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Antarctic Ice Bridge Finally Breaks Off
GreennMann writes "An ice bridge linking a shelf of ice the size of Jamaica to two islands in Antarctica has snapped. Scientists say the collapse could mean the Wilkins Ice Shelf is on the brink of breaking away, and provides further evidence of rapid change in the region. Sited on the western side of the Antarctic Peninsula, the Wilkins shelf has been retreating since the 1990s. Researchers regarded the ice bridge as an important barrier, holding the remnant shelf structure in place. Its removal will allow ice to move more freely between Charcot and Latady islands, into the open ocean."
that's certainly one way to break the ice in a tense situation like this.
512 MB RAM, 20 GB disk, 200 GB transfer, five datacenters. $19.95/month.
Given my SUV driving has yet to save me in a crash (I've not had one since buying it)... I'm glad to see it has contributed to something productive at least.
Help Brendan pay off his student loans
Now, I'm gunna drive my SUV 65 miles to work tomorrow and feel ok about it.
You may feel okay about it, but I feel bad for your gas card :).
512 MB RAM, 20 GB disk, 200 GB transfer, five datacenters. $19.95/month.
Once the ice bridge falls away, scientists will find one pissed off ice troll.
Oh, and a few inches (or feet) of ocean won't bother me. I have no beach property, nor do I intend to. Last I checked, I'm about 950 feet above sea level..
From the FA: "While the break-up will have no direct impact on sea level because the ice is floating"....
You'd need to go back to a time when you can't blame humans.
I still blame Canada. They obviously failed to hold on to the ice caps when they had the chance.
512 MB RAM, 20 GB disk, 200 GB transfer, five datacenters. $19.95/month.
If you really, really wanted to save the polar ice caps, you'd create a time machine and travel back..say, 19,000 years ago. Back when the polar ice cap extended down into what is modern day Illinois. Which predates SUVs and industrialization by around...19,000 years or so.
You could also increase the number of pirates.
You presume that the ice will not float northwards into the shipping lanes. All that ice can travel a long ways before melting.
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
Yes, but that still requires you to go around them, boosting costs as they need to burn more fuel.
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
Thank god we have the average mook on Slashdot or I might have thought this were cause for concern. I guess all of the scientists who have agreed that there are man-made effects on climate are completely incorrect, but this website is the last bastion of sanity?
I'm waiting to see the live video footage of that scene where the poor sweet little baby polar bear is trapped on an ice floe which shrinks until he falls off to be eaten by sharks or some garbage like that *splash*
It would be quite remarkable to have video footage of polar bears in the Antarctic.
So by your reasoning we Aussies should not be arresting arsonists who are responsible for starting about 1/3 of all our bushfires. We should let them continue with their bussiness as usual because we know that the other 2/3 of bushfires are started by natural causes.
BTW: This particular environmentalist doesn't care if you drive an SUV, a sherman tank, or a skateboard.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Speaking from naval experience here...
What does your bellybutton have to do with icebergs?
"Nobody knows the age of the human race, but everybody agrees that it is old enough to know better." - Unknown
Now you've gone and ruined his nefarious plot to continuously drive his SUV until he's the proud new owner of oceanside property. In these uncertain economic times, how else is a fella supposed to increase his property value? Huh? Huh? Bastard.
512 MB RAM, 20 GB disk, 200 GB transfer, five datacenters. $19.95/month.
Not to argue the point, because it's always a holy war with folks, but there's some logistics to that, which you failed to see.
If the seas rise by 10 to 20 feet at the coastlines, coastal areas will flood. That means the ports will be under water, and nothing will come in by sea. International imports will be severely hampered. Pretty much, if you can't bring it in by plane, it won't happen.
If coastal areas flood, major highways, bridges, and train tracks will become unusable.
People will migrate from the flooded areas to higher ground (like, your 900 feet up), but food supplies will be very limited, and transportation will be very difficult without oil coming into the country.
