While early autumn snowstorms aren’t uncommon in US weather history, they tend to be quick affairs that melt off quickly in a day or two. This however is a bit different in that we have a significant portion of the northern Midwest plains and northern Rockies are snow covered and it is not quickly dissipating, in fact it is increasing. Since October 10th the coverage has increased from 13.2% of the USA covered by snow.
This map below is from NOAA’s NOHRSC National Snow Analysis page.
Here is the accompanying table and discussion:
October 13, 2009
| Area Covered By Snow: | 19.9% |
| Area Covered Last Month: | 0.0% |
| Snow Depth | |
|---|---|
| Average: | 0.7 in |
| Minimum: | 0.0 in |
| Maximum: | 728.8 in |
| Std. Dev.: | 2.1 in |
| Snow Water Equivalent | |
| Average: | 0.1 in |
| Minimum: | 0.0 in |
| Maximum: | 403.4 in |
| Std. Dev.: | 0.4 in |
By way of comparison, here is the October 13th USA snow cover for the last few years:
2003- .7
2004- .3
2005- 1.7
2006- 3.7
2007- .3
2008-12.7
2009-19.9
What is also interesting is the 6 year trend of snow depth on this date.
2003- 38.2 in
2004-322.6 in
2005-456.9 in
2006-223.2 in
2007-458.1 in
2008-600.6 in
2009-728.8 in
You can watch the snow cover advance in the animation they provide:
Click for animation of the last 72 hours
Weather Summary
A series of potent systems moved across the coterminous U.S. this weekend, and they brought snow to the north and rain to the south. Late last week, heavy rain fell across the south, which continued to aggravate river flooding and keep soils most.
On Friday, up to 1 foot of snow fell at higher elevations in Wyoming, mainly due to upslope flow from a surface low which moved across the Plains. This same system produced up to 1 1/2 feet of snow to mainly Nebraska Friday and Saturday. Lighter amounts – up to 1/2 foot – fell across the southern Dakotas. On Monday, another system produced light snow across the Upper Midwest and western Great Lakes.
Much of the Western snowpack is cold and stable due due to unseasonably cold air temperatures in those areas. Along the southern edge of the snowpack – from southeastern Idaho to southern Wyoming and from southern Nebraska through southern Iowa, warm and melting conditions were present.
A deep, strong offshore system off the West Coast with potent onshore flow will cause widespread heavy rainfall across the northern two-thirds of California. Up to a foot of snow is possible in the high-elevation central Sierra Nevada, but it will be mixed with rain.
The energy of this West Coast system will shift northward and bring moderate rainfall – 1 to 2 inches – to the coastal Northwest and the Cascades on Wednesday and Thursday.
A midlevel trough will develop across the eastern U.S., and a stationary front across the South will be a focus for heavy rainfall through midweek, and this rain will shift to the Middle Atlantic states late this week.
As the West Coast system lifts northward, midlevel ridging will develop progress smartly across the West. Daily maximum temperatures are expected to be above freezing in much of the West by Friday. The ridge will move into the central U.S. by the weekend and bring seasonable temperatures to the Plains and Upper Midwest, causing snowmelt there.
Snow Reports
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h/t to WUWT reader Mike Bryant
“The Earth has a fever”.
ManBearPig
NOAA recap for October:
Temperatures at or above normal
Snow at or below normal
NOAA understands and predicts changes in the Earth’s environment….
Might this be because of the two volcanoes which erupted earlier this year plus the colder PDA cycle getting ramped up?
Anthony, On that website, you can also see the US continental snow coverage percentage for October 13 back to 2003.
2003- .7
2004- .3
2005- 1.7
2006- 3.7
2007- .3
2008-12.7
Ah, good news. Anything to show up the ninnies in charge. Now if only the earth would open up and swallow the Federal Reserve building.
NK (09:03:29) : “The Earth has a fever”.–ManBearPig
I’d say it’s got the chills.
Definitely the results of Global Warming!!!
Looks like I’ll be winning all my bets that this winter will be colder and with more snowfall than the last 2 “cold” winters, despite El Nino – whoops, I forgot, there’s not one AGWer with enough spine to take my bet… Ahhh well.
Now is the time for Climate Progress to post fires and 2099 forecasts. If you don’t like today’s cold weather you can tune into the AGW networks and see hot in 2050.
This doesn’t help the Carbon Credit scheme trading prices. You can buy a ton for a dime.
Hey man. Got change for a paradigm??
Albedo up, temperatures down.
How inconvenient.
My car had ice on the windscreen this morning. Coastal (ie *mild*) New Jersey.
Let’s see…above average temperatures for September, followed by unusually early snowfalls in October. Sounds like weather to me!
Now lets ask the biosphere…from humans down to single-celled pond plants…which they liked better: the (relatively) warm September or the winter-like October? If climate was controlled by a democracy, October would be above average as well.
Henry chance,
Climate scientist out of work says, “Buddy, can you paradigm?”
Mike
Yeah, but just wait, in ten years it’s going to get really warm… just wait.
Is this merely a coincidence that this is happening as the sun goes into a long minimum? Personally I wonder if it isn’t too early for the sun to have an affect, but I’d like some response from those much wiser than I.
O.T.: There have been 3 meteoroids in the last week or so. Does anyone know how much effect the solar wind has on this size (several kilo) “particle” coming in from outside our solar system?
What effect would a solar wind at solar maximum have had on repelling these meteoroids, keeping them from reaching the earth?
Did Watts cover how June-Sep was the warmest on record, despite a solar ebb?
No?
Didn’t think so.
REPLY: I did cover the NOAA report for Sept, see the story below this one. And if you can provide a link to the story you reference I’ll add it also. Can’t cover what I don’t know about. – Anthony
Here in Calgary (just north of Montana) I can assure you we’re looking at real winter conditions today. I’m so glad I got a new car last month, the traction control, ESP and ABS have definitely been well tested now.
Interestingly, we broke a heat record in September (35 C, and our warmest day of the year 2009!) and 20 days later we broke a cold record (-17C). Interesting times!
I keep telling people that weather varies, but we are certainly within the range of “normal” and have always been. Nothing unusual is happening here. Nothing!
Anthony, I made a comment in Open Thread about snow coverage over in the interior of Russia. IIRC, I believe I read an entry by D’Aleo a year or two ago about the correlation of early snowfall in Siberia and how cold the NH winter is. It looks like snow has come much earlier this year to Siberia than 2008.
Oct 12, 2008: http://www.natice.noaa.gov/pub/ims_gif/ARCHIVE/EuAsia/2008/ims2008286_asiaeurope.gif
Oct 12, 2009: http://www.natice.noaa.gov/pub/ims_gif/ARCHIVE/EuAsia/2009/ims2009285_asiaeurope.gif
Look for a hard, long winter…
It is interesting too as the sun is still fairly high in the sky. The impact of that snow on reflecting visible light back into space is much greater now than it would be in, say, December.
And a note about the storm that just passed through the SF Bay area: in my 13 years here, I can’t remember a storm that blew over so many trees. On my way to taking my son to school there were trees blown over everywhere. Three large trees in the park were down including two that were snapped off at the trunk some 10 feet above the ground. They weren’t blown over due to soft soil … they snapped in half. This was probably due to the fact that the leaves were still green and on the tree increasing the wind resistance. Trees in yards are down, there are branches all over the place. This was one doozy of a storm.
Ben Lomond in the Santa Cruz hills got 9 inches of rain. 6.25 inche fell in Corralitos. A municipal water department in the coastal region sent out the following to city employees: At Green Valley & College Rd. in the Corralitos Creek USGS has recorded 1,056 cubic feet second (or 473,933 gallons per minute) and a creek height of over 7.6ft. The most they have ever recorded prior to today was 387 cfs (173,685 gallons per minute) in 1963. What we received in the last 12 hours is almost half the amount of rain we received all of last year.
And all of this fell in 24 hours.
Typhoon Melor followed me home (LA), although since I had to land in San Fran and endure significant flight delays before — finally, exhausted — I reached destination, Melor mistook its “target” (me) tracked since Oct. 8 and directed its ire on Central and Northern CA. Ha!
Tongue out of cheek, and weather not climate: I read that the West Coast storm has broken all records for this time of year since 1962. If this stat is true, it seems that the current El Nino cannot be to blame. We have had many more rxtreme El Ninos without this kind of early rain and snow (central Sierras). Perhaps that huge cold spot in the Eastern Pacific with the negative PDO is showing off? Giving us a taste of what is to come in company with a grand minimum?
Like in Japan when I could not sleep through Melor’s dumping rains and howling winds, I could not sleep last night because of the very loud, steady drumbeat of rain. And this is October in Southern CA? My nerves are also a little unsettled after having just read one historical account of the Wolf Minimum years, W.C. Jordan’s book “The Great Famine: Northern Europe in the Early Fourteenth Century”. (Thanks to a WUWT commenter — sorry, forgot who — for the citation.)
Back2Bat (09:12:12) :
“Ah, good news. Anything to show up the ninnies in charge. Now if only the earth would open up and swallow the Federal Reserve building.”
Reply: Here here! And the UN too while it’s at it.
Despite the UK Met office predicting a mild winter here, I’ve already filled the oil tank for the central heating and cut half a cord of logs for the stove. This could be the long winter of discontent which finally starts the demise of the great CAGW scam (and a few politicians as well). :-))
I wonder how long it will take the NOHRSC to adjust this data…
Mann from about three feet of snow accumulation to over SIXTY feet since 2003… I wonder how much snow it really is since there has obviously been compaction as well…
Mike
ENSO Wrap-Up
A regular commentary on the El Niño-Southern Oscillation
Summary: Weaker Trade winds warm central Pacific
Central Pacific Ocean temperatures warmed over the past fortnight in response to weakened Trade winds, and remain at levels typical of an El Niño event. Leading climate models suggest tropical ocean temperatures will remain above these thresholds until at least early 2010.
