Santa set adrift

September 1, 2008 10:18 PM

For the first time in at least 125,000 years, the Arctic ice cap is an island. (previously)
posted by Knappster (55 comments total)

The Beluga Group in Germany says it will send the first ship through the north-east passage, around Russia, next year, cutting 4,000 miles off the voyage from Germany to Japan.

This is good news for the environmentalists: shipping companies will use less fuel, leading to a decline in greenhou... oh, wait... never mind.
posted by not_on_display at 10:23 PM on September 1, 2008

Well, listen, we all know there is a global climate change going on. What I dispute is the human agency involved in it. Weather goes up and down, and there is just no way to demonstrate that humans are somehow responsible ...

What! Something just crashed through my door! A POLAR BEAR! Get away! GET AWAY!

I CAN FEEL IT EATING MY BRAIN!
posted by Astro Zombie at 10:27 PM on September 1, 2008 [8 favorites]

It's good for shipping, it's good for global trade, it's good for the economy. Take that Inconvenient Truth, Al ManBearPig Gore!
posted by orthogonality at 10:38 PM on September 1, 2008 [1 favorite]

pah . . . I'm not going to have my Bakersfield properties become beachfront until the landborne stuff melts.
posted by troy at 10:40 PM on September 1, 2008

OH WHEN THE SAINTS
OH WHEN THE SAINTS
OH WHEN THE SAINTS GO MARCHING IN
I WANNA BE IN THAT LUCKY NUMBER
OH WHEN THE SAINTS GO MARCHING IN
posted by Citizen Premier at 10:56 PM on September 1, 2008 [2 favorites]

Nibblin' on sponge cake
Watchin' the sun bake
All of those tourists covered with oil
Strummin' my six-string
On my front porch swing
Smell of shrimp dip beginnin' to boil

Chorus:
Wastin' away again in Margaritaville Winnipeg
Searching for my lost shaker of salt
Some people claim that there's a woman to blame
But I know it's nobody's fault

I don't know the reason
I stayed here all season
Nothin' to show but this brand new tattoo
But it's a real beauty
A Mexican cutie
How it got here I haven't a clue

Chorus:
Wastin' away again in Margaritaville Winnipeg
Searchin' for my lost shaker of salt
Some people claim that there's a woman to blame
Now I think
Hell, it could be my fault

I blew out my flip-flop
Stepped on a pop-top
Cut my heel had to cruise on back home
But there's booze in the blender
And soon it will render
That frozen concoction that helps me hang on

Wastin' away again in Margaritaville Winnipeg
Searching for my lost shaker of salt
Some people claim that there's a woman to blame
But I know it's my own damn fault
Yes and some people claim that there's a woman to blame
And I know it's my own damn fault
posted by jimmythefish at 10:57 PM on September 1, 2008

Haha! Take that, polar bears. What were you thinking, evolving to be dependent on ice?
posted by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America at 11:02 PM on September 1, 2008 [1 favorite]

Prof Mark Serreze, a sea ice specialist at the National Snow and Ice Data Centre (NSIDC) in the US said the images suggested the Arctic may have entered a "death spiral" caused by global warming.

C'mon, tell us what you really think, no need to hold back.
posted by salvia at 11:07 PM on September 1, 2008

think we'll beat last year?
posted by sergeant sandwich at 11:14 PM on September 1, 2008

also, not to be an irritating pedant, but doesn't "the ice cap is an island" imply to anyone else that it's just floating around out there in the middle of the ocean, not touching any land? the most recent data from NSIDC show it still pretty clearly attached to greenland and the other little canadian islands. i guess in this case it just means "not attached to a continent".
posted by sergeant sandwich at 11:24 PM on September 1, 2008

Last one to the beach is a rotten egg!
posted by clearly at 11:49 PM on September 1, 2008

or maybe, First one to the beach has a shitty travel agent!
posted by clearly at 11:51 PM on September 1, 2008 [2 favorites]

Ice Age lesson predicts a faster rise in sea level: If the lessons being learned by scientists about the demise of the last great North American ice sheet are correct, estimates of global sea level rise from a melting Greenland ice sheet may be seriously underestimated.
posted by homunculus at 12:01 AM on September 2, 2008 [2 favorites]

