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Post by Col 'NDX on Apr 4, 2009 16:43:58 GMT
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mrmga
New Member
Posts: 14
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Post by mrmga on Apr 4, 2009 19:33:51 GMT
This article only focuses on the Antarctic Peninsula and West Antarctica, a small fraction of the total continent. What's happening there is old news and is not typical of the vast remainder of the continent. The Reuters article is based on a mapping project being conducted by the USGS and its British counterparts. These people are surveyors, mappers, imaging experts, etc., NOT climate scientists. When they attribute the disappearing ice shelfs to climate change, they are merely parroting the official government line. The effects of volcanism, seismic activity and ocean currents are not mentioned. I went to the USGS site to learn more about the project. The changes in ice shelfs and glaciation along the entire Antarctic coast line during the past 30 years are being overlayed in a series of 24 maps. Naturally, the first six maps that have been released cover the Antarctic Peninsula and West Antarctic since they knew in advance that these are the areas that would generate the most dramatic results and attention. The remaining 18 maps will almost certainly show stable or increasing ice and be completely ignored.
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Post by walterdnes on Apr 5, 2009 0:57:39 GMT
It's called a "dynamic equilibrium". You've seen the pictures of abandoned Antarctic sites, with only the rooftops sticking up above the ice/snow. So why aren't there 10-mile ice/snow mountains, you ask? Simple, ice builds up in the interior of Antarctica, and flows outward towards the coast. When it gets to the relative warmth of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, it melts. The overall mass remains relatively constant.
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mrmga
New Member
Posts: 14
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Post by mrmga on Apr 5, 2009 4:06:39 GMT
It's called a "dynamic equilibrium". You've seen the pictures of abandoned Antarctic sites, with only the rooftops sticking up above the ice/snow. So why aren't there 10-mile ice/snow mountains, you ask? Simple, ice builds up in the interior of Antarctica, and flows outward towards the coast. When it gets to the relative warmth of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, it melts. The overall mass remains relatively constant. That's an interesting point. And when researchers note an increasing velocity in the movement of glaciers toward the oceans (as did the USGS), it is automatically assumed to be caused by global warming. In fact, it may simply reflect an increasing build up of ice in the interior and the movement toward equilibrium as you noted. Your comment reminds me of a segment I recently saw on the Discovery or Science Channel. Some group or agency received funding to refurbish some of the abandoned Antarctice sites you mentioned in order to measure the "declining" ice pack in interior Antarctica. The trouble was, they had to raise them by 20 or 30 feet on stilts so they didn't get buried before the study ended. The irony was lost on them....
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Post by Col 'NDX on Apr 5, 2009 8:21:41 GMT
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mrmga
New Member
Posts: 14
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Post by mrmga on Apr 5, 2009 17:04:02 GMT
Yes they will, even though it is a regional phenomenom and very likely part of a natural cycle. On the same web site in your link above, I found a previous BBC article that said: "Sediments extracted from the Antarctic seafloor show the world's largest ice shelf has disintegrated and reappeared many times in the past." news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6206672.stm
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Post by Pooh on Apr 5, 2009 17:07:04 GMT
We are "assured" ice shelves break off and melt due to Global Warming, and that it is our fault. Suppose the situation were reversed, and the ice shelves did not break off and melt. What would we call that? Ice Age?
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Post by Acolyte on Apr 6, 2009 9:05:24 GMT
Reading mmga's BBC link, the bit I love is at the bottom - although their research shows this has happened many times in the past, they then make sure of publication by pointing out that never has CO2 been so high when it happened, implying that 'wow! if it was like that then, what is it going to be like now?'
This nicely obfuscates the fact for the average Joe out there that if this happened when CO2 was low then quite obviously, CO2 levels have zilch to do with the event.
It's like the recent Victorian weather here - everyone at work was talking about how 'hottest weather in a century' & 'longest string of hot days in 105 years' meant agw was a reality. When i mentioned that the statements meant that it was hotter a century back plus they had a longer string of hot days 105 years back, there was stunned silence.
These people rely on the fact that the average person out there has no concept of critical thinking or rational analysis.
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Post by icefisher on Apr 6, 2009 17:06:41 GMT
We are "assured" ice shelves break off and melt due to Global Warming, and that it is our fault. Suppose the situation were reversed, and the ice shelves did not break off and melt. What would we call that? Ice Age? Yep, and it portends doom either way. . . .yech!!! Were doomed!!!!
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Post by FurryCatHerder on Apr 7, 2009 13:34:35 GMT
We are "assured" ice shelves break off and melt due to Global Warming, and that it is our fault. Suppose the situation were reversed, and the ice shelves did not break off and melt. What would we call that? Ice Age? It would be called "Impossible" because of the dynamic forces in the Southern Ocean. But, yeah, if it were possible, it would be called an Ice Age.
