say it's similar to the high-pressure systems that have parked over the American Midwest bringing record-breaking warmth and drought.

Ohio State University ice scientist Jason Box, who returned Tuesday from a three-week visit, said he ditched his cold weather gear for the cotton pants that he normally dons in Nevada.

"It was sunny and warm and all the locals were talking about how sunny it was," Box said after getting off a plane. "Beyond T-shirt weather."

Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

http://www.usatoday.com/weather/climate/story/2012-07-25/greenland-ice-sheet-melt-climate-change/56479518/1

[mikesimon]

El, I really am a bit choked up.
Let me gather my thoughts and maybe I will be able to respond.

You can drive what you want el.
I won't dare tell you what I drive....except it's fast.
My thermostat is set at 73% when I'm away and 70% when I'm home and awake and way down to 68% when I sleep.


Mike

[el_em_en_oh]

I love you man... I quite literally LOL'd when I read your comment above!

I think in real'life (not over the interwebs), we might could actually be friends. Well, maybe not "friends" per se, but maybe friennemies;-)

I have to stand by what I said though.

H3ll... I'm not going to be around in 40-50 years anyway, so I'm going to keep on driving my SUV and keeping my thermostat at 72 degrees!

Call me insensitive and uncaring...

[rivll]

:-)

[mikesimon]

I accept your apology Rivil.

Thanks,
Mike

[Vance2335]

No need to apologize to all, just to me rivll as this is now the 2nd time you have made a personal attack against me for no reason what so ever.

[rivll]

I agree with you OH. I sometimes turn fatalistic about these issues because there is some comfort in "washing ones hands" of the matter. I find comfort in the thought that it is just the way of the natural world that we don't have anything to do with accelerating its (and our) destruction. But the truth is, we do have a part in it. Wecan argue about how much a part, but it really doesn't matter.
For me, living simply and consuming less is the best I can do.

BTW, my apologies to all for adding to the insults. I hope that living a simple life means also a kinder life. I am trying, anyway.

[orphanedhawk]

Although we can not turn back time I think this is very frustrating to those of us who remember these warnings a good 30 or more years ago, when stopping the pollution could have made a difference.

Continuing to foul our air, water and land because of the idea that it can't be reversed or because someone believes this is the end of days, seems to me like simply giving up.

Perhaps we can use our intelligence to mitigate the destruction we see around us, if not for ourselves then for our children  and grandchildren.
There used to be a belief in doing things for the betterment of mankind.

[Barb135]

There is no "stupid one" on this forum........ if you have nothing to add to the subject of the thread, there's no need to post on it.

[rivll]

Do you need to ask?

[Vance2335]

So Mike who is the stupid one?

[mikesimon]

No adgal, believe me - you are not the stupid one.

[adgal]

El, you are probably right in that turning everything off now wouldn't change things.  And I don't disagree that lots of this is nature and the earth's natural cycles.  However, doesn't it seem reasonable that all the garbage we have been sending up into our atmosphere has done some damage?  And if we could work on or find cleaner way's of doing what needs to be done, maybe we could slow down at least our part in it?  I know it is not reasonable to think everyone is just going to stop driving, or stop manufacturing, etc.  That isn't going to happen anytime soon.  But I do think if we all did our little part maybe it could help?  Maybe I'm the stupid one...lol.  

[el_em_en_oh]

Climate-change, global-warming, drought, monsoon-rain, melting-ice, etc, etc.

It's getting hotter out, it's getting colder out. Whatever the case may be, there is absolutely NOTHING that can be done to reverse the situation in the short-term, medium-term, or long-term.

If we turned off every single factory on the planet and no one ran their cars, trucks & SUV's ever again, we'd STILL have these issues, as it's part of the planets 10,000 year CYCLE of heating & cooling.

Have we lent a hand i speeding up the onset of this cycle, who's to say. There's no concrete PROOF.

The only concrete PROOF that we have, is that the planet has gone through heating & cooling CYCLES every 10,000 years'ish, since the planet developed an atmosphere.

I'm not saying you're wrong, and I'm not saying you're right. I'm just saying that there's nothing we can do to stop NATURE.

Call me stupid...

[Vance2335]

Also in that FoxNews article you see they speak to more then 1 person so they are not fudging anything, they got several opinions on the matter.