Hello this is CNN reporting direct from "Platos Cave"
Everybody out of there car "NOW"and stop all those cows from farting!!!!
Can we please see all of those 125,000 or so satellite photos from the last 125,000 years please! I just want to be sure that the North Pole was never an island before. I kinda have a hunch that it probably was at some time in the past 125,000 years. Don't get me wrong I'm concerned just want to see the facts and all of the stories I read regarding this had little.
posted by thedailygrowl at 1:03 AM on September 2, 2008

I CAN FEEL IT EATING MY BRAIN!
posted by Astro Zombie

Payback's a bitch, ain't it?
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 2:31 AM on September 2, 2008 [6 favorites]

Well, heck, at last, we have a Northwest Passage all around the world.
posted by Joey Michaels at 2:42 AM on September 2, 2008

Springfield Glacier (The Simpsons)
posted by twoleftfeet at 3:47 AM on September 2, 2008

Is Santa going to be ok?
posted by clearly at 4:25 AM on September 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

What? 2 feet? You mean I'll never get to see Florida underwater?
posted by jeffburdges at 4:47 AM on September 2, 2008

"I CAN FEEL IT EATING MY BRAIN!
posted by Astro Zombie"

You are a lying liar. As if zombies have live nerve endings.

We both know that zombies can't feel pain; only heartache.
posted by Eideteker at 5:04 AM on September 2, 2008

> Last night Professor Mark Serreze, a sea ice specialist at the official US National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), hailed the publication of the images – on an obscure website by scientists at the University of Bremen, Germany – as "a historic event"

Sure would be nice to see these "historic" pictures.
posted by stbalbach at 6:38 AM on September 2, 2008

This won't end well.
posted by Halloween Jack at 7:23 AM on September 2, 2008

We need to move in now and re-purpose those confused polar bears to be trained arctic warriors in our up coming war with Russia. We may have lot the war of the flag planting, but by George, our polar bear warriors will wreck fear and devastation on the unsuspecting Russian populace. (Bonus: They'll work for coke!)
posted by Atreides at 7:26 AM on September 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

We may have loSt the war of the flag planting....

Evil Putnin stole my S. Bah.
posted by Atreides at 7:27 AM on September 2, 2008

> For the first time in at least 125,000 years, the Arctic ice cap is an island.

Linkie, please, to those comparison satellite images from 125000y BP.

Also a link to that "obscure website" would be nice, though I suppose the big aggregator sites wouldn't treat it gently. Is there any mention anywhere of forthcoming publication in a refereed journal?
posted by jfuller at 7:46 AM on September 2, 2008

I Googled "obscure website" but couldn't find it.
posted by Knappster at 7:48 AM on September 2, 2008

Wisdom from Meatbomb:
1. Swim, Polar Bears, swim!
2. Build, Netherlanders, build!

We are so fucked.
posted by Meatbomb at 8:00 AM on September 2, 2008 [2 favorites]

We both know that zombies can't feel pain; only heartache.

And hunger. For flesh.
posted by Brittanie at 8:08 AM on September 2, 2008

Yay! More whales to drive barges over!

Seriously, though, this could mean Arctic ports, which might actually do a lot of economic good for that segment of the population that just lost its millennia-old way of life to global warming.
posted by Sys Rq at 8:21 AM on September 2, 2008

...Can we please see all of those 125,000 or so satellite photos from the last 125,000 years please! I just want to be sure that the North Pole was never an island before. I kinda have a hunch that it probably was at some time in the past 125,000 years. Don't get me wrong I'm concerned just want to see the facts and all of the stories I read regarding this had little.
posted by thedailygrowl at 1:03 AM on September 2 [+] [!]

That's right, the entire field of paleoclimatology can be dismissed with a simple "pics or it didn't happen". Does the entire world disappear whenever you close your eyes, too?
posted by FatherDagon at 8:40 AM on September 2, 2008 [4 favorites]

Poor Santa :(
posted by Mister_A at 9:11 AM on September 2, 2008

Can we please see all of those 125,000 or so satellite photos from the last 125,000 years please! I just want to be sure that the North Pole was never an island before. I kinda have a hunch that it probably was at some time in the past 125,000 years. Don't get me wrong I'm concerned just want to see the facts and all of the stories I read regarding this had little.