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/
Weather isn’t climate, but this Fall sure is starting off to be a douse…brrrr!
On another weather front…
(Reuters) – Wed Oct 14, 2009 – Quiet Atlantic hurricane season a boon for insurers
http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSTRE59D2UK20091014
“Thanks to El Nino, the 2009 Atlantic hurricane season has been the quietest in more than a decade, offering a reprieve for residents in the danger zone and a chance for insurance firms to refill depleted coffers.
With the peak of the season — late August to mid-October — now behind, the Atlantic-Caribbean basin has seen just two hurricanes and a total of eight tropical storms.”
“…sea temperatures in the tropical Atlantic are cooler, by about 2 degrees Fahrenheit (1.12 degrees Celsius) on average…”
Yes, we’re in the middle of the hockey stick alright…
and in Poland.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8307661.stm
Its the Sun silly
Anthropogenic greenhouse gasses are causing global warming which is causing global cooling. It’s worse than we thought!
Snow in Hawai,
http://www.mlo.noaa.gov/Live/mlocam/mkcam.jpg
Mauna Kea it is ( not Loa :))
With 729 inches maximum snow depth, Glacier National Park may not only be back in business, but may have to expand to boot!
Are you sure this isn’t a typo? — Over 60 feet seems a bit much for any place that isn’t Buffalo!
Patience is all that is required. If the current solar trends continue, the snow in the driveway will be piled so deep, the ice getting so cold, the dog hiding under the furnace, that everyone on planet earth will know that AGW is a hoax, save for Al Gore.
This may be the winter that AGW dies. But don’t think that will stop the politicians from demanding their carbon taxes, no siree.
Why would anyone think the sun didn’t play a major role in earth’s climate? How would the climate have changed when man wasn’t even around.
Another thing to ponder — how do we know the CO2 levels are too high and not too low? And how would we even know?
Funny, I don’t see an Impressive Nino,but the icy fingers of Nina wrapping around his neck….
CodeTech (09:39:28) :
Your car has ESP?!!!
Gotta git me one a dem! Just think, it would be able to foresee accidents and avoid them! Or speeding tickets!
I question their methodologies as they have almost my entire viewing area with snow cover when in fact, none of my viewing area has snow on the ground currently (eastern ND and western MN). Most of my area only had a brief snowfall on Friday night (0.5″ to 1″) that quickly melted Saturday morning. We may briefly get more tonight, but it’s October, it’s not going to last long (half a day).
More important than brief snow is the fact that October is running 9 degrees below average for the first 13 days of the month in Fargo, ND, quite the anomaly in an already cold climate.
A very early-season snowfall is possible across the region from late Thursday into Friday night. The main threat is to the higher-elevations of Central PA.
http://www.erh.noaa.gov/er/ctp/
You guys are just a bunch of mouth breathers, why don’t you guys be quiet and let the professionals handle the situation. The tiny amount of snow reoport here has allready mostly melted, sort of. It is just weather, none of this white stuff matters. NOTHING that has occurred or will occur that invalidates our models. False claims of cold weather put forth by deniers will not change the truth. As a matter of fact just the other day a new GISS station located in rural Yellowstone proved that the planet is getting warmer as the temperature was a constant 100 degrees Celsius. Furthermore, in an effort to appease the hairy knuckle dragging denier crowd we will be moving the official GISS station in Hawaii away from the airport and it’s UHI. The new station located in very rural Kilauea crater is expected to help prove that AGW is occurring faster then expected and that action needs to be taken immediately!!!
Live by the sword, die by the sword:
For the last couple of decades we have had a global warming angle of every bit of bad weather possible:
Bad river floods: Global warming, global warming, global warming…
Hurricane hits: Global warming, global warming, global warming…
Drought: Global warming, global warming, global warming…
A few hot days: Global warming, global warming, global warming
A few wet days: Global… (you get the picture)
Now we have some cold weather, yes just weather. We might, or might not, have a cold winter. C’est la vie. But if we do have a bad winter it will have a disproportionate impact on public and perhaps political perceptions of the truth or falsity of the whole case for AGW.
The % will be back below 10% by the end of the week.
Also, who has a 700″ of snow on the ground with a 400″ water equivalent on Oct 13? That sounds like a glitch.
Yes, indeed!
Time to buy shares in a snowshoe manufacturing company 🙂
If we don’t stop this running away global warming ASAP, we are all going to freeze to death?
This is interesting as it actually shows an increasing rate of second and subsequent year’s snow.
Any data for mountains in the Canadian or Siberian Arctic?
That map is outdated at the least. What little remains of the snow in Minneapolis can only be found on the north side of structures. Snow covered we are not. Last Monday yes, but no longer.
One more:
Central Europe hit by heavy snow
http://tvnz.co.nz/world-news/central-europe-hit-heavy-snow-3073695
and what’s up with cryosphere today? they are down more often than not.
Lloyd (09:27:20) :
If you don’t know how it works (cooler climate associated with Deep Solar Minimum) then you don’t know when it started working.
If it was accumulated L&P over the limit needed to start the cooling, then the Deep Solar Minimum grinds the salt into already colder wounds.
By how much?
Did it start the PDO flip to cold, just exacerbate it, or is it simply a never mind?
Does the Arctic Ice recovery make for another clue, or does where the Arctic Ice is favoring to form mean anything?
Are the 2 volcanoes popping off in response to, and aggravational effect of, or in coincidence to the Minimum?
Is the cooling a form of “for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction”, or are we just plain unluckily lucky to get the AGW Climate Circus Monkeys off our backs?
To say that all these things mysteriously happen concurrently is beating the proverbial pants off the odds.
Billions will now see where this thing is going and draw the Cooling for Dummies conclusion. They won’t make any further effort than that.
I am waiting for the whining to begin:
“Weather is not climate”. “Weather is not climate.” Ad infinitum Ad nauseum.
Here is the new official AGW mantra:
CLIMATE…IS NOT CLIMATE.
Har har.
P.S. Just turned my heat on here for the first time here in balmy Norfolk, VA. In light of the many recent positive-AMO-fueled mild winters here, this October feels different from many recent years past.
And the IPCC, Gore, Hansen and others are doing the world a GREAT disservice in screaming chicken little if the world warms.
Fear the cold, not the warm.
There is a reason warm periods are called “climatic optima”.
Fear the cold….and not the warm.
WHY is this so hard to understand???
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
No better in Scandinavia, snow yesterday in southern Sweden, it’s getting close to Copenhagen, some 150 km away, snowstorms in that region really aren’t nice.
Yeah, what’s happening in Canuckshire?
crosspatch (09:41:40) :
My thoughts were that this is the type of intense system we wouldn’t see on the central coast until mid/late November. During many years, we would be in the midst of a hot and dry “indian summer” right now. The stats you listed on the water totals are very eye-opening though. Certainly El Niño-like in terms of the shear water volume, but cooler than the last few El Niño events.
And yes, there was floral carnage all over my yard. Heavy potted plants were strewn around like they were made of styrofoam. A 25 ft. tree fell over, luckily away from the house!
To paraphrase Tommy Lee Jones from Men in Black…
“A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it. Fifteen hundred years ago everybody knew the Earth was the center of the universe. Five hundred years ago, everybody knew the Earth was flat, and fifteen minutes ago, you knew that humans were” causing global warming. “Imagine what you’ll know tomorrow.”
We all have our hockey sticks. This one obviously shows that in 10 years, the entire U.S. will be covered in snow. Ice age, here we come.
if the increase in snow depth keeps increasing year by year, by 2050 the US will see the rebirth of the Laurentide Ice Cap. And it will be all the fault of human caused global warming, of course.
Our main illegal immigration problem will be Canadians fleeing across our northern border. Who’s got a bunk for Steve?
Oh, Anthony is moderating. Anthony Did you like the Lou Dobbs and Glenn Beck
Video’s on climate I put up?
REPLY: Haven’t watched yet. -A
Daryl Ritchison: “Most of my area only had a brief snowfall on Friday night (0.5″ to 1″) that quickly melted Saturday morning.”
One man’s dusting is another man’s blizzard. Fortunately, here in north Texas our blizzards melt after a day as well.
Since 2000, I’ve manage snow and ice control operations for a municipality in Wisconsin. Our crews did not plow snow in December through 2003 and had very few plowing operations otherwise.
Since 2004, we have plowed every December, set a record calendar year total in ’07, a record season total for snowfall in ’07/’08 and a new December record in ’08.
I’m also an avid outdoorsman and deer hunter. I recall many deer seasons in the late ’80s and throughout the ’90s that were unbearably warm. In 1998 i harvested my best buck ever and it was 65F that day – end of November. Things have changed significantly since 2004. The seasons now remind me of the seasons of the ’70s when I first started hunting. Brrrrrrrrr.
All anecdotal. But I don’t care. Something has changed.
Disaster!
Albedo up and so more energy to be trapped by deadly carbon dioxide.
This video says it all!
Here’s the link on recent TV news admitting global cooling.
http://www.prisonplanet.com/lou-dobbs-al-gore-not-evil-just-wrong-global-warming-debate.html
Glenn Beck’s One Minute Response to Recent Global Cooling News 10-13-09
Law of unintended consequences strikes again:
“Wood making comeback as fuel source”
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-10-13-wood-power_N.htm
“Across the USA, power plants are turning to wood to make electricity. The move is spurred by state mandates to encourage renewable power and by bills moving through Congress that require more renewable electricity nationwide.”
