.Ice shelf about to break away from Antarctic coast
PARIS (AP) - A massive ice shelf anchored to the Antarctic coast by a narrow and quickly deteriorating ice bridge could break away soon, the European Space Agency warned Friday.
The Paris-based agency said satellite images show the bridge that connects the Wilkins Ice Shelf to Charcot and Latady Islands "looks set to collapse."
"The beginning of what appears to be the demise of the ice bridge began this week when new rifts" appeared and a large block of ice broke away, it said.
The Wilkins Ice Shelf - which like the rest of Antarctic's ice sheet "was formed by thousands of years of accumulated and compacted snow" - had been stable for most of the last century before it began retreating in the 1990s, the statement said.
The shelf, which was originally of Jamaica or the U.S. state of Connecticut, is located on the western side of the Antarctic Peninsula, which thrusts up from the continent toward the southern tip of South America.
Originally covering about 5,000 square miles (13,000 square kilometers), the ice shelf lost 14 percent of its mass last year alone, the statement quotes a scientist Angelika Humbert of Germany's Munster University as saying.
In two 2008 incidents, large chunks of the ice bridge fell away, shaving it down to just 985 yards (900 meters) across at its narrowest, the statement said.
As a result, "In the past months, we have observed the ice bridge deforming and its narrowest location acting as a kind of hinge," Humbert is quoted as saying.
Scientist are examining whether global warming is behind the shelf's breakup, the statement said. Average temperatures in the Antarctic Peninsula have risen by 3.8 degrees Farenheit (2.5 degrees Celsius) over the past half century, the statement said - higher than the average global rise.
MyWay
The Paris-based agency said satellite images show the bridge that connects the Wilkins Ice Shelf to Charcot and Latady Islands "looks set to collapse."
"The beginning of what appears to be the demise of the ice bridge began this week when new rifts" appeared and a large block of ice broke away, it said.
The Wilkins Ice Shelf - which like the rest of Antarctic's ice sheet "was formed by thousands of years of accumulated and compacted snow" - had been stable for most of the last century before it began retreating in the 1990s, the statement said.
The shelf, which was originally of Jamaica or the U.S. state of Connecticut, is located on the western side of the Antarctic Peninsula, which thrusts up from the continent toward the southern tip of South America.
Originally covering about 5,000 square miles (13,000 square kilometers), the ice shelf lost 14 percent of its mass last year alone, the statement quotes a scientist Angelika Humbert of Germany's Munster University as saying.
In two 2008 incidents, large chunks of the ice bridge fell away, shaving it down to just 985 yards (900 meters) across at its narrowest, the statement said.
As a result, "In the past months, we have observed the ice bridge deforming and its narrowest location acting as a kind of hinge," Humbert is quoted as saying.
Scientist are examining whether global warming is behind the shelf's breakup, the statement said. Average temperatures in the Antarctic Peninsula have risen by 3.8 degrees Farenheit (2.5 degrees Celsius) over the past half century, the statement said - higher than the average global rise.
MyWay
posted by madtom at 6:04 PM
34 Comments:
How'd I miss this? You do know that this ice shelf has been breaking away and refreezing for years? I saw a report that proved that the pictures they used in reporting this event as the end of the world as we know are at least two years old and accompanied some articles that were all but identical as some written two years ago--- only the dates were changed to protect the lying fuckers who wish to rule us in the name of saving us from a mythical disaster.
By any chance, did you notice the rash of Peruvian mummies that were turning up a few years back?
Do you know why people were just stumbling across thousand year old mummies. I don't think anyone was faking it, or rediscovering the same mummy twice. It's the permafrost that is retreating up the mountain.
And do you know what caused this sudden change..Catalytic converters and smokestack scrubbers. Took all the particulates out of our emissions. What a bummer. The unintended consequence phenomena
Or just maybe--- it's part of a natural cycle that has taken place for millions of years! What, you think the Peruvians were burying their people in permafrost or do you think the permafrost came along later? Fact is, the Earth has been cooling rapidly for the last decade. I cant remeber the guys names, but they published a paper a few months ago where they demonstrated with fairly simple math that we were in a warming cycle and now headed into a fairly major cooling cycle. Their formula worked with historical data far better than anything NASA's computer have been able to generate. Part of it is solar storm cycles. The amount of greenhouse gases for which humans are responsible is a fraction of the whole. A good volcano could beat our total in a matter of minutes. You know the global warming-Marxists (or their useful idiots) know it's bullshit from the way the immediately shoot down dissent offering no science to prove the dissent wrong, or practical science to prove themselves right. Sort of like Creationists vs. Darwin. Global Warming is a religion.