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Post by Pooh on Apr 8, 2009 16:55:46 GMT
We are "assured" ice shelves break off and melt due to Global Warming, and that it is our fault. Suppose the situation were reversed, and the ice shelves did not break off and melt. What would we call that? Ice Age? It would be called "Impossible" because of the dynamic forces in the Southern Ocean. But, yeah, if it were possible, it would be called an Ice Age. I guess my post was a feeble attempt at sarcasm about alarmism: doom every time there is a report about Arctic / Antartic Ice decreasing. On the other hand, Ice Ages have occurred before. Perhaps the sun had some influence upon the oceans.
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Post by Acolyte on Apr 8, 2009 22:39:32 GMT
It would be called "Impossible" because of the dynamic forces in the Southern Ocean. But, yeah, if it were possible, it would be called an Ice Age. I guess my post was a feeble attempt at sarcasm about alarmism: doom every time there is a report about Arctic / Antartic Ice decreasing. On the other hand, Ice Ages have occurred before. Perhaps the sun had some influence upon the oceans. Some people have little appreciation of the fine art of sarcasm - for them it should be spelled 'sarchasm' to denote the gulf between the originators intent & their understanding. ;D Of course this fails to prevent them from seizing the opportunity to use it when someone trips over their dogma.
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Post by icefisher on Apr 8, 2009 23:35:28 GMT
I guess my post was a feeble attempt at sarcasm about alarmism: doom every time there is a report about Arctic / Antartic Ice decreasing. On the other hand, Ice Ages have occurred before. Perhaps the sun had some influence upon the oceans. Perhaps what we are looking at is the "super" Al Gore effect! or OTOH, maybe there is something behind the timing . . . .sort of a precursor to when God kills all the atheists.
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Post by kiwistonewall on Apr 15, 2009 10:13:14 GMT
Kiwi - take it away........ Righto, here goes....... All the hype about the Wilkins ice shelf! It is quite disgusting the false impression that has been given. 1. You can see from this image that all that has happened is that the link to one Island (Charcot) has been severed. The ice shelf is still firmly anchored in place to several islands and the mainland. The impression given was that Charcot Island was "anchoring" the ice shelf, and the whole thing would just float off & be lost. What rubbish. 2. The Wilkins is NOT a glacier shelf. It is surface snow fed. Built up from years of snowfall, and isn't like other Ice shelves fed from Glaciers in the main Antarctic continent. Its dynamics are related to precipitation and it is not an indication of what might happen to other shelves. 3. It aint going anywhere soon. ;D 4. This is an image from 10th April showing the fractures in the ice close to Charcot Island: (left of picture) It will be interesting to see what happens over the southern Winter - will the refreeze of the area & new snow consolidate the shelf? If so, will we be told! 5. From Cryosphere, I can see ice forming rapidly around Charcot Island, so there is no danger of this shelf collapsing this winter in the South.
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Post by jimg on Apr 17, 2009 7:04:13 GMT
I was thinking about this one this morning. What I understand about the ice shelves & Antarctica. 1) They're floating on the water. 2) They're attached to the land. So what happens if you have an underground earthquake? It would lift up a column of water and send a wave in both directions perpendicular to the fault line. When the wave reaches the shore, it pushes up, causing a fissure. I can't imagine that an earthquake would have to be very big to cause intense pressure pushing up the ice shelf and causing it to crack. Magnitude 4? This post just prompted me to look for global earthquake monitoring: and found this, www.iris.edu/seismon/bigmap/index.phtmlwww.iris.washington.edu/seismon/zoom/?view=eveday&lon=-26&lat=-61This one occured on the Pacific-Antarctic ridge on April 2nd: Link: neic.usgs.gov/neis/bulletin/neic_eyes.htmlThere is a link that shows the p-wave travel times. Part of it was headed right for the peninsula. Magnitude 4.5 PACIFIC-ANTARCTIC RIDGE Thursday, April 02, 2009 at 23:38:36 UTC Preliminary Earthquake Report Versión en Español Magnitude 4.5 Date-Time Thursday, April 02, 2009 at 23:38:36 (UTC) - Coordinated Universal Time Thursday, April 02, 2009 at 02:38:36 PM local time at epicenter Time of Earthquake in other Time Zones Location 54.32S 133.26W Depth 10 kilometers Region PACIFIC-ANTARCTIC RIDGE Distances 4050 km (2510 miles) SE of WELLINGTON, New Zealand Location Uncertainty Error estimate: horizontal +/- 32.9 km; depth fixed by location program Parameters Nst=10, Nph=10, Dmin=3983.7 km, Rmss=1.39 sec, Erho=32.9 km, Erzz=0 km, Gp=100.8 degrees Source USGS NEIC (WDCS-D) Event ID useyes
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