On Friday, or a few posts down, we noted that the Arctic ice pack was and is headed for a remarkably small extent this year, the lowest since satellites started getting good looks at it 33 years ago. Some research institutes had already declared this a record low year and now the big kahuna in US polar ice...
Category: Arctic climate change
On Friday, or a few posts down, we noted that the Arctic ice pack was and is headed for a remarkably small extent this year, the lowest since satellites started getting good looks at it 33 years ago. Some research institutes had already declared this a record low year and now the big kahuna in US polar ice studies, the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado, rang its bell. The new mark comes as the ice plot still carries a steep downward gradient and with a few weeks to go before the usual period when it bottoms out. Looks like it'll pass below 4 million square kilometers, something of a milestone if only for the dimension of it (ie, explicitly no miles in it).
A press conference underway at about the time I start writing this will spur plenty of stories. A few outlets got out of the gate a bit early, propelled by a press...
About a week ago a lively, well-reported article by Ed Struzik ran apparently simultaneously at the Calgary Herald and at Yale's e360 non-profit enviro news sites. He reported in vivid, anecdotal detail a remarkable series of recent sightings. Canadian biologists say they are seeing an upsurge in hybrid bears born of brown (aka grizzly) and polar bears, plus brown bears stalking game incuding seals at the high latitudes where the white bears are the norm but their big inland cousins had been exceedingly rare.
The swift vignettes of the animals are intriguing. Here is a short bio of...
We've checked in every once in...
We've checked in every once in awhile on the Arctic adventures of freelancer Wendee Holtcamp, who enterprisingly snagged a ride aboard a research vessel last year (previous posts One, and Two). On that second post I wondered about an observation she reported - a recent and marked chilling of the Bering Sea between Alaska and Siberia, north of the Aleutions and south of the narrow Bering Strait gateway to the Arctic Ocean....
Last week a...
Last week a post here noted the falling appetite in mass media for fundamental, and disturbing, news on the science of climate change and global warming. It referred to the low pickup of news of the kind that ten or five years ago would, my gut tells me, have gotten a lot more attention. One reason for less coverage is that recurring news becomes old news, and that's no news. Another may be the media are discouraged and cowed by vociferous ridicule and contempt from usually conservative, contrarian politicians,...
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