[Vance2335]

Drought...remember the "Dust Bowl" was that climate change? And tsumami's have nothing to do with climate change but is related to earthquakes. Every year we have storms and tornados, nothing unusual. When warm tropical air mass meets a cool air mass we have severe t-stomrs.

End of days has a lot more than what is going on now and has been going on for as long as I have been alive. This weather I am seeing is no different then when I was 10. I was living in upstate NY and I remember a hurrucane (well tropical storm) hitting upstate NY, just like it did last year. Just a freak thing.

[Barb135]

""If we continue to observe melting events like this in upcoming years, it will be worrisome." she told Nasa."

Maybe this is a natural phenomenon that happens every 150 years or maybe it's actually a weather change.  As long as there is evidence that it's happened before, I can't get horribly worried about it; however, if, like Lora Koenig, says, we continue to see it in future years, it would be very worrisome.

I do believe that our weather goes in cycles; I can remember years, throughout my lifetime that have been very similar to this year, with the widespread drought and heat wave.  I can also recall years in which the other extreme was prevalent.

[orphanedhawk]

Looks like Fox news is fudging the truth again.

The so called, expert climatologist quoted in the above Fox article is Patrick J. Michaels  a largely oil-funded global warming skeptic who argues that global warming models are fatally flawed and, in any event, we should take no action because new technologies will soon replace those that emit greenhouse gases.He is associated with ALEC.

More on the greenland ice melt:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/jul/24/greenland-ice-sheet-thaw-nasa
Greenland ice sheet melted at unprecedented rate during July

Scientists at Nasa admitted they thought satellite readings were a mistake after images showed 97% surface melt over four days

The Greenland ice sheet melted at a faster rate this month than at any other time in recorded history, with virtually the entire ice sheet showing signs of thaw.

The rapid melting over just four days was captured by three satellites. It has stunned and alarmed scientists, and deepened fears about the pace and future consequences of climate change.

In a statement posted on Nasa's website on Tuesday, scientists admitted the satellite data was so striking they thought at first there had to be a mistake.

"This was so extraordinary that at first I questioned the result: was this real or was it due to a data error?" Son Nghiem of Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena said in the release.

He consulted with several colleagues, who confirmed his findings. Dorothy Hall, who studies the surface temperature of Greenland at Nasa's space flight centre in Greenbelt, Maryland, confirmed that the area experienced unusually high temperatures in mid-July, and that there was widespread melting over the surface of the ice sheet.

Climatologists Thomas Mote, at the University of Georgia, and Marco Tedesco, of the City University of New York, also confirmed the melt recorded by the satellites.

However, scientists were still coming to grips with the shocking images on Tuesday. "I think it's fair to say that this is unprecedented," Jay Zwally, a glaciologist at Nasa's Goddard Space Flight Center, told the Guardian.

The set of images released by Nasa on Tuesday show a rapid thaw between 8 July and 12 July. Within that four-day period, measurements from three satellites showed a swift expansion of the area of melting ice, from about 40% of the ice sheet surface to 97%.

Scientists attributed the sudden melt to a heat dome, or a burst of
unusually warm air, which hovered over Greenland from 8 July until 16
July.

Greenland had returned to more typical summer conditions by 21 or
22 July, Mote told the Guardian.

But he said the event, while exceptional, should be viewed alongside
other compelling evidence of climate change, including on the ground
in Greenland.

"What we are seeing at the highest elevations may be a sort of sign of
what is going on across the ice sheet," he said. "At lower elevations
on the ice sheet, we are seeing earlier melting, melting later in the
season, and more frequent melting over the last 30 years and that is
consistent of what you would expect with a warming climate."

Zwally, who has made almost yearly trips to the Greenland ice sheet for more than three decades, said he had never seen such a rapid melt.

About half of Greenland's surface ice sheet melts during a typical summer, but Zwally said he and other scientists had been recording an acceleration of that melting process over the last few decades. This year his team had to rebuild their camp, at Swiss Station, when the snow and ice supports melted.

He said he had never seen such a rapid melt over his three decades of
nearly yearly trips to the Greenland ice sheet. He was most surprised
to see indications in the images of melting even around the area of
Summit Station, which is about two miles above sea level.

It was the second unusual event in Greenland in a matter of days, after an iceberg the size of Manhattan broke off from the Petermann glacier. But the rapid melt was viewed as more serious.

