thanks for that link to our West Coast (New Zealand) galaciers. I’ve been looking for something like that for awhile. Try this excellent photographic web site composed by a glacier gude at Franz Josef Glacier, Blair Campbell. A superb photographic record of glacial advance.

http://icebalance.googlepages.com/advancingice

During the year New Zealand glaciologists cited the continuing retreat of the major glaciers on the eastern side of the Southern Alps (Tasman Glacier in particular) as more evidence of global warming. I found it intrguing that they didn’t make a mention of the advancing pair of glaciers on the western slopes of the Southern Alps.

Galcial advance for the west coast glaciers in particular is dependent upon the following conditions; 1. Winds coming predominantly from the south west and 2. Dry, cool conditions to inhibit melting. These conditions have been very strong again recently. Severe rainfalls (the rain turns to snow at that altitude – over 2,000m) at the top of the neves for both Franz Josef & Fox galciers have been the norm this past southern spring.

Glaciologists tell us that it takes approx. 5 years for the heavy rainfalls to manifest themselves as surges/advances at the terminal face. FJ and Fox have been advancing at a rate of 3 metres per day in recent times. I need to find out more on the rainfall of the past 5 years down on the lower west coast of the South Island to see whether or not to expect a continuance of the current advance. My guess is that we will definitely see futher advance in 2013 at least.

BTW, they measure their rainfall by the metre down on The Coast, not the mm! I plan to get back down there next March (the southern autumn & winter are the best times to visit) and try to take some more photos from the positions that I used in 1984, 89 and 2001. The viewing platform I used in 1984 is now buried under ice.

The anecdotal evidence from around the world, and mentioned above, coincides with weather events down here in New Zealand as well over the past 5 years. For me the most significant events were the arrival of icebergs off the Canterbury (east coast South Island) for the first time in around 75 years. There were regular recordings of similar events from the 1890′s until the early 1930′s.

Straight away this was given as an example of global warming. Antarctica was melting and here was the proof. This immediately ignored the fact that this type of thing had occurred often in the past when the world was supposedly colder. My contention is that sea-surface temperatures had dropped sufficiently off the SE coast of New Zealand to sustain large icebergs. Just put an ice cube in warm water and see how long it lasts.

Another local event of similar signifigance was the occurence this past southern winter of avalanches in the Tararua Ranges (mean height 1,500m or 5,000 ft) also for the first time since the late 1920′s. In fact there are no mountain trampers alive who can remember seeing avalanches in these mountains. Prior to this year the average snowfalls in these mountains were around 1m. This year the average has ranged from 2 – 3m. The Tararuas are the only mountains, outside of the large volcanoes, in the North Island to show signs of glaciation from the last Ice Age.

It appears to me that some weather situations around the world are similar to those experienced in the late 1920′s and the early 1930′s without being identical. Does anyone else see these similarities in their neck of the woods?

Cheers

Ian

I came across with an article online somewhere months ago where it said the Passage has been open before and fairly recently – in 1905 and beginning of 1940′s.

Now a quick 2-minute search resulted in this – a quote from an article from last year:

“…the Canadian government on Monday ordered a Canadian coast guard icebreaker laden with scientists, the Amundsen, to make a detailed survey of the route. The ship is named after the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen, the first person to travel the passage in 1905, who made the journey in a wooden sailboat.” http://www.studentnewsdaily.com/daily-news-article/northwest_passage_open_for_business/

Rayes on CBC.ca: “They were ready to be there for us if we called them, but I didn’t see one cube of ice,” he said.”

Now, I had some Scotch too last night and I sware, I didn’t see one cube of ice either…;)

Cheers!

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/north/story/2008/11/28/nwest-vessel.html

The Canadian Coast Guard has confirmed that in a major first, a commercial ship travelled through the Northwest Passage this fall to deliver supplies to communities in western Nunavut.

“That was the first — that I’m aware of anyway — commercial cargo delivery from the east through the Northwest Passage.”….

Rayes, who was on the vessel during its trip through the Northwest Passage, said the company informed the coast guard, which put an icebreaker on standby.

“They were ready to be there for us if we called them, but I didn’t see one cube of ice,” he said.

http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/

The animation is impressive too.

8. Many AGW “cilmate scientists” have long lost their credibility by resorting to science shenanigans and neurotic alarmism, e.g. AIT, Mann curve, etc..

Pierre, this is the most compelling reason for my skepticism about AGW. I don’t care for the way the advocates treat skeptics, particularly the ones with scientific credentials.

Can anyone find any RECENT data on extent of the glaciers in Glacier National Park? The only data I can find are several years old. I can’t find anything at all from the most recent two years. Oh, and GNP is quick to point out that the park isn’t named for the glaciers themselves, but for the landscaping done there by glaciers in the last glaciation.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/11/29/antarctic.ice.shelf.collapse/index.html

JimB

I know science has nothing to do with PR, but unfortunately climate science is all about PR. This PR battle, my friend, you appear to be losing.
http://www.canada.com/windsorstar/news/story.html?id=f0a1687c-decd-4c72-9d0e-7e6dd92d4ebe

Well the story may be promising, but that article, dated Nov 27, has an inset
of snowmaking and a caption that reads “A file photo showd [sic] snow cannons blasting artificial snow on a slope in Kitzbuehel, Austria. Due to the uncommonly warm weather many European alpine ski resorts have no snow. (Roland Schlager/Getty Images)”

However, a November 26th article, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/travel/winter_sports/article5238245.ece says

Ski resorts open early after heavy snow – as prices plunge
…
Ski resorts across Europe are opening early after snowfalls of a metre and more in the past week.

