Giant Ice Shelf Breaks Off In Arctic

(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.