“Some environmentalists fear that the rise of wood power could devastate forests. “
Funny they don’t use a “snow depth anomaly”… they use it about everywhere else… even their models contain a fair amount of anomalies.
Let me think which average they would use to calculate the anomaly… yeah, the average snow coverage during the last ice age… look people, we never had such little snow since recorded human history… and they would be right!
I`m from Romania , and i’m amazed ! We should make sth for this world . 🙁
Early snow in Mediterranean country of Montenegro.
http://www.pobjeda.co.me/slike/vijesti/1255476420.jpg
Have they flipped F and C at LAKE MORAINE, CO.
13 October 2009 another new record. I know they understand and predict and protect and everything but can they keep their records straight.
Sorry forgot the link
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/records/index.php?ts=daily&elem=lomx&month=10&day=13&year=2009&sts%5B%5D=CO&submitted=Get+Records#recs
I have not yet seen the following comment on that alarming snow graph, and no thread on WUWT would complete without it, so if I may…
Ahem. “It’s worse than we thought!”
rbateman (10:59:31) : If you don’t know how it works (cooler climate associated with Deep Solar Minimum) then you don’t know when it started working.
This is expected! Ocean heat content drop causing early frost and snow is expected due to Deep Solar Minimum. The same happened in the beginning of the previous century when Titanic hit an ice berg. To me this is obvious, and I am struggling to understand why a brilliant scientist like Dr. Svalgaard is still sitting on the fence and says that any connection between solar activity and clouds is not proved [yet].
However, we all know that many scientist have another point of view – and as natures own grand experiment – Deep Solar Minimum is steadily getting deeper and deeper:
http://spaceweather.com/ 14.oct.2009
“Long after many forecasters thought solar minimum would be finished, the quiet is not only continuing, but actually deepening” ,
we may finally be able to determine whether solar minimum may cause cold weather and climate. I do not know if Friis-Christensen, Svensmark and Kirkby are following WUWT, however, if you do, I have one advice to you:
The thermal mass of the oceans is huge, and any increased cloud cover will have negligible instant effect on the heat content in the oceans – it takes many years to alter the temperature of the oceans. However, a prolonged increased cloud cover for more than 3-6 years may have a dramatic effect on the heat content in the oceans, and the resulting global ocean and atmosphere temperature will then start to drop like a rock.
Any input regarding this advice will be very much appreciated.
Dave D (09:16:24) :
“Looks like I’ll be winning all my bets that this winter will be colder and with more snowfall than the last 2 “cold” winters, despite El Nino”
Not despite – more likely because of. This is a real weak el Nino, and a weak Nino means 75 % probability for a cold winter in North America.
Simon says
“Global warming alarmists take 1 step backwards”
Simon says
“Global Cooling alarmists take 1 step forewards”
Early start in sweden to…
Tallbloke:
here in Canuckistan, we just went through the coldest Thanksgiving that I ahve ever seen. Winnipeg Manitoba broke a snowfall record that has held since 1872 and a good portion of the wine grape crop was hit by sub zero temperatures in the Okanagan Valley of BC. Welcome to winter…it’s going to be a bumpy ride.
Forecast for this weekend here in N.E. MS is for low’s in the upper 30’s. About 10-15 degrees cooler than normal for this time of year. Probably snow again this year also. Got a few inches last winter. Not unheard of, but unusual for sure.
Simon (12:31:30) :
Oh! Simon is dancing a waltz! 🙂
Saturday, Denver broke it’s record low by 8 degrees F. I-25 was closed to Wyoming, and portions of I-80 were closed in Wyoming. On Oct 10th?
But hey! It’s only weather, not climate.
Joe Bastardi reaffirmed his Winter Outlook today with a little more detail. Didn’t see it linked in here, but I may have missed it.
http://www.accuweather.com/news-weather-features.asp?partner=accuweather&traveler=0&date=2009-10-14_12:55&month=10&year=2009
I have to admit it seems like the initial graph and date of Oct 13th might be a bit cherry picked (I don’t mean to insinuate that it’s deliberate). I agree with the premise in general…that Winter is early this year, but I live in the affected area and I can tell you it came with a storm recently.
Looking at the rest of the data for October 1st through 13th for ’03 through ’09 it seems that the snowfall comes and goes rather quickly. There are sudden increase in snowfall in 2005, 2007, 2008, and 2009 within this 13 day period, which suggest these are large regional snowstorms. It is fair to say that 2008 and 2009 are the largest such occurrences which, while it may not constitute promotion to “climate” as opposed to “weather”, is certainly still worthy of note.
The real issue to me is that giving data for the mean/median of the first half of October would be more informative and provide more context for consideration. Something like this for example:
Year, Mean, Median
2003, 0.14, 0.0
2004, 0.17, 0.2
2005, 3.08, 2.3
2006, 1.03, 0.1
2007, 1.61, 1.0
2008, 2.71, 0.4
2009, 8.88, 7.5
Obviously it still shows a spike this year, and as I said I don’t disagree at all with the premise that we have a lot of early snow this year.
>> Bob Shapiro (09:27:27) : What effect would a solar wind at solar maximum have had on repelling these meteoroids, keeping them from reaching the earth? <<
No effect. A meteoroid would have to be smaller than one micron for solar radiation pressure (sunlight) to push it out of the solar system (IIRC, the number is close to 1/10th micron for a particle of density 2.5 gm/cm3). The solar wind pressure is about 1/4th of the solar radiation pressure. Just deflecting it would take less, but it still becomes negligible for particles one mm or larger.
TerryBixler (12:17:14) :
“Have they flipped F and C at LAKE MORAINE, CO.”
Lake Moraine is at 10213 ft.
Wray is at 3667 ft.
It’s likely that the information is correct. I haven’t been there, but Lake Moraine is a reservoir and probably sits in a bowl, where the cold air settles.
Perhaps “Retired Engineer” knows the location.
Al Gore is right now preaching in Argentina:
http://www.clarin.com/diario/2009/10/14/um/m-02018674.htm
Is it 270 times more thermal mass in the oceans than in the atmosphere?
Earlier snow than usual in Scandinavia as well and it doesn’t seem to melt. Norwegian snow maps at http://senorge.no
PS – The mean/median data I posted above is for Oct 1st through Oct 13th for the respective years.
Could you please post one of these showing the Canadian Shield?
DR – NOAA would have been a great reference were it not for issues like this, “To enable them to make the case the oceans are warming, NOAA chose to remove satellite input into their global ocean estimation and not make any attempt to operationally use NASA’s Argo data in the process. This resulted in a jump of 0.2C or more and ‘a new ocean warmth record’ in July. ARGO tells us this is another example of NOAA’s inexplicable decision to corrupt data to support political agendas.” Please do not reference politically driven pseudo-science in the future.
Mod. Please delete the bold code if in error.
——————————————
tallbloke asked, “Yeah, what’s happening in Canuckshire?”
Up here in the Frozen North it is, err … well, it has been frozen for about one week. Mean temps similar to mid December.
Records shattered all across southern Alberta. Have a boo here for Waterton National Park:
http://www.climate.weatheroffice.ec.gc.ca/climateData/dailydata_e.html?StationID=26850
Those mean daily temps for Oct 9 through Oct 12 are ~22C° below mean! The three consecutive days of -22°C to -24.5°C were all new records. I think the -24.5°C broke the previous record (2002) by something like 8 C degrees. (TBV.)
Calgary .. “Temperatures dropped to –16.1 C in Calgary early Monday, breaking the day’s previous record, from 1928, by about three degrees.”
See here..
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/calgary/story/2009/10/12/mb-snowy-cold.html
Anyway, accord to the elves at Environment Canada we are to return to normal temps tomorrow.
Lots of cranky folks here in Canuckistan. ☺☺
Clive
Steinar Midtskogen (13:07:29) : Earlier snow than usual in Scandinavia as well and it doesn’t seem to melt. Norwegian snow maps at http://senorge.no
In Norway it is colder than usual too – Røros with a new astonishing record -13.9 C today. No wonder it doesn’t seem to melt…
News in English:
http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?hl=en&sl=no&u=http://www.adressa.no/vaeret/article1398424.ece&ei=OzPWSuv8F4nz-QaD46SOAw&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=1&ct=result&ved=0CAgQ7gEwAA&prev=/search%3Fq%3DKulderekord%2Bp%25C3%25A5%2BR%25C3%25B8ros%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG
News in Norwegian:
http://www.adressa.no/vaeret/article1398424.ece
Simon (12:31:30) :
Global Warming alarmists go sit in the corner.
Hmmm early snowfalls and record low temps. Is Al Gore planning to speak somewhere?
I love skiing, therefore I love [this] global warming!
Same here, this side of the Atlantic, Austria, Czechia, Germany still in orange alert for snow storms. Many ski resorts in the Alps accumulating over 3 feet in the last 48 hours. Below a map of snowfall in the past five days: http://tinyurl.com/yz968hd
The terra Modis shows a beautiful image of all of the Eastern Alps covered in white: http://tinyurl.com/yzh8gqz
it is clearly visible to the top right of the image
“Fear the cold, not the warm.” savethe sharks
Wait! Doesn’t cold weather keep pests in check?
May it get as cold as necessary to discredit the “sky is falling unless you pay us” crowd.
Young scientists! Don’t trust anyone over 30 — x 10^1 pounds!