So, even people living on high ground that won't be flooded will be affected.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
This is it the season that it recedes. Its winter down there and only moving more into winter. Also, this shelf has been there for centuries, and now the whole thing is going to come unhinged.
Yes, because we have lost the technology to build ports...
Control is an illusion, order our comforting lie. From chaos, through chaos, into chaos we fly
Can we really discount the possibility of ice having stealth technology?
Control is an illusion, order our comforting lie. From chaos, through chaos, into chaos we fly
>...and provides further evidence or rapid change in the region. Not everyone agrees. For another spin on this event take a look at http://icecap.us/images/uploads/Wilkins_Ice_Shelf_con.pdf which suggests that the evidence for rapid climate change in this area is missing and suggests that, at best, hyperbole is involved.
"See doc, there's a natural progression to blood pressure. High low high low. It's going up,BFD.
Now, I'm gunna eat this bag of potato chips and get a big mac and feel okay about it."
You have to love it how some people cling to the first rationalization that allows them to keep doing what they want, from the time they're kids right up to when they die.
The building of new ports takes years. They aren't something you can just knock up in a day.
Sure - five years to build a port. Then start on the next for when that port is drowned.
http://www.gladwell.com/2004/2004_01_12_a_suv.html
the country I live in, the Netherlands, has one fourth of the land below sealevel by as much as 48 feet already. I guess we can handle a few additional feet of water. More water spurs great engineering, and has done so since medieval times. That doesn't mean you can't leave your SUV at home and take your bicycle to work today, though.
For us Europeans, could somebody say how many Belgiums there are in a Jamaica, please?
Most estimates don't account for melting of continental Ice (Antarctic). That is because most expect the antarctic climate to be stable. The observed melting of Ice is worse than the estimates suggested by climate models.
This causes concern that the antarctic climate could be much more dynamic than we think.
A change in the climate of Antarctica could lead to large amounts of continental ice melting, which would lead to sea level rises much more than a couple of feet.
That if global warming really will be a very bad thing, then our energy should be spent trying to deal with it when it happens, not prevent it. Why? Well because we are pretty sure that the Earth has been much hotter (and cooler) in the past than it is now. We are about as certain as we can be that there has been a long history of climate fluctuations. Thus it doesn't matter if the current one is natural or man made, because we are going to have to deal with one like it at some point. So that means the real focus should be how to deal with the eventuality, not how to prevent this particular one, if it is in fact preventable.
Unless we can get the ability to control the climate such that fluctuations like that won't happen again (and I seriously doubt that) then preparation is what we need. If we spend a great deal of effort preventing this shift, only to get screwed over by another one, then no good is done. Likewise if it turns out this shift is natural and nothing we can do will prevent it, again no good is done.
Now this all assume you accept the idea that a slightly warmer average temperature will lead to disastrous conditions. However that does seem to be what is claimed in general. Well, if that is in fact what you believe, then you really should be advocating focusing on how to deal with it, not how to prevent it unless you believe you can prevent it when it isn't a human caused phenomena.
It mentions that a lot of the dynamics of this situation are poorly understood. Whether or not you believe in global warming or what you think is causing it we don't know what the results are going to be.
There are so many possibilities with some scientific basis and the whole environment as a system is so complex that we can't predict details. We can paint broad strokes of the future but saying the sea level is going to raise 2.37 feet and believing that the sea will raise exactly 2.37 feet put blinders on you just like believing that a Divine Being created the universe in 6 days.
We have an idea of what MAY happen but there is so much complexity that we don't know what WILL happen. Right now it looks like shit is going to get warmer, ice is going to melt, sea levels will get higher and who knows the Gulf Stream may stop flowing causing Europe to get cold.
Some of you seriously need to stop beating the Global Warming Manifesto like it is a Bible.
I'll meet you at the intersection of "Should be" and "Reality"
You laugh, but...
http://www.physorg.com/news5619.html
---linuxrocks123
vi ~/.emacs # I'm probably going to Hell for this.
