Oceanography

Fram Jam Floe Flows Lying between Greenland and Spitsbergen, Fram Strait is the major export path through which ice is lost from the main Arctic sea ice pack. Ice floes flowing through Fram Strait sometimes flow freely and at other times jam together, choking the Strait and slowing down the rate of ice export. In this article I attempt to show how studying the behavior of sea ice as a material which exists in many forms can lead to a better understanding of the dynamics of Arctic sea ice export. Location of Fram Strait Granules and aggregates A granular material has specific properties which…

Tokyo: A powerful tsunami spawned by the largest earthquake in Japan's recorded history slammed the eastern coast Friday, sweeping away boats, cars, homes and people as widespread fires burned out of control. Tsunami warnings blanketed the entire Pacific, as far away as South America, Canada, Alaska and the entire US West Coast. Authorities said at least 60 people were killed. The magnitude 8.9 offshore quake was followed by at least 19 aftershocks, most of them of more than magnitude 6.0. Dozens of cities and villages along a 1,300-mile stretch of coastline were shaken by violent tremors…

The Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets are losing mass at an accelerating pace, according to a new study in Geophysical Research Letters. The authors suggest these ice sheets are overtaking ice loss from Earth's mountain glaciers and ice caps to become the dominant contributor to global sea level rise. "That ice sheets will dominate future sea level rise is not surprising -- they hold a lot more ice mass than mountain glaciers," said lead author Eric Rignot, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, and the University of California, Irvine. "What is surprising is this…

Ross Ice Shelf - Some Observations The Ross Ice Shelf is the largest ice shelf in the world with an area of roughly 182,000 square miles - 472,000 square kilometers.  The shelf  was named after Captain James Clark Ross who discovered it  January 28th, 1841.  The coast to which the ice shelf is attached reaches nearer to the south geographic pole than any other part of Antarctica's coast. Image source: NASA/MODIS Antarctic mosaic. The region has seen some interesting activity recently.  Notably, the ice which has been intact for about 15 years and which was the…

The Arctic Ice is preparing itself for a large reduction in sea ice area this summer. The summer of 2007 surprised climatologists when a summer low in ice area was set at about 3 million sqkm. To put that in perspective, in the early 1980's, the Arctic sea ice would melt back to an area around 5 mil sqkm. The current ice coverage is 1.1 mil sq km less than what it should be, and should be setting a record low for winter ice area this winter. More importantly though, the Cryosphere Today website by the University of Illinois shows that the current midwinter ice cap has not completely frozen…

Arctic Ice November 2010 Return to previous Arctic conditions is unlikelyRecord temperatures across Canadian Arctic and Greenland, a reduced summer sea ice cover, record snow cover decreases and links to some Northern Hemisphere weather support this conclusion Arctic Report Card 2010http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/reportcard/ In the Arctic Report Card 2010, the term 'previous conditions' refers to the 20th century.  My own studies go back to the settlement of Iceland in 857 CE. In that context, return to previously stable Arctic conditions isn't just unlikely, it is extremely improbable. As I…

A Census of Marine Life expedition discovered a new character for the Mr. Men and Little Miss series - "Mr. Blobby," the fathead sculpin fish, lives in the Atlantic, Indian, and Pacific Oceans at depths of between about 330 feet (100 meters) and 9,200 feet (2,800 meters), according to National Geographic. Mr. Blobby is now preserved in 70% ethyl alcohol, which shrunk his nose so he "no longer retains his cute look." Check out other photos from the 10-year Sea Census here.

Arctic Ice October 2010 ... the land being very high and full of mightie mountaines all covered with snowe, no viewe of wood, grasse or earth to be seene, and the shore two leages of into the sea so full of yce as that no shipping cold by any meanes come neere the same. The lothsome viewe of the shore, and irksome noyse of the yce was such as that it bred strange conceipts among us, so that we supposed the place to be wast and voyd of any sencible or vegitable creatures, whereupon I called the same Desolation. John_Davis, 1587cited by Captain Albert Hastings Markham R.N. in -Our Life In The…

A group of researchers say receding glaciers due to global warming at the end of the last ice age, 20,000-100,000 years ago, resulted in the rampant biodiversity left behind in their wake. Certainly it is true there is much less biodiversity at the poles, though likely there are limits in how hot we want the planet to be. Investigating fossil clams and snails Steffen Kiel and Sven Nielsen at the Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel (CAU) say retreating glaciers created a mosaic landscape of countless islands, bays and fiords in which new species developed rapidly, geologically speaking.…

We are a water planet but 10% of Earth is covered in ice - ice that is melting in ways that have to be a concern.    To get a handy view of what is happening in the big areas, Greenland, the Arctic and the Antarctic, NASA have put together a Global Ice Viewer. You can zoom in on Ilulissat Glacier, which is is depositing icebergs in cubic kilometer denominations equivalent to 9.3 trillion gallons per year - if that sounds like 14 million Olympic-sized swimming pools every 365 days, it is.  Or Antarctica, where ice shelves the size of small U.S. states have collapsed in recent…