David S (13:43:15) : said
Hmmm early snowfalls and record low temps. Is Al Gore planning to speak somewhere?
Where is that pesky ManBearPig?
See what Piers Corbyn have to say about winter in Britain:
http://www.youtube.com/user/1weatheraction#p/a/u/1/Yyld9QH55dw
Buy a forecast and you will know what is going to happen.
Bookmakers refuses to take his bets about the weather, must be a reason for that!
Well so much for that 50 year storm.
So howcum I never noticed it when I walked out to lunch yesterday. Well yes I did put a hooded sweatshirt on over my office duds, and I did take my umbrella with me, because it was raining all the way; but no the umbrella didn’t get turned inside out, and yes the rain did blow in under the brolly, and soak my trouser legs.
Biggest proble was that the drainage system for all the UHI parking lots that I cut across to get to my favorite eating plaqces, so I was walking in about a half inch of ruinning water both coming and going; but nothing that I haven’t seen before; even as recently as last year so phooey on the 50 year BS; we get 50 year storms pretty much every year. Yeah I saw some branches blown off trees; largely because the city weenies won’t allow people to cut all that bric-a-brac off their trees.
So today was sunny and cloudy; funny how clouds appear out of nowhere when the surface warms, and puts moisture in the air.
So the DMI temperature finally seems to be taking a dive, but not before the JAXA ice dropped a tad below (I think) 2008; but so what; the minimum was well above last year, so that means we muct be growing some two year and three year ice now. All in all the ice now seems to be back in the historical normal range.
So what did cause all the DMI temperature hiccups earlier this month ?
Bob Shapiro (09:27:27)
Further to Tom_R (13:00:34) :’s reply almost all(I’m guessing greater than 99.999%) of meteoroids entering earth’s atmosphere originate within the solar system).
The vast majority are in the meteor showers, all of which are solar system origin.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_meteor_showers
Snowfall records for Mammoth Mountain by month since 1968-69 season.
http://www.mammothmountain.com/MyMammoth/
Snowfall this season to date is double the average over the last 50 years.
Looks like great season with very early start for Mammoth.
“Mammoth is opening Friday, Oct 16, 2009! 2nd earliest opening EVER!”
20″ base already.
Yippee
“jorgekafkazar (09:14:48) :
NK (09:03:29) : “The Earth has a fever”.–ManBearPig
I’d say it’s got the chills.”
Put it this way. The Earth has feverish chills. 🙂
Simon says
“Don’t let it get too cold or the Bees will die off.” The bes pollinate the flowers that give us our fruits, and others as well!
Too wet to harvest crops and moisture damage to corn, soybeans and small grains is what I found on a google search yesterday. Since stormx ag/news/weather ceased to exist this summer locating good real time agriculture information has been difficult. Despite very late plantings this spring the crops looked to be an improvement over 2008 despite USDA stating it would be a mirror year. That was up until the moisture settled in and cold returned.
I grew up in Winnipeg. Winter of 1955/6 shovelled snow every morning for 100 successive mornings. When it didn’t snow, it blew. You young fellows jest don’t know what a real winter is like! :>). I tell people that Winnepeg (Winterpeg) is a great place to be FROM. Murray
I don’t need a forecast to see what’s happening.
Last year, it was Alaska and the Yukon that got it bad.
This year, the joy of Winter comes early and often, and has much it wants to share with us.
Got to watch ORiley tonight on Fox. Ug. Dennis Miller is to say attacks on Al Gore are just the tip of the iceberg.
@richard Heg (09:55:00) :
and in Poland.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8307661.stm
But I’m more interested what conditions have created such weather pattern in Europe with jet streams making 360 deg loop pushing cold polar masses over central Europe. See some maps:
j-streams:
http://squall.sfsu.edu/gif/jetstream_norhem_00.gif
http://www.wunderground.com/global/Region/EU/2xJetStream.html
temp:
http://www.wetterzentrale.de/pics/Reurmett.html
EUMETSAT precip.:
http://oiswww.eumetsat.org/IPPS/html/MSG/PRODUCTS/MPE/CENTRALEUROPE/index.htm
EUMETSAT air masses:
http://oiswww.eumetsat.org/IPPS/html/MSG/RGB/AIRMASS/CENTRALEUROPE/index.htm
NATO / MIL Access Site – Air Force Portal:
http://131.54.120.150/index.cfm?section=MetsatAnal
Signum temporis aka “global cooling” or a freak weather?
Regards
To what record are you refering, I cannot find any reference to that in this thread other than your question.
Moraine lake sits on the east slope of pikes peak just above Colorado Springs and Manitou springs, so it collects cold air coming down off Pikes peak.
Google map 38.812326 -104.994857
Manitou springs is at about 6400 ft elevation and had temperatures in the low 20’s late and 30’s during the Period Oct 12-13.
With normal lapse rates of 5 deg F/thousand feet, temps at 10000 ft in that area should have been near the teens.
Larry
This site has hourly weather for Moraine Lake Colorado for the last few days.
http://www.hamweather.net/cgi-bin/hw3/hw3.cgi?config=&forecast=obarchive&icao=KAFF&day=2&place=lake+moraine&state=co&zipcode=&country=us&county=08041&zone=COZ081&icao=KAFF
Larry
Early snow and traffic Chaos in Germany (google translate):
Snowstorm caused mass accident on A20
Multiple pile-ups in case of snow on the A20
Austria:
The winter moves in with new records
And of course you find these kinds of News, too:
Earlier snow, but warm winter
You see, warming will continue. BBQ winter for Austria is expected…
still getting a bit of late snow in Victoria Australia
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,26213024-12377,00.html
superDBA
When I look for the lake I get not so cold.
http://www.hamweather.net/local/us/co/lake+moraine/wxn460129.html
No doubt we will hear that this is just more “extreme weather” predicted by the models.
I really do need to learn how to do the link thingy. Check out this – El Nino models clearly expecting less of the white stuff.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf
@David S (13:43:15) :
Hmmm early snowfalls and record low temps. Is Al Gore planning to speak somewhere?
This is yet another example of the Gore Effect. Al Gore was in Wisconsin last week (Friday, 9 Oct) speaking to 500 environmental journalists about his favorite topic.
Perhaps the good folk in Vancouver, B.C. might consider booking Mr. Gore to speak on his belief system just prior to the 2010 Winter Olympics ~ just to ensure a good punch of winter weather.
@MattN (09:39:56) :
If you look at Europe and Northern Asia pressure pattern there is alternate sequence of Highs and Lows which works like gigantic sucking pumps drawing polar air onto Europe and Asia. Perhaps there lies the cause of the early snow both here in Europe and there in Asia?
See the map (today!):
Asia temp:
http://www.findlocalweather.com/weather_maps/temperature_north_asia.html
Asia pressure:
http://www.findlocalweather.com/weather_maps/pressure_north_asia.html
Europe temp:
http://www.findlocalweather.com/weather_maps/temperature_europe.html
Europe pressure:
http://www.findlocalweather.com/weather_maps/pressure_europe.html
Former maps a few days older would reveal better the pattern dragging cold air from the North but I got no archives.
Regards
Please excuse the free ad re Goreacle & FruitFly Suzy.
George Galloway, pro-terrorist MP from Britain, was barred from entering Canada.
Why not Goreacle?
…-
NK (13:53:30) :
“Is Al Gore planning to speak somewhere?
Where is that pesky ManBearPig?”
“Former U.S. vice-president Al Gore to speak in Toronto Nov. 24”
“Proceeds from the Toronto event, at the Allstream Centre at Exhibition Place, will go to the David Suzuki Foundation.
In a release, MTS Allstream executive Dean Prevost says Gore is recognized across the world for his passion on environmental issues.”
http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5hoXXgw2nhdj3_oxZn_FQ2FYNbCzg
Invariant (12:27:10) :
“rbateman (10:59:31) : If you don’t know how it works (cooler climate associated with Deep Solar Minimum) then you don’t know when it started working.”
“This is expected! Ocean heat content drop causing early frost and snow is expected due to Deep Solar Minimum. The same happened in the beginning of the previous century when Titanic hit an ice berg. To me this is obvious, and I am struggling to understand why a brilliant scientist like Dr. Svalgaard is still sitting on the fence and says that any connection between solar activity and clouds is not proved [yet].”
Because it hasn’t been proven yet. I’ve had a keen interest in science since I was young, but I am not a scientist. Having said that, even I know that “coincidence is not causation”. This reinforces what Robert Bateman (rbateman) was essentially saying, and what I believe Dr. Svalgaard has said previously, which is if you can’t demonstrate the mechanism by which the sun controls the earth’s climate, then you don’t have the data to claim that the sun controls the earth’s climate.
While a position that the sun controls the climate seems reasonable, it is not a claim that many honest scientists will make at this time, as the earth’s climate is at the center of 3 very complex, non-linear systems, none of which we understand very well: the sun, the oceans, and the atmosphere. And other systems contribute as well-volcanoes for example-again, their influence on the climate is not that well understood, particularly underwater volcanoes.
Which leads me to ask the WUWT crowd a general question about something I really don’t understand, and have seen little discussion of: What effect on temperature and climate does the solar wind, CMEs and solar flares have? There is a tremendous amount of energy in these phenomena, enough to light up the Polar Regions for days or weeks at a time. These highly charged particles also carry a very large amount of kinetic energy because of their speed. So when they hit the earth, where does all that energy go? Someone please enlighten me. Thanks!