Yes, in the permafrost. they would climb up into the permafrost, look for an exposed wall, and then place their sacrifice up against it. I think they used some drugs to put the victim to sleep and them smashed their scull in with a blunt object, and natural cycles take much longer, they change over eons not years. They know this from ice cores. Now there are sharp changes in the ice core too, but they correspond to events.
I don't know or understand why the right is taking the opposition on this issue. Even if we did not have to worry about the warming, we do have to worry about oil and energy. And the only place we are going to find enough is through conservation.
And besides you saw it posted here, that new car. It has 420hp and gets 100mpg. You could just as easily build a 1 ton truck with the same hardware. If all the trucks got 100mpg we would not need to import a single drop of oil.
Which would give us more security than we could get from any war.
I take that stand on the the issue because the facts lead me to. The Global Warming BS is unsupportable and looses credibility every day, just as the 'world is running out of oil' BS is proven to be BS. Are you like Gore and believe the science is settled and don't even bother to consider facts? Read up on the Univ of Milwaukee study that applied chaos theory to climate change. No manmade global warming theory works nearly as well or can be applied to historical data as accurately. Shit happens and the claim that changes like these happen naturally over similar time frames .
PS--- your electric car is BS, too. Just read the specs, especially the part about MPG. What they don't say is all you need to know. Converting gasoline to electricity doesn't yield more energy than a good combustion engine connected directly to a drive train. But, individually electric driven wheels are cool.
I look up the study and see.
And yes it dose, converting gas to electricity bypasses the transmission, and that is 40% saving right there.
Plus you get all the bells and whistles, anti lock, anti spin, your car will be able to drive up a iced road and never lose control, they computer will adjust each tire and the car will go straight. Not to mention that you have an electric generator everywhere you go. If there is a power outage, just plug into your car. And if you read the details, you don't need the batteries, when you switch the car to performance mode, it runs directly off the generator. You could build any number of passenger cars based on this design and not worry one bit about expensive batteries.
OK I read up a little on the new theory. Not bad at all very interesting. But, all it describes is a new mechanism. The coupling and decupling of nodes, instead of the trapping or reflecting of sunlight, but I don't think it said anything about how atmospheric or ocean chemistry affects the coupling. Not to mention that it's a cyclical effect that explains whether variations on small time scales, 11 years medium. It might be that it has no effect on larger scales. In other words as the temps go up, we could still see this effect of warming and cooling within some range of temperatures.
Give it a year, and this new theory may be front and center in the global warming literature.
Link to paper
It's a pretty simple test. Does a generator exist that can convert fossil fuel to electricity to drive motors capable of doing as much work as efficiently as a gasoline direct drive engine? Since no one has done it and even those who plan to produce such a car avoid making any such claims, I gotta figure the answer is a definite NO. I did see where there's a lot of work being done to make fuel cell generators capable of reaching that threshold, but so far no luck. And even then, unless the efficiency is MUCH greater, it won't make economic sense to make such a drastic change for a mythical problem. There is plenty of oil and coal and nothing is cheaper or will be for the next century. If we force the tech by artificially increasing costs of carbon fuels, we will fail and the rest of the world will move on without us. Most of the world doesn't have the luxury of employing eggheads to invent crises for eggheads to solve.
I don't know if you caught O man telling us how a govenment dedicated to creating a non carbon based economy will create jobs a prosperity, and pointed to Spain as an example to aspire to. I saw an article that covered a study in Spain the showed unemployment there was increased significantly because of their efforts and is causing major economic problems. They can't compete. What a future!
Anything practical, logical and understandable has no place in Global Warming doctrine. That study has been ignored as is anyone who dares to speak up and point out that the emperor has no clothes. I don't know if you ever read Crichton's State of Fear, but it's the truest bit of fiction I've read in a long time. It's getting a little dated, but is becoming more true by the day.
Your whole argument was proven wrong by the railways. They had to swath to electric or go broke. They proved what you claim no one has 75 years ago.
No, my argument isn't disproved by the use of diesel electric locomotives. They aren't more fuel efficient, direct drive diesel locomotives are more efficient, but they are more practical because of the difficulties in designing and maintaining of transmissions for direct drive locomotives. When pulling hundreds of tons uphill, you don't want to be shifting gears and using a clutch-- and the transmission itself is as large or larger than the engine itself. You are talking apples and oranges. If you were right, we'd be driving diesel electric cars. Why aren't we and why do prospective manufactures decline to make claims about efficiency? Well, because they are like the rest of the enviro wackos--- the truth is not their friend.
