Giant Ice Shelf Breaks Off In Arctic

Ice Chunk Spanning 7 Square Miles Is Largest Piece To Break Off Since 2005

(AP)  A chunk of ice spreading across seven square miles has broken off a Canadian ice shelf in the Arctic, scientists said Tuesday.

Derek Mueller, a research at Trent University, was careful not to blame global warming, but said the event was consistent with the theory that the current Arctic climate isn't rebuilding ice sheets.

"We're in a different climate now," he said. "It's not conducive to regrowing them. It's a one-way process."

Mueller said the sheet broke away last week from the Ward Hunt Ice Shelf off the north coast of Ellesmere Island in Canada's far north. He said a crack in the shelf was first spotted in 2002 and a survey this spring found a network of fissures.

The sheet is the biggest piece shed by one of Canada's six ice shelves since the Ayles shelf broke loose in 2005 from the coast of Ellesmere, about 500 miles from the North Pole.

Formed by accumulating snow and freezing meltwater, ice shelves are large platforms of thick, ancient sea ice that float on the ocean's surface. Ellesmere Island was once entirely ringed by a single enormous ice shelf that broke up in the early 1900s.

At 170 square miles and 130-feet thick, the Ward Hunt shelf is the largest of those remnants. Mueller said it has been steadily declining since the 1930s.

Gary Stern, co-leader of an international research program on sea ice, said it's the same story all around the Arctic.

Speaking from the Coast Guard icebreaker Amundsen in Canada's north, Stern said He hadn't seen any ice in weeks. Plans to set up an ice camp last February had to be abandoned when usually dependable ice didn't form for the second year in a row, he said.

"Nobody on the ship is surprised anymore," Stern said. "We've been trying to get the word out for the longest time now that things are happening fast and they're going to continue to happen fast."

[tulcak]

the scientist are telling us what nature is telling us - that we are changing the biosphere by our human activities... well, its too late now to do anything because we''ve had those that felt their political viewpoint was more important than anything and delayed action that could have reversed global warming. the supreme cosmic idiocy.

[octavianfdlr]

"Ellesmere Island was once entirely ringed by a single enormous ice shelf that broke up in the early 1900s. "
...
"''Nobody on the ship is surprised anymore,'' Stern said. ''We''ve been trying to get the word out for the longest time now that things are happening fast and they''re going to continue to happen fast.''"

-The Article
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Wow! Slightly more than a hundred years! That''s FAST! Didn''t the Nobel Prize winning IPCC that this is even faster than the one-decade warmup at the end of the last glacial maximum? LOL

[piercetheval]

...Gee, and not a mention of the butterfly that sneezed in Madagascar or the giant pine tree that fell in Siberia...that no one heard yet made a sound...sheesh, do we really need all this info?

[nextgenman]

Posted by Humanavance at 06:27 AM : Jul 31, 2008
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I have to ask. Why do you spam so much?

[carlylaine]

You guys are the same as the Xtian groups. They spout a god and end times.

Your god is Al Gore and your doom and gloom is to make us scared with GLOBAL WARMING. You are all arrogant in thinking that in a few short years we have done so much damage. It''s a lie; it''s a myth.

It''s a lie; it''s a myth. If it''s not one thing it''s another with both factions.

[gaye5]

Funny how people could grow crops in greenland during the Viking days but the vikings had to eventually go to greener pastures to survive as the land became too cold and covered with snow to grow anything..

It is just the normal variations on our cycles...
CO2''s are acturally better for us as our plant life thrives on CO2''s it is fertalizer to them, so by killing down CO2''s we are starving plant life...
It is about time we start to think for ourselves instead of being programed to think certian ways. Hitler said, "what luck for leaders that people dont think." and he is right people cant think for themselves. We were taught at school that plants need CO2''s to survive, plants give off oxygen which we need, less oxygen more sickness, more plant life means more oxygen, more water given off and thus more rain.. More CO2''s more plant life in the sea, better for the fish..
However, having said that we must clean up our air...

[sumose]

Burn baby burn. 25 years I have watched. all the nay sayers ver''s all the sooth sayers. should you live under 100 foot in elevation I suggest you move, and soon. BURN BABY BURN...

[beehive21-2009]

Evolution, folks,all you can do is relax an enjoy the show,man is nothing,too,The Planet Earth. Relax nothing you say or do will change anyhting, Evolution.

[arlenice]

SCIENTISTS HAVE BEEN TELLING GOVERNMENT AND GOVERNMENT HAS NOT REALLY LISTENED...THAT DEFORRESTATION IS CAUSING BACTERIA & MOLDS/SPORES TO BE PICKED UP BY MOISTURE & CARRIED BY CLOUDS FROM ONE SIDE OF THE GLOBE TO THE OTHER. UNKNOWN DISEASES ARE THE PRODUCT OF THE SUCH...NO MEDICINES YET AVAILABLE. THE CUTTING DOWN OF FORRESTS IS ALSO CAUSING WILDLIFE AND NATIVES TO BECOME DISPLACED. WHY DO WE ALLOW IT? HAVE WE NOT LEARNED THE LAWS OF CAUSE AND EFFECT? THE TREES ARE NECESSARY TO PRODUCE OXYGEN AND MOISTURE FOR RAIN THAT IS NEEDED FOR AGRICULTURE....IS THERE MORE? YES.