Dan Murphy
Re David S:
Al Gore is said to be in Argentina, where Buenos aires in July 2007 saw the first snowfall since 1918:
Could be that this latest snow is the Gore Effect “warming up” for Copenhagen…
Sometimes the nature interferes by its own means, when it is due time. Napoleon, Hitler armies froze badly in decisive moments. I guess, now it is another decisive moment. God´s fingers, nature´s common sense, knights from Blanik, call it as you wish.
here in Canuckistan, just a few days ago in British Columbia there was a record for the number of records broken in one day. Those just happened to be low temperature records, and most of those records where broken by a large margin.
I live in MN and there was momentary snow that was on the ground for a day but its gone from central mn north to the border. Day time temps are in the 40’s and the ground is still unfrozen. Ponds are open etc.
Dan Murphy (15:59:55) :
Great questions. I’m a little surprised that our resident solar science curmudgeon hasn’t turned up yet to address them, but I think most of us are in… “gee, what’s gonna happen next?” mode. The science is not settled. And it’s getting chilly in New England…
I don’t know if you guys remember the show “In Search Of” with host Leonard Nemoy in the 1970’s. The other day I was surfing around and found a link to this video. It is about global cooling and the coming of the new ice age. The video is in 3 parts. I encourage everyone to watch it. It was not the content so much (though great) that interested me, it was the eerily familiar use of language that captivated me. I was in stitches!
http://algorelied.com/?p=2839
“God´s fingers, nature´s common sense, knights from Blanik, call it as you wish.”
I see similarity with Adam Smith’s “invisible hand”.
Dan Murphy,
I think it is safe to say at this point, the Sun is a major player in our planet’s climate, and I say this with high regard to recent solar activity of past 3 years correlated with recent personal climate observations.
I would also say, not to be alarmist, we are underestimating the solar effect at our own detriment. Perhaps we should be spending more money on studying the solar affects on or climate in order to give us a better heads up on what to expect, not that we can do anything about what the Sun is doing.
“Perhaps the good folk in Vancouver, B.C. might consider booking Mr. Gore to speak on his belief system just prior to the 2010 Winter Olympics ~ just to ensure a good punch of winter weather”
I sent him an email invite, explaining that based on his outstanding record, he is a natural for our Big Event next Feb.
Still waiting for a reply
If it is anything like last winter, we can ignore The Goreacle. This picture
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/21859766
was taken about 250 yards away from where the opening ceremonies will take place and very close to the Olympic Village.
Not very typical for downtown Vancouver, but it sure looked nice for Christmas last year . . . as long as you didn’t have to drive.
RE: George E. Smith (14:02:53) :
“Well so much for that 50 year storm.”
A number of one day rainfall records, previously set by the Columbus Day Storm of 1962, were broken. Miner Ridge in Monterey County got over 18 inches of rain. This was not data manipulation.
I would add, however, that this event owed to a polar jet moving south several weeks earlier than normal, allowing the grab of the Melor remnant. Another leading indicator of global cooling?
October one day records.
Big weather front over all of Europe
http://www.nrlmry.navy.mil/sat-bin/display10.cgi?SIZE=full&PHOT=yes&AREA=mediterranean/model_overlays&PROD=500mb_Hghts&TYPE=ssmi&NAV=over&DISPLAY=Latest&ARCHIVE=Latest&CGI=over.cgi&CURRENT=20091014.1800.composite.500mb_heights_model_overlays_mediterranean_mediterranean.x.jpg&MOSAIC_SCALE=15
Near hurricane conditions in Newfoundland
http://www.nrlmry.navy.mil/sat-bin/display10.cgi?SIZE=full&PHOT=yes&AREA=atlantic/model_overlays&PROD=500mb_Hghts&TYPE=ssmi&NAV=over&DISPLAY=Latest&ARCHIVE=Latest&CGI=over.cgi&CURRENT=20091014.1800.composite.500mb_heights_model_overlays_eatl_atlantic.x.jpg&MOSAIC_SCALE=15
NAO is negative as during the cool part of the summer
http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/pna/nao_index.html
BBC are pushing Pen Hadow stating Arctic summer ice will be gone in 10 years
Since it is new snow, NSIDC will tell us it should not be taken seriously. Only snow that has been around for 3 years should count.
(irony off)
I hate to cave to the AGW’ers but they were correct with the “hockey stick” depiction of global temperatures. They just had it the wrong way up when it’s really down. We’re in for a cold winter.
Robert Wykoff (16:45:56) :
I don’t know if you guys remember the show “In Search Of” with host Leonard Nemoy in the 1970’s.
Yes, I do remember that, and the language is all too familar.
Might be the joke is on us this time.
So, will Spock do a Part IV, or will Kirk best him for the helm in real life too?
The El Nino in the Pacific is a rather small one. We are not cold “in spite of” an El Nino. We are cold because the El Nino isn’t particularly a hot one. Not enough to scorch the Earth like the 98 El Nino. But it does kick up the water vapor which in turn turns up the humidity, which in turn falls as snow in Winter.
Obviously Gore Effect snow and temps. Move along. Nothing to see.
I was comparing Unisys SST maps and it looks like the ocean temps. could contribute to more cold outbreaks over the Winter if the cooling trend keeps up.
OCT 10th
http://weather.unisys.com/archive/sst/sst_anom-091011.gif
OCT 14th
http://weather.unisys.com/surface/sst_anom.html
Looks almost like the downtrend and advance and deepening of blues accelerated since El Nino decided to strengthen just a little. It seems to provide a stunning base to prove Tallbloke’s theories on deep long solar minimum and its effects on SST’s.
Here in Kansas Wichita is reported to have had its coldest start to October since records began, we’re well below average and Intellicast is indicating we’ll get into the 60’s starting tomorrow but stay below average.
Re crosspatch (09:41:40) :
You write “And a note about the storm that just passed through the SF Bay area: in my 13 years here, I can’t remember a storm that blew over so many trees.”
On our southern island of Tasmania, there was a strong wind storm, followed by a TV crew interviewing a local farmer.
TV: “Sure was a strong wind last night”
Farmer: “Yep, blew down a lot of trees that had never been blown down before.”
BTW, this thing named snow. We have organised life so that we do not have it as a nuisance, but as a playground it is only a drive of a few hours. Skilled people are invited to migrate here, with $ assistance. Think about it.
tallbloke asked, “Yeah, what’s happening in Canuckshire?”
Chilly and damp mid Vancouver Island. Grey and miserable thanksgiving. Max 11 Celsius yesterday, Max 14 Celsius today.
Slightly O/T; have you seen the latest doomsaying re the Arctic from the BBC?
“Arctic to be ‘ice-free in summer'”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8307272.stm
Sorry, can’t take them seriously any more.
My only comment is that I hope nobody points this snow cover issue out to Al Gore. He already has had a tough week after being informed in a very cold Madison, Wisconsin that there are more polar bears now then there were ten years ago. He almost stroked out when this fact was presented to him and now he has to deal with this. I just don’t think the Goracle’s mind and body is designed to handle this kind of rejection.
Well, it snowed here in VT today. The temp is forecast to come within 3 degrees of a record low.
But that 20% is in the bit that doesn’t count. It’s just Idaho, the Dakotas, Iowa, and the other bits that no-one uses.
Yep we have confirmation:
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,26213406-601,00.html
Arctic is definitely going to be ice free by 2020. I guess the end if nigh for the polar bears too! Oh the humanity!!1!1!eleven
PS> I see this is from the Polar Ocean Physics Group from Cambridge University… so should we refer to them as a Cambridge University POP Group?
Everyone here who has been a parent knows a child coming down with a cold goes through fever and chills first. So it is with Mother earth! Stand by for the coughs and sneezes to follow!
My understanding is that Global warming is expected to cause global climate change, it seems fair that the unusual weather patterns in Americas mid west are evidence of changing weather patterns.
Changing weather patterns are also evidenced by changing populations of animal and plant life.
Global warming doesn’t mean that everywhere becomes warmer in a short period of time, sure the general trend is for warming, but there is still plenty of Cold air mass to be moved around.
Dan Murphy (15:59:55) :
“What effect on temperature and climate does the solar wind, CMEs and solar flares have? There is a tremendous amount of energy in these phenomena, …”
I predict that Dr. Svalgaard’s response to this would be(in essence but more elegantly expressed).
1) No detectable effect.
and
2)(There is a tremendous amount of energy in these phenomena, ) No there isn’t. Compared with the electromagnetic energy from the sun it is minuscule.
I assert that I am the curmudgeonliest one of all.
PS And the world champion pedant as well.
Bill, yes, Shukman’s sycophantic Catlin coverage was a total embarassment, and without doubt the worst ‘scientific’ reporting I have ever seen (in particular when he got someone to jump through a few inches of a recently refrozen lead, and then stating that this thin ice was evidence of global warming). But the BBC is a big organisation and there are still a few independent thinkers in there, as Stephen Sackur demonstrated when interviewing GreenPeace’s Dr Gerd Leipold for HardTalk:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6phCQG25V8&feature=related
I think it is important to give credit where it is due, that way more journalists and reporters will feel more confident in questioning the alarmists’ bad science and spin.
Re: Slightly O/T; have you seen the latest doomsaying re the Arctic from the BBC?
The “National” news on Canada’s CBC (Communist Broadcasting Corporation) covered the Catlin Expedition nonsense tonight. Funny there was no mention as to how the intrepid explorers on that expedition almost froze to death due to the unseasonably (even for the Arctic) cold and stormy weather at the time. Anyway they droned on about the measurement of the thinner first year ice, not bothering to mention of course that the path chosen for the expedition was well, across the thinner first year ice! At the end of the piece they did manage to mumble something about how the ice extent has actually recovered “a little bit” over the last two years but failed to mention that “a little bit” was actually 23%!!
