Sea Ice update # countless: Per buoys map, NOAA Polar Webcam 2 has just moved outside the 2 degree zone that CryoSat-2 cant see, but the webcam itself has been Hi-Res reporting on a daily basis for the whole drift track, multiple times in 24 hour periods, how the Arctic Ice is doing... Well, it's melting: See http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/npole/2011/images/noaa2-2011-0722-015533.jpg

The full picture archive can be found here http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/npole/gallery_np_selectall.php

NOAA1 fell over several weeks ago, on leg went through the soggy surface: http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/npole/2011/images/noaa1-2011-0722-024319.jpg It's been tilting further and further as can be seen whilst browsing through the images.

In the last 48 hours there was over 398,000 km square of Ice loss [Area], whilst the extent kept spreading from the remainder, so JAXA does not show what's really going on... 2011 continues to track below 2007 record year on almost all metrics, such as this one showing the anomaly for the first 201 days of all years since 1979.



Can't remember seeing it before... don't worry, it will come back again, with a new set of updated bars.

Food for thought, but not for all!

--//--

P.S. Walked into a dataset starting from 1972... daily detail. There were those undisclosed missions from when JASON [video for elucidation ] and Nierenberg did their studies in the 70's decade... some feared a new ice-age that turned 180 degrees with some human help. Nierenberg found then
The chief Inconvenient Truth revealer might have had a hand in getting the 70's sea ice data to come to surface and CO2 at present exponential growth rate will hit 600 ppmv a little sooner, 10 years sooner, but not by his doing, it's us all.

P.P.S. When it snows I wear a hat, of some teflon like material... nothing sticks even after long hours of weathering exposure. It's bright red, so they see me coming.

I saw another study linking it to mostly sulfur from burning Chinese coal.

http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-07-global-linked-sulfur-china.html

Yes, that's why I come here... to keep all abreast on the canary of planet earth, The Arctic **. One wing broken, One leg limb and the arthritis progressing... it's vocal cords are over-streched, many not hearing it's anxiety.

The bird is not doing well with all that soot, sulfur and other pollutants added in a constant stream... up to a point CO2 is not, but as with anything 'too'... then it becomes one, and EPA has used the 'pollutant' angle as a facilitation within the law to try pass controls.

For the ''normal'' functioning of the biosphere, of which our atmosphere and oceans, and land plantlife are the most important constituents, the time since end of the last ice-age, some ~12,000 years ago, switching into our recently ended Holocene, CO2 was nicely balanced around 280 ppmv. Today it's way up as can be seen in me sig [auto-updating monthly]. It's ''too'' now, because it functioning as a thicker more closely knitted catch-net for Long Wave radiation [change of opacity], before more easily escaping to space. Here a link to a short and longer elaboration: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100301144237AAZoWYA

So, on the Arctic canary, a new record was set yesterday [one of many this year, to include a heatwave matching, maybe exceeding the one Russia suffered last year].

There was the new ''earliest'' under 10 million km square of sea ice extent:



Then there was the near matching of 2007 record low passing through the under 9 million km^2:



Yet another record when the 8 million km^2 was undercut:



And now the lower than 7 million km^2, where until 15 years ago many years would not even come that low at the lowest point in the year usually occurring in later August and September.



Does that not look like a sign... a little bit more than just weather?

Current forecasts are for 6 million to pass around August 5, and 5 million in later August. So far, for the first 204 days of 2011, there is no previous year where the average has been seen to be so poor [and thin and rotten]

Food for thought, but not to all!

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** The Antarctic has a lag because it's surrounded by a vast body of ocean having a buffering effect on global warming, or cooling. It's tough showing clear signs now too of ''mass balance'' loss. At Face, which of course if shooting pictures will never convey what climatologists measure.

David Autumns, don't they all ''appear'' as your Heile Welt?

Wisse, wenn in Schmerzensstunden
dir das Blut vom Herzen spritzt:
Niemand kann die Welt verwunden,
nur die Schale wird geritzt.

Tief im innersten der Ringe
ruht ihr Kern getrost und heil.
Und mit jedem Schöpfungsdinge
hast du immer an ihm teil.

Ewig eine strenge Güte
wirket unverbrüchlich fort.
Ewig wechselt Frucht und Blüte,
Vogelzug nach Süd und Nord.

Felsen wachsen, Ströme gleiten,
und der Tau fällt unverletzt.
Und dir ist von Ewigkeiten
Rast und Wanderbahn gesetzt.

Neue Wolken glühn im Fernen,
neue Gipfel stehn gehäuft,
bis von nie erblickten Sternen
dir die süße Labung träuft.

------- Poem by Werner Bergengruen, ca 1950

The sad facts: Both North Pole webcams now lost, at 88N to provide good in-situ imagery.



One observer with hot-link posted a line to the metrics screen where power consumption and battery temperature shot through the roof...

http://obuoy.datatransport.org/monitor

Click in left margin on Ubuoy #2 and batteries at bottom to see more. Look left down, and one sees what addition information was recorded... O3 [Ozone], CO2 [Carbon Dioxide].

These set-ups ''were'' known to last into the Arctic night.

http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/gallery_np_seasons.html

No longer there are enough of stable / thick slabs in the target area near the pole to be found.

--//--

I wonder if this has been switched off yet ?

http://www.magnoxnorthsites.com/news/2011-03-01/continued-generation-at-oldbury

Ah

Yes http://www.magnoxnorthsites.com/news/2011-06-30/final-day-for-reactor-2

and

No http://www.magnoxnorthsites.com/news/2011-06-...ate-electricity-into-2012

So that's a reactor that first went critical on 18th September 1967 originally to shut down in 2008 given until the end of 2012 to continue to run. So that's 43 years 10 months and (still) counting.

Fingers crossed

Here's background info on my local Nuke Station
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oldbury_Nuclear_Power_Station