Con job and spin are the correct terms for that particular web site.
This is the second time this site has popped up in the last few days. It's run by one J. D'Aleo who is paid to do so by the "Science and Public Policy Institute", they are in turn backed by "Frontiers of Freedom" which is the lobbying brain child of this guy. They have a donate button on their site but their funding is otherwise obscured.
Older readers may recall the "Frontiers of Freedom" also backed the tabacoo industry in their anti-science campaign.
Disclaimer: I don't have anything against lobbyists or politicians until they pretend to be something they are not.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Lowest point in the Netherlands is 6.76m (just over 22 feet) below sea-level, near Nieuwerkerk-aan-de-IJssel.
Already done
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Of course we can't. And what's worse, they can fire while cloaked.
I am officially gone from
Ice extent starts to grow/recede around the time of the equinox. March is always the low point for sea ice in the south, September is always the low point in the north. The high points are also marked by the equinox so that September is the high point in the south, March in the north.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
No (obviously), but it would depend on how fast the water rises.
Besides just the pesky problem of the port, there's the infrastructure that goes with it.
For just one example, at 10', Manhattan would start looking like Venice. Tunnels, railways, and 3 major airports would become useless. There's a lot of infrastructure to rebuild elsewhere.
If you look around, a lot of airports and power plants are situated very close to sea level, on the waterfront. Airports use this for noise abatement (the planes can take off over the water to keep from annoying people). Nuclear plants require lots of sea water for cooling.
So, ports, sure they could be rebuilt. But have you ever watched what happens around the planning of new facilities? Years upon years of arguing points. People would argue about the environmental impact of the new facility, and the remains of the old facility.
I don't know what the thresholds are, but I'm sure once you reach a critical point (say 10'), more cities will have problems quicker. Say between 10' and 15', there could be not only one or two, but dozens of major coastal cities that would need to be rebuilt simultaneously.
Don't forget about fresh water reserves too. Water wells would start becoming contaminated with sea water too. You could rebuild the city near by, but can you restore their essential supplies like drinking water?
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
Belgium's area (assuming no mountains or hills) is 30,528 km^2. [Wikipedia]
Jamaica's area is 11,100 km^2.
Dividing, we see that there are 2.75 Jamaicas for every Belgium.
On that basis, the Ice shelf is just over a third (0.364) the size of Belgium. Damn Flanders.
Paul Gillingwater
MBA, CISSP, CISM
This is a family website. Please refrain from using the b word gratuitously.
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
Well, most gas usage experts show that driving ~65 MPH is the sweet spot for optimal MPG. It's much better then 80 MPH, or 20 MPH in stop and go traffic.
Given that wind resistance goes up as the square of your speed, and that rolling resistance is negligible at highway speeds, I am skeptical. Roughly, it takes 1.3 times the work (and 2.2 times the power) to cover a certain distance at 65mph than at 50mph. If drivetrains can be tuned to the tune of 30% just by fiddling with gearing, then cars would probably have more gears, or maybe CVTs. Also, this number is confirmed by my own very rough measurements in a few cars, when I actually have the discipline to drive 50mph over a long enough stretch of flat highway.
Of course, you stipulated "stop-and-go traffic" in which case a huge portion of your gasoline is used to heat up your brake rotors. Fair enough. But 65mph cannot possibly be a magic number given similar acceleration profiles.
"The biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it has taken place."
Greenpeacers broke off that chunk in order to convince people that their fantasy "globular heating" religion is real. Or maybe it would have broken off anyways but humans aren't responsible--too many polar bears sitting around on an ice shelf for 6000 years are bound to cause some damage eventually. This might happen again if we don't kill all the polar bears. Actually, it's all a liberal pinko lie--you're so gullible, since the ice bridge is just fine, thanks very much. Scientists are out to destroy us all. Haven't you seen them in movies?
"The biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it has taken place."