The Himalayas and Nearby Peaks Have Lost No Ice In Past 10 Years, Study Shows

DesScorp writes "A story from UK's Guardian reports on a study of ice levels from the Himalayas area, and finds that no significant melting has occurred, despite earlier predictions of losses of up to 50 billion tons of ice. 'The very unexpected result was the negligible mass loss from high mountain Asia, which is not significantly different from zero,' said Professor Jonathan Bamber, who also warns that 8 years simply isn't enough time to draw conclusions. 'It is awfully dangerous to take an eight-year record and predict even the next eight years, let alone the next century,' he said." Readers have sent in a few other stories today relating to melting (or persisting) ice around the globe; read on for more. bonch writes "New research from the University of Colorado concludes that the polar ice caps are melting less than previously thought. Almost 230 billion tons of ice annually melt into the ocean, 30% less than past predictions. The new data comes from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment satellite, which provides more accurate estimates than previous methods."

The earth being a complex thing, though, note that these observations don't mean an end to predictions of elevated sea level.

Finally, an anonymous reader writes with another ice story: "NASA's Terra satellite saw a huge crack in the Pine Island Glacier in Antarctica and it is all set to give rise to an iceberg the size of Manhattan! The huge gash in the snow is 30 kilometers (or 19 miles) long and nearly 100 meters wide, and is widening every passing minute. This is expected to create an iceberg more than 900 square kilometer in area, as compared to the 785 square kilometer area of Manhattan, Brooklyn, Staten Island and Bronx combined, said NASA."

Comments

Re:Skeptical != Scientific

[EdZ]

It's 'healthy' to follow the data and not make any assumptions before you analyze it.

That's what skepticism is.

And the seas are not rising

[Chemisor]

In related news from last year, global sea levels dropped 6mm over 2010.

Re:Maintaining a balanced position

[dougmwne]

For example, do you remember how polar bears drowning in the Arctic sea due to global warming were cited as a reason to classify them as an endangered species, and how they were used as a symbol of climate change in Al Gore's movie? The lead scientist was actually placed on administrative leave, and several questions were raised about how the bears actually died and how the corpses were observed from 1,500 up in a helicopter rather than examined to actually determine their cause of death. Whether or not they were really drowning, there just wasn't enough data to come to the conclusion that was presented to the public with the level of certainty that was conveyed.

The Charles Monnett (polar bear scientist) investigation was likely politically motivated since nothing has come of it, but either way, the agency is on-record saying that his temporary administrative leave was unrelated to his polar bear research. He is back to work as of last August. This entire climate debate is so politically charged that a "rational "healthily skeptical" position" probably doesn't exist.

Director Bromwich:
" I can assure you that the decision had nothing to do with his scientific work, or anything relating to a five-year old journal article, as advocacy groups and the news media have incorrectly speculated. Nor is this a "witch hunt" to suppress the work of our many scientists and discourage them from speaking the truth. Quite the contrary. In this case, it was the result of new information on a separate subject brought to our attention very recently."

http://www.alaskadispatch.com/article/boemre-director-says-offshore-oil-agency-not-witch-hunt