"If you look at the 8 July image that might be the maximum extent of warming you would see in the summer," Zwally noted. "There have been periods when melting might have occurred at higher elevations briefly – maybe for a day or so – but to have it cover the whole of Greenland like this is unknown, certainly in the time of satellite records."

Jason Box, a glaciologist at Ohio State University who returned on
Tuesday from a research trip to Greenland, had been predicting a big
melt year for 2012, because of earlier melt and a decline in summer
snow flurries.

He said the heat dome was not necessarily a one-off. "This is now the
seventh summer in a row with this pattern of warm air being lifted up
onto the ice sheet on the summer months," he said. "What is surprising
is just how persistent this circulation anomaly is. Here it is back
again for the seventh year in a row in the summer bringing hot, warm
air onto the ice sheet."

He also said surfaces at higher elevation, now re-frozen, could be
more prone to future melting, because of changes in the structure of
the snow crystals. Box expected melting to continue at lower
elevations.

About half of Greenland's surface ice sheet melts during a typical
summer, but Zwally said he and other scientists had been recording an
acceleration of that melting process over the past few decades. This
year his team had to rebuild their camp, at Swiss Station, when the
snow and ice supports melted.

Lora Koenig, another Goddard glaciologist, told Nasa similar rapid melting occurs about every 150 years. But she warned there were wide-ranging potential implications from this year's thaw.

"If we continue to observe melting events like this in upcoming years, it will be worrisome." she told Nasa.

The most immediate consequences are sea level rise and a further warming of the Arctic. In the centre of Greenland, the ice remains up to 3,000 metres deep. On the edges, however, the ice is much, much thinner and has been melting into the sea.

The melting ice sheet is a significant factor in sea level rise. Scientists attribute about one-fifth of the annual sea level rise, which is about 3mm every year, to the melting of the Greenland ice sheet.

In this instance of this month's extreme melting, Mote said there was evidence of a heat dome over Greenland: or an unusually strong ridge of warm air.

The dome is believed to have moved over Greenland on 8 July, lingering until 16 July.

[adgal]

That is exactly what I believe too.  I think some of this is just a normal cycle, but I also believe what man has done is contributing to the issue.  It's always what has made the most sense to me.

[teko]

The 2012 drought disaster is rapidly worsening in severity, especially over the nation's agricultural heartland, according to the latest weekly U.S. Drought Monitor report, released Thursday.

While the area covered by the overall drought grew only slightly, the intensity increased alarmingly.

Nationally, the percentage of the country in "extreme" to "exceptional" drought – the two worst categories on the scale – jumped from 13.53% to 20.57%.

In other words, another 219,000 square miles was added to the area in extreme drought – an area slightly larger than the states of California and New York combined.

The overall percentage of the country in drought grew for the tenth week in a row, inching up from 63.54% to 63.86%.

[teko]

hmmm... So. What is the benefit of denying that something (call it what you want to) is going on with our earth? Some say Cycles, yet we have drought, severe storms with baseball sized hailballs, we have floods, tsunamis, and now drought across a vast portion of the US to the point it is affecting our food supply and I suspect water will be next. So if not global warming? What? Cycles? Does it matter what we call it?

Any Christian will tell you all these things are predicted to happen in the end times too. Revelations pretty much spells it out. So. call it what we want to call it, but to deny something big is going on? Thats stupid.

[Vance2335]

Skeptics put the freeze on NASA 'hot air' about Greenland ice
By Jeremy A. Kaplan

Published July 26, 2012
FoxNews.com

Extent of surface melt over Greenlands ice sheet on July 8 (left) and July 12 (right). Measurements from three satellites showed that in just a few days, the melting had dramatically accelerated and an estimated 97 percent of the ice sheet surface had thawed by July 12. (Nicolo E. DiGirolamo, SSAI/NASA GSFC, and Jesse Allen, NASA Earth Observatory)

NASA’s claim that Greenland is experiencing “unprecedented” melting is nothing but a bunch of hot air, according to scientists who say the country's ice sheets melt with some regularity.

A heat dome over the icy country melted a whopping 97 percent of Greenland’s ice sheet in mid-July, NASA said, calling it yet more evidence of the effect man is having on the planet.

But the unusual-seeming event had nothing to do with hot air, according to glaciologists. It was actually to be expected.

"Ice cores from Summit station [Greenland’s coldest and highest] 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 Goddard glaciologist and a member of the research team analyzing the satellite data.