They should force these journalists to put a bit of skin in the game! Like if their statement of an ice free Arctic in 10 years doesn’t come true, we get to line them up against a wall and shoot them!!!
Australia has just had an intensly cold winter. Record setting all over australia. Prepare to freeze.
“Sorry, can’t take them seriously any more.”
What, you mean you’ve actually taken the BBC seriously before this?
O’Reilly and Miller’s Comic Relief on Phelim McAleer’s Questioning of Al Gore’s Science 10-14-09
. . . or that the 23% represented almost an additional million square kilometers of sea ice cover!
Simon (14:28:26) :
Simon says
“Don’t let it get too cold or the Bees will die off.” The bes pollinate the flowers that give us our fruits, and others as well!
Your wise statement now applies to the Bees, the hard working class…they give us our fruits…
“Bulldust (18:26:02) :
Yep we have confirmation:
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,26213406-601,00.html
Arctic is definitely going to be ice free by 2020. I guess the end if nigh for the polar bears too! Oh the humanity!!1!1!eleven”
To make any approximation of their carefully thought out plan the Catlin “Expedition” were forced to stick to the smoother first year ice. The data that they collected is primarily that of the thinner 1st year ice.
At th same time as the Catlin croud was testing the 1st year ice a spoil sport German group in an upgraded DC-3 flew a much larger area and found thicker than expected ice.
Geoff Sherrington (17:54:53) : have it as a nuisance, but as a playground it is only a drive of a few hours. Skilled people are invited to migrate here, with $ assistance. Think about it.
Do you take 50 something computer guys with way too much experience?
If so, count me in! Almost migrated there in 1982 as a database specialist, but an offer of more money and a better job kept me in the USA. A decision I have often regretted… It is that “90 mile beach” with 100 yards of people on it near Melbourn that haunts my memories most 😉 followed closely by the night on the town in the same city with live entertainment acts working the whole restaurant / bar… Folks on stilts juggling things, strolling minstrals, giant perfect steak.
And you do have the good sense to keep your snow up in the “mountains” for skiing 😉
Is it just me or has anyone else noticed that the many AGW trolls, ratbags etc. seem to have gone quiet lately on the leading sceptical blogs?
Bill Sticker (18:02:52)
according to today’s The Australian newspaper the study was done by Peter Wadhams, Professor of Ocean Physics at Cambridge
See http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,26213406-601,00.html
He based his forecast on Pen Hadlow’s ice survey when on the Catlin Expedition.
Bill Sticker (18:02:52) wrote:
Slightly O/T; have you seen the latest doomsaying re the Arctic from the BBC?
“Arctic to be ‘ice-free in summer’”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8307272.stm
*******
I noted with great interest that the BBC item concerned Professor Wadhams of the University of Cambridge, who has been studying the Arctic ice since the 1960s. The report told us that “He was speaking in central London at the launch of the findings of the Catlin Arctic Survey.”
In Canada we have various comedy festivals with lots of stand-up comedians. Was this a British equivalent?
IanM
Geoff Sherrington (17:54:53)
The ABC reported that snow is presently falling on the snowy mountains
Back2Bat (13:50:16) :
Oh…I love cold weather.
You are right…controls the pests and the riff raff.
What I meant by that statement “fear the cold, not the warm”….was that the times of greatest hardship in human history coincide with cold periods.
Crop failures, disease, drought, extreme weather….
But we are technologically advanced these days to adjust to cold periods and see them coming.
Trouble is, we have not been preparing for such.
Trouble is…the AGW crowd has been steering the boat the absolute wrong direction…and it goes to show that they make terrible navigators or ship captains….and then all of the sudden the ship brushes a big fat iceberg…
But I agree with ya there….let the pond freeze over….I’m ready to skate.
Lemme dust off my snowboard….
Yeehah.
Chris
Norfolk, VA
Gordon Ford (19:00:50) : I hear you 🙂 I am totally with you guys, and this web site has been a fantastic site to get to grips (in lay terms for me) with the issues and science.
Geoff C (19:09:19) : Yup – I even keep beating down (politely) the Crikey nutters on their blogs and they are giving up the debate with me because I keep using their arguments against them. Classic case was them using the UAH temp record (as per Spencer & Christie – I hope I have the names right, from memory) as proof of the “warming trend.” I gave them the link to S&C’s own assessment on the climate situation, which sadly does not agree with their AGW rhetoric.
Hopefully the facts and evidence continue to pile up en route to Copenhagen. Personally (being somewhat advisedly sceptical of the politicians) I see the Copenhagen talking heads already pointing to the fact that it is unlikely there will be a significant resolution, and the blame game is already going at full steam.
My cynical side is saying… the politicians know they do not really want the ETS, but they are trying to make it look like they are really gunning for it, but they are being thwarted by because they can’t get their policy through their legislative process.
So the end game is, no global ETS and some other country/party is to blame for the failiure to achieve consensus on action.
And the world heads into a cooling phase, so in a few years we can start the whole process again. Except will the debate now be… use more coal to put a warm blanket on the atmosphere? Hmmmm, I guess not.
In the meanwhile the Gorgon LNG project got the FID (Final Investment Decision) in Australia… the gas is quite dirty (a lot of CO2) and they plan to separate and sequester the CO2. I cynically asked the project guys if they had a backup plan to emit the CO2 if things get a tad chilly. Strangely no one laughed… I guess I am just a smidge peculiar when it comes to humour.
Considering Arctic summer sea ice extent has rapidly decreased by over twenty percent over the last thirty years, it seems perfectly fair to expect this trend to continue leading to the ultimate result of nil summer ice coverage.
The rate of decline is incredibly fast in Geological terms.
But the Canucks are teh screwed… their Winter Olympics will have to be called off it seems:
http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/Vancouver+Olympics+could+face+lack+snow+Accuweather/2102994/story.html#
What’s the white stuff on the web cams?
http://www.whistlerblackcomb.com/weather/cams/index.htm
Feel free to post links to evidence 4 Billion. Links are allowed, nay encouraged, here.
Only if you totally ignore history and the fact that the ice has done this repeatedly in the past.
That cyclic behavior is documented in the historical record. Your view only makes sense if you assume a linear tread. If on the other hand, you assume that it is a natural cycle (as documented historically), the perfectly logical conclusion is that the ice will do precisely what it has done numerous times in the past and quickly recover.
Larry
Eddie Murphy (14:33:23) :
Try; http://www.agweb.com/ >” Crop comments”
for comments on the weather situation from the real farm folks whose yearly income is on the line with your current US weather.
And the USA National Agricultural Statistics Service for the situation re the USA harvest progress.
Not good at all for the planet’s long term food outlook if a weather pattern like the current one in the US and now in eastern Europe continues to reappear and in perhaps in an even more serious form in future seasons.
http://usda.mannlib.cornell.edu/MannUsda/viewDocumentInfo.do?documentID=1048
I wonder if 4 billion is Soros? His checking account? Or is it the number of people that the poster believes should inhabit the planet? Why not kill 2 billion people? IF that’s the case, one would think you would welcome a climate catastrophe?
“Crop failures, disease, drought, extreme weather….” Savedemsharks
Yeah but you should know that the fractional reserve banksters have blown it again (as they must). We might be heading into an economic Greater Depression. The last one resulted in WWII and 50 – 80 million dead. This carbon nonsense comes at a very bad time economically.
Our banking and money system is fundamentally unstable. New regulations will merely damp the system and not fix it.
I’m frankly surprised there is ANY ‘sea ice’ in the arctic at all! Considering it forms over water (and considering water’s higher heat capacity, the fact that those waters are not stagnant, etc.).
Next …
.
.
Michael, it is considered really bad form to ‘spam’ the threads like this; we’ve seen these links to Alex Jones’ (Pinhead ConspiratorialistTM) website more than just a few times now …
I’m sure I speak for more than just a few others on this matter.
.
.
4 billion (19:40:27) :
Apparently 4 Billion was born after the introduction of satellites so it is “perfectly fair” to assume that his climate knowledge is limited to the last 30 years
and he provides no scientific data to backup his statement.
“… the gas is quite dirty (a lot of CO2) and they plan to separate and sequester the CO2.” Bulldust
CO2 = dirt?
Hopefully, you guys won’t seem too silly in the future. Maybe you can erect a bottling plant on the site and sell carbonated beverages. Or maybe the gas can be sold to local farmers to raise crop yields. Or maybe you can run turbines off it for power.
Can an error this huge (the CO2 scare) ever be admitted?
Bring on the cold. It is less a danger than the lunatics in charge, IMO.
hotrod (19:50:15) :
Only if you totally ignore history and the fact that the ice has done this repeatedly in the past.
That cyclic behavior is documented in the historical record. Your view only makes sense if you assume a linear tread. If on the other hand, you assume that it is a natural cycle (as documented historically), the perfectly logical conclusion is that the ice will do precisely what it has done numerous times in the past and quickly recover.
I am looking at the linear trend in the well known plot,
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/n_plot_hires.png
The thing that strikes me is short time frame over which such a massive amount of ice has been lost.
here is plot for coverage since 1900
http://espanol.wunderground.com/climate/SeaIce_Fig04.asp?MR=1
Of course we have no data to say if such a decrease in coverage has occured over such a time period previously.
To say that this is a natural cycle, it is fair to expect there to be a natural driver of this change.
The only driver that has significantly changed is temperature, seems fair to expect then this is the driver of signifcant change.
Following on with the cyclic nature of change, sure, ice coverage would return when temperature drops again.
James
ps TJA..if only 4 bil was my cheque account 🙂
fyi I use it because it is the rough age of the planet.