Andorra has had two metres of snow, and both of its ski areas opened last weekend, the best start to a season for more than 40 years.

More than 200 resorts will also open early this weekend in Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Norway and Switzerland. The story is repeated in Canada and New England, where a metre of snow also fell at the weekend.

Today, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/weather/article5254462.ece

Arctic winds bring a blast of good fortune to mountain resorts
Paul Simons, Times Weatherman

The large snowfalls last week brought magnificent conditions across the Alps, Pyrenees and Scandinavia.

The snow in many areas is already more than twice as deep as average for this time of year. The high-altitude resort of Zermatt in Switzerland has reported more than 2m of snow, but even slopes down to 1,000m (3,280ft) have had enough snow to leave sufficient cover for the rest of December without another snowflake falling.

Particularly encouraging is that the big snowfalls have come with very cold weather. Often an early snowfall quickly melts because the ground is too warm. The recent cold temperatures froze the ground, however, letting the snow settle and build up a thick base, which can better withstand a run of no snow during the rest of the season.

Scotland’s resorts have also benefited from the bonanza. Visitor numbers had dropped alarmingly in recent years as winters have grown milder and shorter.

The autumn snowfalls in Europe have been delivered on northerly airflows streaming down from the Arctic. The winds are being driven by two big pressure systems in the mid-Atlantic, known as the North Atlantic Oscillation. As low pressure around Iceland and high pressure over the Azores slacken, so cold, wet air is steered over Western Europe, producing snow over mountains from northern Spain to Scandinavia. This type of pattern produced some brutal winters in the 1960s and 1970s. Since then the North Atlantic Oscillation has tended to intensify, driving milder winter weather over northwestern Europe.

This year’s early taste of winter does not necessarily mean that it will last, but the weather pattern looks as if it is locked in place well into December, with the promise of more cold and snow to come for Europe. A particularly striking feature of this pattern is the way the Azores high pressure is stuck in the mid-Atlantic, held in place by a big kink in the high-altitude jet stream winds like a pair of nutcrackers. This is known as a blocking weather pattern, and tends to last for some time, and until it shifts the weather is likely to remain much the same.

However, the Met Office reiterated its long-range forecast for a milder than average winter over northern Europe. If last winter is anything to go by, though, the European mountains may stay cold while lowland areas enjoy relatively milder conditions.

Wow, technical stuff. And an obligatory chant from the Met.

And also http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article5254459.ece

Winter resorts revel in white gold after best snowfall in decade
Mark Frary, Ski CorrespondentSki resorts across Europe will open this weekend ahead of schedule after the biggest November snowfalls for at least a decade.

The exceptional conditions, including 60cm (23in) of snow on Alpine slopes and even more in the Pyrenees, has given a much needed boost to the ski industry after claims that global warming could devastate its multibillion-pound business.

“This is nature’s way of cocking a snook at the experts,” said Christian Rochette, the director of Ski France International, ….
On the Spanish side Roberto Buil, the marketing manager of the Baqueira Beret resort, said that the slopes had opened on November 22 for the first time in 44 years. “All our 69 ski runs are open,” he said. “We are having an amazing start.”

The tourist office in La Molina said that it would open 18 of its 52 slopes today with “very, very good snow for this time of the year”.

The cold snap comes after an OECD report said that a two-degree rise in temperature could eliminate a third of all Europe’s ski slopes over the next 40 years.

“We know that global warming is happening,” Mr Rochette said. “Perhaps there will be an unforeseen impact which means we carry on getting as much snow as we do now.”

Yah just gotta watch out for those unforeseen impacts.

// rant over

PS Ethos pdf is really good.

harold ambler – I will check out the malware thing – not had that before – my email is peter.taylor@ethos-uk.com

on ocean heat content – i have been reviewing that area recently – there seems to be a few teams in the USA – reviewing the ocean instrumental data – Lyman, Gouretski, Willis and Warren White at Scripps has some good stuff on links to solar cycles – and a team at Hadley (Matthew Palmer) – one data set and maybe five teams looking at it! I’m not at my desk right now, but can get you all the references if you mail me.

what is important is not just the oft-reported ‘no net warming’ since 2000 (once the ‘cooling’ error was corrected) – but that two teams have now confirmed that there was a long term instrumental bias in addition and that means past warming was 200% over-estimated. The crucial thing is that the ability to hindcast the past warming was taken by the modelling fraternity as a ‘validation’ of the models they then use to predict the future warming! The really sad thing is that the oceanographers reporting this revision state in mealy-mouthed words – that their findings ‘underly the importance of ocean heat content studies for attribution studies of global warming’ or some such designed not to cause too much of a stir.

A similar revision of the atmsopheric models – hitherto validated by their ability to hindcast ‘global dimming’ due to AG sulphur – held until recently to be the cause of the 1945-1978 ‘dip’ in temp – now known NOT to be caused by AG sulphur but the PDO cycle – means the models need a major overhaul!

pierre gosselin – I agree on the proxy record – I suspect that instrumental records will show higher short term peaks – like the 1998 ENSO – and that any such past peaks will show less in the tree-ring, stalagmite or whatever the proxy being used is.

on future cooling – the AMO index suggests the Atlantic has another decade or so of warm phase before it turns and joins the PDO – which leaves Landscheidt’s prediction of LIA for 2030 looking about right!

The Little Ice Age WAS global bar Antarctica and Tasmania – which tend to do the opposite to the Northern Hemisphere – but some regions – like West Africa saw 2-3 degree C changes between warm and colder conditions, due to major ocean current changes.