You do realize that climatologists take thousands of core samples from all over the Arctic icecap, providing them with a cutaway view of the various layers of ice/snow deposited over many tens of thousands years, yes? It's pretty readily apparent from those samples which areas have ice older than 125,000 years.
posted by Ryvar at 9:36 AM on September 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

Well, obviously, God put the ice core samples there to test our faith--our faith in, uh, burning, you know, fossils.
posted by Sys Rq at 9:43 AM on September 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

Seriously, though, this could mean Arctic ports, which might actually do a lot of economic good for that segment of the population that just lost its millennia-old way of life to global warming.

Eh, their way of life wasn't that great anyway. Bring on the McDonalds!
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 9:55 AM on September 2, 2008

> That's right, the entire field of paleoclimatology can be dismissed with a simple "pics or it
> didn't happen". Does the entire world disappear whenever you close your eyes, too?

Pics or it's an inference from some collection of less compelling but presumably converging evidence. And it's a fairly extraordinary claim (headline-making, for instance) which calls for extraordinarily clear evidence. To begin with (and quite apart from the question of ice cover) we'll need to show that we know exactly where the Arctic coastline was for each and every melting season in each of the last 125,000 years, so we'll know we were taking the ice cores in all the right places.
posted by jfuller at 10:06 AM on September 2, 2008

Hey, don't laugh; Winnipeg is Canada's Global Warming Success Story(tm) !
posted by sporb at 10:09 AM on September 2, 2008

So.... all this spazzy jokery is just cover for gut-clenching terror, on the We Are So Fucked Scale, right? Because otherwise you guys come across as kinda cretinous.
posted by jokeefe at 10:17 AM on September 2, 2008 [1 favorite]

Speaking of zombies. There’s a good scene from one of the zombie movies (Dawn of the Dead I believe) where, in the midst of the zombies attacking and killing people, and all this chaos going on, one of the scientists just keeps saying “Dummies... dummies... dummies.”
I believe around that time the two guardsman decided to cut from the program and head off on their own.

...I like movies.
posted by Smedleyman at 10:57 AM on September 2, 2008

FatherDagon : Does the entire world disappear whenever you close your eyes, too?

You better hope not; I feel a sneeze coming on, and I always blink when that happens.

You all know that you're just a figment of my imagination, right?

Crap! I probably should have put a "Spoiler Alert" on that, huh?
posted by quin at 12:51 PM on September 2, 2008

Pics or it's an inference from some collection of less compelling but presumably converging evidence

Just curious, why are ice cores or other scientific data "less compelling" than satellite pictures? In fact ice cores are more compelling as they represent a lare time frame, while satellite pics are just a snapshot.
posted by stbalbach at 1:18 PM on September 2, 2008

I’ve also been following this sunspot* (or lack thereof) thing.
I’m utterly and completely convinced - that I have no idea what’s going on.


*the comments are waste of time graffiti for the most part
posted by Smedleyman at 1:38 PM on September 2, 2008 [2 favorites]

I've actually met Mark Serreze. "Death spiral" is, for him, pretty mild from my (single, daylong) exposure to the guy. Amazingly, um... plainspoken.
posted by Emperor SnooKloze at 3:50 PM on September 2, 2008

It's probably time to learn to swim.
posted by subbes at 4:49 PM on September 2, 2008

We're screwed...
posted by ooklala at 4:50 PM on September 2, 2008

Pics or it's an inference from some collection of less compelling but presumably converging evidence.

Here are some "pics", updated daily.

"The passages are open," said Professor Serreze, though he cautioned that official bodies would be reluctant to confirm this for fear of lawsuits if ships encountered ice after being encouraged to enter them. "It's a historic event. We are going to see this more and more as the years go by."

"It's very different from in the past when you had a low year and you tended to rebound. We haven't been doing that anymore," says Julienne Stroeve, a research scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Centre in Colorado.

