Greenland is losing 8,300 metric tons of ice per second each day during the summer melt — the equivalent of 286,848 Olympic swimming pools worth of water every 24 hours.
Last weekend, while the Northeast shivered from unseasonably frigid temperatures, Greenland was broiling.
Summer-like temperatures eclipsed ice melt records for Greenland. So far this month scorching temperatures over parts of Greenland have been measured as high as 64°F (17.8°C). Photo credit: thinkprogress.org
Warm, southerly winds gust to hurricane force of over 75 mph in a staggering early season heatwave. Temperatures hit 36 degrees Fahrenheit (20 Celsius) above average along the southwest coast of Greenland on Monday, April 11. Ice has begun to melt with gusto.
According to the Danish Meteorological Institute, an early melt event over Greenland’s ice sheet occurred this week, smashing by a month the previous record of more than 10 percent of the ice sheet.
The melt was driven by warm air from the southwest and rain along the coast. The Danish Meteorological Institute reported that almost 12 percent of Greenland’s ice sheet shed at least one millimeter of melt water on April 11.
Global temperatures surged in February (1.35C or 2.43F) coming within striking distance of 1.5C (2.7F) goal agreed last year in Paris — experts now say it’s a climate emergency. Note that the Arctic was more than 5.36C (9.95F) above average for the month of February (traditionally the coldest month of the year). Parts of the Arctic were more than 16C (29F) warmer than “normal” for February — on par with June temperatures (the warmest month of the year). This is a terrifying milestone. Photo credit: climatechangenews.com
The Arctic is experiencing unprecedented warmth for 2016. The High Arctic — above 80 degrees north latitude — is the warmest it has ever been in modern times.
A river exiting from beneath the rapidly diminishing ice sheet near Kangerlussuaq, Western Greenland. Photo credit: Dr William Colgan
Tropical heat is being transferred from a record hot El Niño pole-ward in the Northern Hemisphere due to a weakness in the polar jet stream.
Melting Greenland ice sheets due to the climate in crisis are impacting ocean circulation and raising sea levels around the globe. Photo credit: Dr William Colgan
Last summer, my colleague from York University recorded the rate of loss that the Greenland ice sheets are undergoing post 2010. Those ice sheets are melting three times faster than prior to 1980.
This photo was taken during the 2000 Australian Olympic Trials in Sydney, NSW. An Olympic swimming pool contains 660,000 U.S. gallons or 2,500,000 liters or water. Photo credit: Swimming Australia.
Greenland is losing 8,300 metric tons of ice per second each day during the summer melt — the equivalent of 286,848 Olympic swimming pools worth of water every 24 hours. Frighteningly, that is ice melting on the land running off into the North Atlantic Ocean.
Much of South Florida will be inundated with just a few feet of sea level rise by 2040. Map courtesy University of Arizona.
This has devastating implications for sea level rise along the U.S. eastern seaboard, particularly for six million people in the low-lying sunshine state of Florida.
Photo credit: nasa.gov
Also, the ice-cold melt waters are diluting the normally saltier polar waters, which are heavier and act like a weight on a conveyor belt, pulling the lighter, warmer North Atlantic Gulf Stream water back towards the equator. Greenland’s melt waters are slowing down the Atlantic Gulf Stream current by as much as 30 percent. The Gulf Stream brings heat from the equator for 163 million people of Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia, enabling those countries to be habitable and grow food crops.
Seismic airguns are deadly for whales, dolphins & porpoises. Every 10 seconds — non-stop for a couple months — airguns explode under the sea as Big Oil scourers the seabed for more heat-trapping oil & gas. Those explosions are 8 times louder than a jet engine and they deafen whales. A deaf whale is a dead whale. Photo credit: oceana.org
It is clearly time to take the climate in crisis very seriously and terminate subsidizing the fossil industry — the wealthiest polluters on the globe.
Lucid Energy pipes used in Portland, OR contain four 42-inch turbines. As water flows through the pipes, the turbines spin and power attached generators feed energy back into the city’s electrical grid. Photo credit: LucidEnergy.com
All towns and cities around the world are required to future-proof in the face of the forthcoming wild weather.
Earth Doctor Reese Halter is the author of “Shepherding the Sea: The Race to Save Our Oceans.”
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