"of the difficulties in designing and maintaining of transmissions"
Exactly
"we'd be driving diesel electric cars. Why aren't we"
Saudis fly in and pass out money.
A VW Bettle had a 70hp mortor, that like 50hp at the wheels. If you put 4, 15hp electric mortors on a car like the old Bettle you could get like 350mpg.
A train pulls one ton 400 miles on a gallon of diesel
You skipped right by the most important fact--diesel-electric engines are NOT as efficient. That is an inconvenient fact. Fewer ton-Miles Per Gallon. Cars don't have the same issues with transmission. 100's of tons less cargo, yaknow? And just like a good lefty, you ignore logic and go to conspiracy. It just doesn't fucking work, OK! If electricity was FREE it still could not compete just from a maintainance and upfront cost aspect. Combustion engines are ingenious and carbon fuel is the cheapest. Cheaper than fucking bottled water. To give that up so our global betters can control our lives just makes no goddamn sense. That is the crap you are unwittingly pushing. Marx had a term to describe people who do such things.
You could drive from Texas to Florida and back, on a tank of gas.
here--- went to wiki to get easy facts I already know from who the hell know where.....but they say slightly more efficient, but I recall it being more significant-- it's wiki so who the hell knows without more effort than I want to spend.
Diesel-hydraulic locomotives are slightly more efficient than diesel-electrics, but initial versions were found in many countries to be mechanically more complicated and more likely to break down. Hydraulic transmission for locomotives was developed in Germany. The bad reputation of diesel-hydraulic principle was caused by the poor durability and reliability of the Maybach Mekydro hydraulic transmission. The Mekydro consisted of a hydraulic torque converter followed by a four speed automatic mechanical gearbox. A different solution using several torque converters was developed by Voith, and it has proven to be extremely durable and very well suited for the purpose.
Why in HELL would I want to drive from Texas to .... Florida!?
Who wants to give up carbon fuel??, I just want to use it efficiently. And nothing could be easier to maintain than an electric motor. But you reduce the size of the gas engine. Right now it's backwards, you need a 600hp engine to put 400hp at the wheels. But with electric it's the other way around, you make 600hp at the wheels with a 400hp gas motor. No transition can do that for you.
If you are a global warming acolyte, then YOU want to give up carbon fuel AND all the prosperity and dominance over tyranny money can buy. And you invite tyranny so subtle you may never fully realize it's got it's fingers around your throat.
Diesel to electric is not as efficient as diesel to wheels--- get over it. In fact, they are starting to make more diesel hydraulics as the transmissions have improved. They aren't doing that for nuthin.
Sunshine.
I was a metal roofer for 30 years in Texas a surrounding states--- sunshine I got plenty of.
"Diesel to electric is not as efficient as diesel to wheels"That is the mythology. Sorry if I am offending your religious beliefs. I apologies in advance.
I could pass for one of Obama's destitute half brothers.
There's always Mickey Mouse
I'll compromise--- I am right about current technology-- and I know I am--- but I may be wrong about the timeframe for when the tech becomes competitive. We will never know, cuz the powers that be will legislate cost efficiency.
Well, once you guys criminalized bestiality--- what's the point?
All it will take is for some nut to build a Hybrid NASCAR, and win all the races.
I am sure there's still some loophole, for farmers.
Sounds like you've given the issue some thought--- the bestiality exception, I mean.
If someone could do it, they'd damn sure do it for NASCAR> follow the money.
Are you saying a farmer could do to Mickey what a regular Joe could not? Equal protection under the law--- don't you guys ever learn?
Money = Saudis
Did you watch the video yet?
Is there a mickey mouse sex tape or are you talking about something else? You know, that's stupid, you gotta figure there is a mickey mouse sex tape somewhere on the WWW. I'm enjoying a really nice spring nite on the deck watching the koi eat bugs while I drink JD--- i may have missed a video link?
The C-Span video.
Nope. I'm trying to not think about serious stuff for a minute.
Watching my Dallas Mavs get their ass kicked by another Republic of Texas based NBA team. But, we got three of them in the playoffs. so who can keep up?
Well, maybe you know me cuz I had to go speed read the transcript. I'll check it out later---- thanks, look interesting, maybe a little too nerdy to be credible. right up your alley!
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