Back2Bat (20:44:06) :
Standard industry parlance I am afriad – dirty in the gas industry equates to a lot of non-hydrocarbon gas impurities (in Gorgon’s case, a lot oc CO2). The Gorgon project has always been described as sufferring from a lot of D’s – Distant (offshore), Deep, Dirty, Dry (not much LPG content)… etc some add Difficult. But it is going ahead nonetheless… the plant is to be on an A class nature reserve (Barrow Island) off the NW coast of Western Australia. Needless to say the Greens are real happy about that >.>
Just like other “technical” terms in other industries… “red mud”, “slimes”, “sludge”, “slug”… somewhere I have a paper that says something about a degree in bucket chemistry (Minerals Engineering – i.e. extractive metallurgy).
But I digress…
So, I’m curious… given the previous post, am I to understand that we’ll need stilts when (if) all this snow melts?
Mark
“. . . something called “Protect our Winters” who want to “fight climate change”. I wonder what they think now?”
Well I think that your use of “think” in connection w/ this group is uncommonly gracious and generous.
Snowy World Cup qualifier:
http://soccernet.espn.go.com/report?id=236564&cc=5901
Thanks Bull. I’m glad I stuck to nice clean electrons and computer bits. It’s nice though that some guys get to play with mud even after they grow up.
Don’t be too hard on the Greens. Most of our problems can be traced to the unstable banking and money system. It takes counterfeit money to really wreck the environment.
Not sure I get it. Dozens of links to dozens of things are posted on WUWT comments every day. Apart from the fact that the site pointed at looked a bit sensationalist, what was different about this one? It was certainly on topic.
The massive drop in ice recently was not due to temperature but due to changes in the prevailing winds pushing large amounts of ice out of the arctic basin. This is one of the things that make the AGW warnings of dire warming so disingenuous. The loss of ice was not due to melting but physical transport out of the arctic due to the wind.
Remember the video clip that Al Gore had showing the “pulse of the planet” where you could see the motion of sea ice in the arctic. In that clip you can see the normal process where sea ice gets driven by winds out past Greenland into the Atlantic ocean. There are several threads here in the recent past that give loads of information on the process of arctic ice transport due to prevailing winds and historical references to earlier cycles of low ice extent.
For example of the cyclic nature, you only need to look at historical records of periods when the North east passage was relatively ice free (like in the early 1900’s), in the 1945-1970’s period there is a clearly documented cooling spell, the modern ice extent measurements “just happen” to start (from satellite data) about the time the ice reached historical high extent when satellite data began. That gives a false impression of the trend because the starting point was at a peak in the cycle.
Larry
Definitely cold in Calgary, we’ve set an all time low for one day this month, and we’ve exceeded the normal amount of snow for the month (10cm) with about 15cm (6 in) of snow in the last 2 days.
Caitlin Ice Survey?
With most of their gear non-functional, life-sign equipment on the fritz, going backwards etc., drilling by hand in the thinnest places he could find, the word survey seems sadly out of place.
North Pole summers ice-free in 10 years: researchers say
Last Updated: Wednesday, October 14, 2009 | 8:45 PM ET
The Associated Press
The North Pole will turn into an open sea during summer within a decade, according to data released Wednesday by a team of explorers who trekked through the Arctic for three months.
The Catlin Arctic Survey team, led by explorer Pen Hadow, measured the thickness of the ice as it sledged and hiked through the northern part of the Beaufort Sea earlier this year during a research project.
Their findings show that most of the ice in the region is first-year ice that is only around 1.8 metres deep and will melt next summer. The region has traditionally contained thicker multiyear ice, which does not melt as rapidly.
“With a larger part of the region now first-year ice, it is clearly more vulnerable,” said Professor Peter Wadhams, part of the Polar Ocean Physics Group at the University of Cambridge, which analyzed the data.
“The area is now more likely to become open water each summer, bringing forward the potential date when the summer sea ice will be completely gone.”
Wadhams said the Catlin Arctic Survey data supports the new consensus that the Arctic will be ice-free in summer within 20 years, and that much of the decrease will happen within 10 years.
Martin Sommerkorn of the World Wildlife Fund said the Arctic sea holds a central position in the Earth’s climate system.
“Such a loss of Arctic sea ice cover has recently been assessed to set in motion powerful climate feedbacks which will have an impact far beyond the Arctic itself,” he said.
He added: “This could lead to flooding affecting one-quarter of the world’s population, substantial increases in greenhouse gas emissions from massive carbon pools and extreme global weather changes.”
Global warming has raised the stakes in the scramble for sovereignty in the Arctic because shrinking polar ice could someday open resource development and new shipping lanes.
The rapid melting of ice has raised speculation that the Northwest Passage linking the Atlantic and Pacific oceans could one day become a regular shipping lane.
The results come as negotiators prepare to meet in Copenhagen in December to draft a global climate pact.
Where is that pesky ManBearPig?
Near Here we have an animal hospital named “CatManDog”.
4 billion (19:40:27) :
Considering Arctic summer sea ice extent has rapidly decreased by over twenty percent over the last thirty years, it seems perfectly fair to expect this trend to continue leading to the ultimate result of nil summer ice coverage.
The rate of decline is incredibly fast in Geological terms.
O´really?
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/changing-artic_monthly_wx_review.png
http://i680.photobucket.com/albums/vv161/Radiant_2009/popularmechanics1957-2.jpg
here is plot for coverage since 1900
http://espanol.wunderground.com/climate/SeaIce_Fig04.asp?MR=1
Of course we have no data to say if such a decrease in coverage has occurred over such a time period previously.
Correct. We have semi-reliable satellite data since 1978.
The graph above is bunk, since if NW Passage was passable in 1944, arctic sea ice could not be much higher than in 2007, 2008 and 2009.
“A series of potent systems moved across the coterminous U.S.”
“coterminous” is defined as: “having the same or coincident boundaries .”
But that’s meaningless in the context, since there aren’t two entities involved. The word they’re groping for is “contiguous,” which means “Connecting without a break: the 48 contiguous states.“
Robert Wykoff (16:45:56) :
I don’t know if you guys remember the show “In Search Of” with host Leonard Nemoy in the 1970’s. The other day I was surfing around and found a link to this video. It is about global cooling and the coming of the new ice age. The video is in 3 parts. I encourage everyone to watch it. It was not the content so much (though great) that interested me, it was the eerily f amiliar use of language that captivated me. I was in stitches!
http://algorelied.com/?p=2839
~~~~~
It might also be mentioned that the Standford Climate Scientist who was going on about the impending ice age (in 1977) is a current acolyte of the Goracle and now preaches AGW.
I go to a bluff top (about one hour each day) at Scripps Institute of Oceanography almost daily. Last week I reported seeing about 60 gray whales (over 3 days) migrating south over 30 days early. I wonder how they knew whats up, or rather whats down, as in an temperatures and an early winter, especially since NOAA reported such warm SST ?
How did the whales know?
4 billion (18:35:00) :
My understanding is that Global warming is expected to cause global climate change, it seems fair that the unusual weather patterns in Americas mid west are evidence of changing weather patterns.
Welcome 4-billion (or James I think it is from your later postings) – you’ve found a site where debate is alive and well; hope you stick around.
Your point above is a common theme in the AGW camp. However, I think that it’s a totally circular statement (and a logical fallacy) and, as such, can never be disproved or argued with. To paraphrase the point: if it gets warmer this ‘proves’ AGW, if it gets colder this ‘proves’ AGW, if anything changes it ‘proves’ AGW. This cannot be the basis of a scientific theory.
There is the view (used to be part of the scientific method) that where an existing theory exists and a new hypothesis comes along, the upstart should present tests by which the old way of thinking can be seen to be false and the new approach seen to be a better fit. (Think Einstein vs Newton + transit of mecury). With AGW the incumbent theory is “natural variation”, to whit what is observed all fits within the normal variability of the Earth’s climate system.
AGW needs to predict or produce some form of tests to take the crown. To my mind, and many others, computer-models to not constitute tests or proofs.
The basic science around AGW seems fundamentally flawed, with shoddy record keeping, cherry-picking of data and bad mathematics, with a great propensity to fit linear trends on a natural, dynamic system (go figure). Do I think that the various proponents of AGW are all “in-on-it” in some grand conspiracy? No, just look up the term “group-think”.
So what of other tests and predictions (sorry projections) from AGW? More and greater violence storms/hurricanes – nope, not happening very quiet on that front. Arctic ice going – nope, big loss in 07 due to winds, recovering quite nicely at the moment (yes I know it’s only been a few years but the Arctic sea ice records are only 30 years in length). Rising sea levels – nope actually flat-lining at the moment, increasing temps – nope just like sea levels.
Do I think the Earth may be warming on a truly long-term trend – yes I think so (coming out of an ice-age and all that). Do I think man has an influence on his environment – yes, we should all be more responsible (recycle, clean-up rivers, not pollute etc.). Do I think man’s CO2 emissions are resulting in runaway warming to a “tipping point” that means the sky-is-falling and the only way to solve this is by ludicrous taxation schemes and knee-jerk reactions – absolutely not.
Cheers
Mark
Extrapolating that snow depth graph out to 2100 indicates that the US will be covered in snow to a depth of 1 mile.
Where are the IPCC when you need them most?
Do we have a word in English for snow?
October 13th? – always unlucky for some.
.
Norm/Calgary (22:31:29) : “Copenhagen in December to draft a global climate pact.”
Is that a typo, Norm? Did you really mean: “Copenhagen in December to draft a global snow pact.” ?