Can we stop pretending this shit isn't happening now?
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 5:23 PM on September 2, 2008

Page 72 of this PDF

August 21, 2008, 2:00 a.m: At Churchill, Manitoba the local weather is clear: temperature 8.7°, visibility 24.1 km, wind direction 180 degrees, wind speed 19 km/hr.
The Murmansk-Churchill Arctic Bridge between Churchill and the port of Murmansk is in full operation. The voyage from Murmansk to Churchill is only eight days and Russian container ships arrive daily. Nine days before, on August 12, the Russian Arctic container vessel, Norsk Nova, departed from Murmansk. Four days out of Churchill, on August 16, its Captain, in compliance with Transport Canada’s regulations, forwarded the required details of his cargo and his route. Since it is not classified as a major port, Churchill has no radiation detection devices for screening containers for it is reasoned that, compared to ports such as Halifax, and Vancouver, such a large investment at the low volume port of Churchill would yield little in return. The government’s routine target and risk assessment process for identifying containers to be checked concluded that the owner of the vessel was a trusted shipper.

Shortly after its arrival at 8:00 p.m. on August 19, the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) staff at Churchill carried out only a pro forma inspection of the ship and its cargo. By 9:00 p.m. the Captain had received the OK to unload. By midnight the ship’s cargo of containers were safely secured aboard the rail cars on the HBRW siding. At 1:20 a.m. on August 20, with his ship refuelled, the Captain headed his ship back out to sea, and set a return course to Murmansk.
Three weeks before, on July 31, a Chechen terrorist cell affiliated with al Qaeda bribed the drug-addicted and poorly paid commander of a badly secured storage unit at the Sevmorput naval shipyard near Murmansk, and received an early model of a trunk-size, man-portable, low yield nuclear device (a “suitcase bomb”) which had been recently rebuilt with new radioactive elements whose "half-life" made it operable for at least four months. It was not equipped with a modern electronic lock. The theft was not discovered by the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), and the International Atomic Energy Agency was not alerted to what had taken place. The terrorist group’s plan was to surreptitiously transfer the stolen device to fellow travellers in the United States by concealing it in a cargo container earmarked for transhipment to Chicago via the HBRY and its interconnected Canadian and American railways.
For reasons unknown, however, the device spontaneously detonated at 2:00 a.m., between the grain elevators and the “tank farm.” Measured from its epicentre at the Port of Churchill’s railway siding the immediate damage inflicted by the 1-kiloton ground level explosion is significant.

Fireball. All matter within the 150-metre diameter fireball was vaporized.
Blast. Out to 500 metres from the explosion the blast wave over pressure of 5 pounds per square inch, followed by winds of around 150 miles per hour, destroyed all wood-frame buildings, and caused severe damage to brick buildings. Destruction and damage of the power-grid nodes in the vicinity of the port caused widespread power outages throughout the area. In addition to the blast effects, the electromagnetic pulse (EMP) from the explosion destroyed most electronic equipment in the vicinity. Containers from a cargo ship in the port were scattered at high velocity. Two ships, including a crude-oil tanker waiting off loading, suffered hull ruptures at the waterline on the side facing the explosion. Oil from the tanker began to flow rapidly into the harbour and is ablaze.
Heat. Out to about 600 metres, the fireball energy in infrared, visible, and ultraviolet wavelengths has burned exposed skin, and charred or ignited flammable materials.
Radiation. Out to around 1,100 metres, all persons in the open receive an immediate neutron and gamma ray dose of 5001 rem, (the dose that will prove fatal within 30 days to about half the people receiving it).
Fallout. A radiation dose of 500 rem will be received by all unprotected persons who remain for over 48-hours in the three square kilometres downwind elliptical area exposed to radioactive fallout in the form of deposited fission products and neutron-activation products.

[via] What else can go wrong in the Arctic?
posted by tellurian at 5:39 PM on September 2, 2008

> You do realize that climatologists take thousands of core samples from all over the Arctic
> icecap, providing them with a cutaway view of the various layers of ice/snow deposited
> over many tens of thousands years, yes? It's pretty readily apparent from those samples
> which areas have ice older than 125,000 years.
> posted by Ryvar at 12:36 PM on September 2 [1 favorite +] [!]

Ryvar, are you under the impression that you can step onto an iceberg, take a core sample, count the annual layers, and go "Aha, 147,000. This iceberg is 147,000 years old"? You can't. None of the very ancient samples was taken over the Arctic ocean. They were all taken over land--all the best-known ones from glaciers in Greenland.

