Believe In Global Warming Yet?

After a week of keen anticipation and massive media build up, this winters major weather event is upon us.

Snow in southern England, snow in Barcelona for the F1 winter testing even snow in Greece. A week of the Iberian peninsular getting battered by hurricane force winds and more rain than we have had in the whole of the previous year.
There is no denying that this rain fall was desperately needed.
Previously never recorded warm weather has enveloped the Arctic. The Arctic is in perpetual darkness at this time of year, with temperatures rarely rising above -10 degrees C. Last week, 61 hours of above freezing temperatures were recorded in northern Greenland. 4 times more than ever before in a 7 day period at this time of year.

This isn’t the only oddity in the Arctic right now. Every year, the Arctic Ocean goes through a two-part seasonal cycle. From late September to early March, its surface hardens into a huge solid mass, creating a vast ice sheet that stretches from Newfoundland to Siberia. Then, from late March to early September, much of that sea ice melts, and much less of the ocean surface is ice-covered.

At this time of year, sea ice should still be growing and expanding. But recent satellite observations have shown that two large gaps have somehow opened up in the ice. The first is in the Chukchi Sea, near Russia. The second, pictured below, is just north of Cape Morris Jesup in Greenland. The blue gaps are open water:

The North Atlantic is ‘upside-down’. There is high pressure in the north and low pressure in the south.This event has been caused by a huge high pressure in the northern Atlantic. Bringing with it freezing winds to northern Europe.This weather situation is pretty much unprecedented as far as scientists are concerned and a clear indication that weather patterns are changing at a far faster pace and in a more extreme manner than expected.

Author: Cei Bunyan

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