[arlenice]

SCIENTISTS HAVE BEEN TELLING GOVERNMENT AND GOVERNMENT HAS NOT REALLY LISTENED...THAT DEFORRESTATION IS CAUSING BACTERIA & MOLDS/SPORES TO BE PICKED UP BY MOISTURE & CARRIED BY CLOUDS FROM ONE SIDE OF THE GLOBE TO THE OTHER. UNKNOWN DISEASES ARE THE PRODUCT OF THE SUCH...NO MEDICINES YET AVAILABLE. THE CUTTING DOWN OF FORRESTS IS ALSO CAUSING WILDLIFE AND NATIVES TO BECOME DISPLACED. WHY DO WE ALLOW IT? HAVE WE NOT LEARNED THE LAWS OF CAUSE AND EFFECT? THE TREES ARE NECESSARY TO PRODUCE OXYGEN AND MOISTURE FOR RAIN THAT IS NEEDED FOR AGRICULTURE....IS THERE MORE? YES.

[arlenice]

SCIENTISTS HAVE BEEN TELLING GOVERNMENT AND GOVERNMENT HAS NOT REALLY LISTENED...THAT DEFORRESTATION IS CAUSING BACTERIA & MOLDS/SPORES TO BE PICKED UP BY MOISTURE & CARRIED BY CLOUDS FROM ONE SIDE OF THE GLOBE TO THE OTHER. UNKNOWN DISEASES ARE THE PRODUCT OF THE SUCH...NO MEDICINES YET AVAILABLE. THE CUTTING DOWN OF FORRESTS IS ALSO CAUSING WILDLIFE AND NATIVES TO BECOME DISPLACED. WHY DO WE ALLOW IT? HAVE WE NOT LEARNED THE LAWS OF CAUSE AND EFFECT? THE TREES ARE NECESSARY TO PRODUCE OXYGEN AND MOISTURE FOR RAIN THAT IS NEEDED FOR AGRICULTURE....IS THERE MORE? YES.

[arlenice]

Yes it is global warming.At the end of 1800 & the beginning of 1900 became the incredible commencement & rapid progression of the scientific era as the world had never had; it opened to the good,the bad and the ugly. Animals got treated with hormones & antibiotics so that they could yield more $ meat $ ,& to be disease-free,so they said & now we are seeing the results in the fat people who eat the meat.Children are developing earlier than normal...little girls with premature breasts at age 9-10....medicines that after a few months of prescription get recalled & Pharmaceutical companies being sued...Blood Centers are buying blood plasma for close to nothing & reselling it at great profit.Last week I witnessed a lady that had just come out of a blood center who collapsed.... they put back the dirty blood & take & sell the plasma which has the bodies'' & defenses...what else?Much!

[caliguy55]

This is irrefutable evidence that global warming is occurring. Thus, the worse thing we could do is to increase the amount of fossil fuels we burn, which produce the most damaging greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide. But, I''m afraid that overall human beings are too stupid to realize they are killing themselves. I''m 56 and hope to be gone, when the stuff hits the fan.

[arlenice]

Obama went overseas and the soldiers stood in line to greet him and he blew them away...ignored them and had pictures taken for political show and then came back...what is he thinking?

[arlenice]

Fact is that the ice is melting worldwide.Polar bears and seals are getting extinct...this past Tuesday there was the breaking away of a large piece of ice...on same day there was an earthquake in southern Calif...could one have been triggered by the other?..Nature?...Scientists are concerned... some politicians are protecting money interests at the expense of our future.

[haoli25]

Someone bring the Bombay Sapphire, I''ll bring the Vermouth!

[kansas1946]

LOL, both your spelling and facts are atrocious:

Posted by jimfinster at 09:22 PM : Jul 30, 2008
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Don''t you love it when the ditto heads that get all of their scientific information from doper Rush try to act like scientists. I think it is the ditto-head that needs to go back to school, as you so graciously pointed out. :o)

[kansas1946]

Derek Mueller, a research at Trent University, was careful not to blame global warming, but said the event was consistent with the theory that the current Arctic climate isn''t rebuilding ice sheets.

"We''re in a different climate now," he said. "It''s not conducive to regrowing them. It''s a one-way process."
*********************************************

LOL. Wouldn''t want to offend anyone by saying those dreaded words "global warming." Let''s see though.....
" but said the event was consistent with the theory that the current Arctic climate isn''t rebuilding ice sheets. "

Gee, I wonder if that means it is getting WARMER. How stupid to make this a political issue.

[allurfears]

McCain knows it is impossible that the environment is starting to fall apart. He knows this as well as he knows the world is flat and the sun is a big bright light bulb in the sky.

[jimfinster]

Posted by jimfinster at 07:42 PM : Jul 30, 2008

I respect their opinions, but I have to go with the data presented & my own experiences w/firearms.

no argument, just difference of opinion. ''''nuf said ''''bout this here.

Posted by nojoy01


Two very rapid hits from a very difficult position at a moving target, by a poor marksman? Not likely.