But rather than a regular 150-year planetary cycle, the new NASA report calls the melt “unprecedented,” the result of a recent strong ridge of warm air, or a heat dome, over Greenland -- one of a series that has dominated Greenland's weather since the end of May.


'NASA should start distributing dictionaries to the authors of its press releases.'
- Patrick J. Michaels, a climatologist


"Each successive ridge has been stronger than the previous one," said Thomas Mote, a climatologist at the University of Georgia. This latest heat dome started to move over Greenland on July 8, and then parked itself over the ice sheet about three days later. By July 16, it had begun to dissipate, along with the ice, NASA said.

Climate skeptics said the NASA report itself was the only “unprecedented” item.

“NASA should start distributing dictionaries to the authors of its press releases,” joked Patrick J. Michaels, a climatologist and the author of the World Climate Report blog.

“It’s somewhat like the rush to blame severe weather and drought on global warming,” Anthony Watts, a noted climate skeptic and the author of the Watts Up With That blog, told FoxNews.com. “Yet when you look into the past, you find precedence for what is being described today as unprecedented.”

It's the latest hot water for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, which critics say has shifted focus and priorities from space and aeronautics to the earth we live on -- and the planet's changing climate.

NASA chief cryospheric scientist H. Jay Zwally told FoxNews.com that the melting has been increasing as the temperatures in Greenland have been increasing.

“Climate in the Arctic has been warming about three to four times more than the global average, and Greenland surface temperatures (observed by satellite and surface instruments) have been increasing about 2 degrees Celsius per decade during about the last 20 years,” he said.

Zwally would be in a position to know: He was lead scientist for the ICESat project, which ran from 2003 to 2010, and used satellites to measure Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets.

“This is the most extensive area of surface melting during last 40 years of satellite observations,” he said.

It may be in line with the 150-year cycles of melting, however. Mary Albert, executive director of the NSF Ice Core Drilling office, and Kaitlin Keegan, an engineering PhD student and a fellow in Dartmouth’s polar environmental change program, are working on a paper on the Greenland ice sheet melt, a school spokeswoman told FoxNews.com.

Neither was available to describe the exact findings, but in a blog posting detailing her work, Keegan noted that several cores dating back millennia have also reflected the 150-year cycle.

“In Greenland there have been many deep ice-core drilling projects which drilled ice to the bedrock,” she wrote. “In the past 10,000 years (the Holocene), there is on average a melt layer every 150 years.”

NASA ice scientist Tom Wagner told the Associated Press researchers don't know precisely how much of Greenland's ice had melted in this latest event, but it seems to be freezing again.

“The belief that almost any aberration in weather and climate today can be attributed to global warming is pure folly,” Watts told FoxNews.com.



Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/07/26/skeptics-put-freeze-on-nasa-hot-air-about-greenland-ice/#ixzz21lAK4YG9

[orphanedhawk]

Greenland is covered in ice. It having freakishly warm summer temperatures contributes to the ice melt which is causing oceans to rise.
This is consistent to the idea of global warming.

Hawaii is also one of the most volcanic regions on the planet, yet it having warmer temperatures won't make much difference in the height of the ocean waters. ( My friends there say they are having a drought)

I agree the extreme weather we are now seeing is a combination of natural occurrences, like the solar storms  AND human activity such as deforestation, pollution, etc.

[brice1967]

Personally, I believe in global warming on 2 fronts.  Obviously, natural cyclical global warming has occured time and time again.  Man also has contributed to the fact....

It is scarey.  Just a thought to throw into the mix of the conversation... isn't Greenland one of the more volcanic regions on the globe?  What does that have to do with it, if anything?

[Vance2335]

I have said this from day 1 when it comes to global warming, earth goes in cycles, warming and cooling based on several factors and a major one is the sun's activity. The sun is in an 11 year cycle which will reach it's peak next year, so warming is to be expected and then after that we should see some cooling. In the 1970's (before my time) experts were worried about global cooling, Time had a big article on it and you can find it via google. In the 17 or 1800's the world went through a mini Ice age.

Overall this has less to do with what "we" are putting into the atmosphere as it has to do with the sun's activity and normal cycles for the earth.

Man made global warming is still an issue that is not agreed upon by many experts based on core samples, as indicated in the story a core sample shows this has happened before.

Earst still has so many mysteries that we can't figure out. Why did the dinosaurs die off (2 real theroies for that) why has the earth experienced I believe 5 ice ages, why was there a sudden explosion of life?