Arctic temperatures

[Paul Ont]

For those of you who are interested in weather phenomena, I have been looking at some of the sea ice data recently. The abnormal jet stream in December caused much of the populated East coast and much (all?) of Europe pretty darn cold. However, this also meant that Iqualiut (Nunavut, Canada) had a December AVERAGE temperature 25f warmer than normal. There was a report on CBC that said that the Inuit in the community had not been able to get out on the ice as usual, since there was none!

Here is the most recent reports on this:

http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/

Keep in mind that accurate sea ice data has only been kept since the 1970's.

If you look at the temperature anomaly map on that page Iqualiut is near, but not at, the bright red patch indicating a 12C departure from normal.

Interesting that the arctic sea ice is well below normal, while the Antarctic has been above average!

[canadianplant]

I was in awe when i seen temps in the eastern canadian arctic at 5 or 6C before christmas. And with this exaggerated jet stream recently.

The thing that gets me, is that theyve ben blaming all these weird temps on el nino and el nina patters. Granted these are always a factor, but from the time I can remember to the millenium, ive gone from snow every second halloween, to it being a rarity. There hasnt been snow on the ground here on halloween, in over 15 years.

To my knowledge, europe has had its coldest winters over the last 5 or 10 years. I know quite a few people in the UK, who remember being told as a young child to watch out for sunburn. ( please correct me if im wrong here).

The thing that i think of, when I hear all of this odd weather/climate change stuff, is that were in an interglacial period, at a time in the earts history, when the climate itslef is very unstable. As far as we know, the earth was closer to the sun at the time of the dinosaurs. The climate, although still ever changing, was more moderate, and sustained during that time. It stayed the same for millions of years before shifting.

We are further away from the sun now, and instead of there being one big landmass, the land is spread out, creating new oceans and influencing ocean currents. The one thing I am truely wondering about, is what the movement of the magnetic north and south poles means in terms of weather. This movement has sped up exponentialy over the last 40 years.


Bah, now im ranting.... sorry guys. thanks for the post paul. Im waiting for the day, i see a polar bear wondering around here, looking for food ( theres been sightings of themjust north of lake nipigon.

[DesertZone]

Good read, thanks Paul.