The ocean has areas of open water, areas where the existing ice froze this year, and areas where the ice (called "perennial ice") is an accumulation from several years. The average age of perennial ice was more than 10 years prior to 1989 but, more recently, the average age is 3 years, Rigor says based on the buoy data. There have been instances in which ice has been known to survive 30 years or more. Got that? Nowhere is the ocean ice cover more than 30 years old. It turns over at that rate, or faster.


> Just curious, why are ice cores or other scientific data "less compelling" than satellite
> pictures? In fact ice cores are more compelling as they represent a large time frame, while
> satellite pics are just a snapshot.

It's possible that "compelling" doesn't mean what you think it means. The core data is fascinating, but that is not remotely the same as being compelling evidence for any question you might ask--with "compelling" meaning both A) highly pertinent to the question and B) unambiguous as to what answer it supports. Going from an examination of some of the very ancient cores taken over land to an assertion that a given area of ocean-cover ice less than 30 years old has been recycling in the frozen state with never a melt for 125,000 years is going to be a stretch, certainly involving a multi-link chain of inference and a significant amount of handwaving. Both of these factors tend to take the turgor out of an argument's compellingness quotient.

I want to see the guy's actual evidence and analysis. It's possible he doesn't even appeal to core data. You simply can't tell anything from what the Telegraph gives you.


> Can we stop pretending this shit isn't happening now?
> posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 5:23 PM on September 2

What on earth are you on about? I don't see anybody in this thread pretending it isn't happening now. I do see several people who wonder how we can know it hasn't happened even once in the last 125,000 years, except for now. If that distinction goes over your head, you're absolutely and entirely worthy of your profile pic.
posted by jfuller at 6:47 PM on September 2, 2008

Come on. That wasn't the place for ad hominem attacks based on profile pics, and you know it.
posted by subbes at 7:40 PM on September 2, 2008

You're right, I accept the correction and apologize.
posted by jfuller at 8:07 PM on September 2, 2008

What on earth are you on about? I don't see anybody in this thread pretending it isn't happening now. I do see several people who wonder how we can know it hasn't happened even once in the last 125,000 years, except for now. If that distinction goes over your head, you're absolutely and entirely worthy of your profile pic.

Your statement, "Pics or it's an inference from some collection of less compelling but presumably converging evidence," was a clumsily worded take on "Pics or it didn't happen." Pics were provided. Hence my reply, "Can we stop pretending this shit isn't happening now?" Jesus, lighten up already.
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 8:26 PM on September 2, 2008

Ah, and no hard feelings. I think I deserve my profile pic as well, albeit probably not for the same reasons you meant.
posted by Marisa Stole the Precious Thing at 8:31 PM on September 2, 2008

Can we all please, please, please stop vilifying everyone who opposes efforts to stop Global Warming? We're not all anti-science religious zealots.

Some of just really, really, really hate Florida.

Also, you gotta love the irony that the one man who stood the best chance of saving Florida was the man who was denied that opportunity by... the state of Florida.

Hummer owners, your restitution will be working as slave laborers on the kelp plantations.
posted by Davenhill at 9:04 PM on September 2, 2008 [2 favorites]

> Ah, and no hard feelings.

fuller tips hat. I need to write myself a greasemonkey script that adds a little reminder to the mefi banner. Something like "This is not fark, this is not 4chan, don't be a /b/tard here."
posted by jfuller at 4:54 AM on September 3, 2008

August 21, 2008, 2:00 a.m: At Churchill, Manitoba [...] a trunk-size, man-portable, low yield nuclear device [...] spontaneously detonated at 2:00 a.m., between the grain elevators and the “tank farm.”

It's probably worth mentioning, for the folks who won't read the link, that that's a hypothetical scenario.
posted by Sys Rq at 5:50 AM on September 3, 2008

that's a hypothetical scenario
It's War of the Worlds all over again.

I've linked to this blog a couple of times just recently as the Arctic enters the news. Maybe I've overdone it. I'll stop for now with the caveat that if there is an apocraphyal story with substance, I would expect this interesting, informative and balanced blog to post a reasoned and valuable resume of events. Then I'm going to go 'Hell for leather' and 'I told you so'.
posted by tellurian at 6:51 AM on September 3, 2008