728.8 inches of snow sounds pretty unbelievable. This is from the region North-West. Does that include Alaska? The Rockies anywhere near have no more than 26 inches. So either this figure is plain wrong. Or it is from Alaska, but then I’d like to know: this ubelievable spot must have a name and somebody will have to explain the extreme changes in a few years time.
@ 4 billion.
Has anyone sailed to within 300Nm, (85ºN) of the North Pole in December without breaking ice since the Soviet icebreaker Syedoff got frozen in up there on December 18th 1938?
DaveE.
Patrick Davis (02:40:15) :
“Do we have a word in English for snow?”
Interestingly there is a Thai word for snow which can be transcribed in English as ‘hee-maa’. There hasn’t been any snow in Thailand for I would think a very long time but they have a word for it so maybe it has snowed there at some time in the past – perhaps the LIA? The word is probably of Sanskrit origin – and no doubt has the same root as the word ‘Himalayas’.
(Note that you have to be careful how you say ‘hee-maa’ in Thailand because, if you get the tones wrong, you could end up offending people by talking about the most intimate part of the female equine anatomy!)
Clive: We can vouch for recent conditions in SW Alberta; we were caught in a really bad blizzard a week ago (8th Oct) between Pincher Creek and Fort Macleod. The temp plummeted with the blizzard from +3C to -4C in a few minutes. There had been snow off and on since the previous Saturday; a lot of it lay around in a way our hosts commented on, having said originally that it wouldn’t last the day. The temps after that blizzard went pretty low, often -12C at night and down to -14C on the Friday night. This was our first visit to Canada; very interesting, to say the least! Especially as I seem to recall some quite warmish weather being forecast for some of those days.
It was a treat to return to the pleasant balmy weather in England, though it’s turned a bit foul today.
as ye believe…so shall it be – the basis of climate change
much more to say later , now just thanks to the site as cryosphere today appears to be crumbling
p.s. no snow yet in Ireland….last year we had our first october snow in 73 years
It’s snowing in Morris County NJ, but I don’t expect any accumulation.
COLD here in New Hampshire. What’s really sad is that I mentionned “Global Warming” to several folks grousing about the cold. Sadly, their serious reply to me was “Yes, I’ve read that GW causes cold weather” They look at me like I have two heads when I respond that a theory that predicts everything is a theory that predicts nothing.
USDA, farmers report varied harvest progress
http://www.agriculture.com/ag/story.jhtml;jsessionid=CUJDLYDLPDNF0CQCEAQSCZQ?storyid=/templatedata/ag/story/data/1255471174562.xml
Whether the crops are ready or not, the freezing temps that have slid through corn and soybean country in the last few days have slammed the book on the growing season in most of the Midwest. So, what’s that mean?
About a quarter of the country’s corn will leave the field immature. As of this past weekend, about 3/4 of the nation’s corn crop is fully matured, according to Tuesday’s USDA Crop Progress report. That’s almost 20% more than a week ago, but still almost 20% below the previous 5-year average.
Corn harvest is at a similar pace: 13% of the corn crop’s out of the field, versus the previous 5-year average of 35%. Only 3% of the corn crop was harvested in the last week, according to Tuesday’s report.
The action’s just as slow with the soybean crop. While 89% of that crop is matured (closer to the normal 95% level for this week of the year), only 23% has been harvested, less than half of the usual pace by this point (57%).
Climate change on the Yucatan Peninsula during the Little Ice Age.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/metadata/noaa-lake-6107.html
http://www.pnas.org/content/104/41/16200.full.pdf
Little Ice Age drought in equatorial Africa: Intertropical Convergence Zone migrations and El Niño–Southern Oscillation variability — Geology
http://geology.gsapubs.org/content/35/1/21.abstract
Little ice age drought russell_johnson_2007.pdf
http://www.seas.harvard.edu/climate/seminars/pdfs/russell_johnson_2007.pdf
NASA – The Fall of the Maya: “They Did it to Themselves”
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2009/06oct_maya.htm?list1100868
Get the picture? This makes you wonder how 7 billion people could possibly get through a little ice age. Relocation would be required for many in the worst climate zones and greenhouse food production with reliable water sources would likely have to replace the commercial farming methods used now.
Gee I was wrong, the snow has alredy accumulated on the grass here in Morris County NJ. I’m glad it is just weather.
Mark Fawcet:
“The basic science around AGW seems fundamentally flawed, with shoddy record keeping, cherry-picking of data and bad mathematics.”
We have a handy example of cherry picking, thanks to our friend 4 Billion. The link to the ice extent begins from 1980, which happens to coincide to when the late twentieth century warming began. It ignores the well documented evidence of cyclic advances and retreats of ice extent, and the MWP.
4 Billion
“The only driver that has significantly changed is temperature, seems fair to expect then this is the driver of signifcant change.”
I don’t understand this. How can temperature be a driver of climate? Surely it is a response.
Can anyone tell me how varying levels of humidity in the air affects the efficiency of heat-loss from the Ocean? The TAO site is showing a significant drop (as far as air above the ocean goes) in humidity in the air above the ENSO region since late September. If it’s pulling heat out of the Ocean and thus cooling SST’s it could also have implications for Winter.
NWS State College, PA just broke the record for the earliest recorded snowfall since records began per their afternoon discussion.
Well if you look at the JAXA ice graphs; conveniently posted here, you can easily see that the arctic ocean sea ice typically has a winter max of about 14 million squ km, and a summer/fall minimum of around 5-5.5 million in recent years, and almost down to 4 million in 2007.
Well that means that at the summer melt minimum we typically have only 40% or less of the arctic sea ice remaining.
And that is something; 9 million out of 14 melting pretty routinely every year.
So how much of a transient glitch woult it take for that remaining ice to just vanish one year. after all, most of the predictions of “Climate Science” have a bult in 3:1 fudge factor; but it would only take a 55% increase in the melt one year to get rid of it all.
So it doesn’t seem to me to be a big deal at all; wow just a small soalr outburst and the whole thing could disappear; well at leasdt until sept 15th, when the regrowth would start to happen.
Also remember that those figures are for the amount of Arctic Ocean that is covered just 15% with ice; so it is already mostly open water anyhow.
Natural variability could easily result in all the ice melting next year; and then just growing back like it always does.
Thgere’s a reason why all that ice is there after all; not much sunlight to stop it.
Yeah I think that snowcover map can be extended now. Webcam from Penn State:
http://146.186.123.229/axis-cgi/jpg/image.cgi?resolution=352×240
And this from Bradford PA forecast:
A Winter Storm Warning remains in effect until 8 am EDT Saturday
A lull in the precipitation will occur during the day Friday
before likely increasing again late Friday night into Saturday.
Expect a total of 4 to 10 inches of snow to fall by Saturday
morning. Again… the heaviest snow will be on the ridge tops…
and most of the accumulations will occur tonight and Friday night…..
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Apparently, despite early snowfalls and wet summers, this dang climate change thingy is drying up Canada’s rivers. http://news.sympatico.ctv.ca/abc/home/contentposting.aspx?isfa=1&feedname=CTV-TOPSTORIES_V3&showbyline=True&date=true&newsitemid=CTVNews%2f20091015%2frivers_risk_091015
Wonder if Professor Mann is spending more time staring out his window at Penn State on days like this….wondering about hockey sticks.
Get out and enjoy the snow, bud!
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Jimmy Haigh (05:19:06) :
I know someone who has property in Thailand and has recently moved there to live.
He told me that intonation is very important as words that sound very similar can have totally different meanings with a different intonation.
DaveE.
Hey now, Gore and Obama won the offical Worthless Peace Prize, I saw it in the outhouse.
“David (01:46:24) :
(over 3 days) migrating south over 30 days early. I wonder how they knew whats up, or rather whats down, as in an temperatures and an early winter, especially since NOAA reported such warm SST ?
How did the whales know?”
Easy.
By pod-cast.
Awww…. I’ve been congratulating myself for having the good fortune and foresight to live in a place where the vagaries of climate don’t intrude…. a little like Camelot, where Winter exits March the Second on the dot…. and then it snowed today…. not much, didn’t stick…. but it was snow. Both my wife and her calamansi tree are giving me dirty looks… “naw… too early to move it inside..”
Never mind Ron (of ‘peacelegacy.com’); if you want to get your ‘news’ from Alex Jones prisonplanet website go right ahead …
Speaking of ‘links and websites – here’s an interesting into from a site called ‘Peace Legacy’ –
Associated with PETA?
.
.
Dan Lee (09:21:04) :
How inconvenient.
Excellent!
Eric (09:30:55) :
Did Watts cover how June-Sep was the warmest on record, despite a solar ebb?
No?
Didn’t think so.
REPLY: I did cover the NOAA report for Sept, see the story below this one. And if you can provide a link to the story you reference I’ll add it also. Can’t cover what I don’t know about. – Anthony
—————————-
I scrolled through all the comments, twice, Eric, and I didn’t see you provide the data for Anthony.
Will you provide the links?
Also, there is not an immediate reaction on the earth do everything the sun does. The sun has been quiet for more than 2 years and the results are showing on the earth. Would you agree?
Gene,
“Will you provide the links?”
Yeah.
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata/GLB.Ts+dSST.txt
Eric (09:30:55) :
June-Sep was the warmest on record, despite a solar ebb?
—————–
This comment assumes that there is proof this happened (if indeed it did happen) despite the sun. You seem to be stating that this can’t happen when there is a quiet sun.
I deduce from you that you have read a work that shows what happened from June to Sep (if indeed it did happen) happened “despite a solar ebb”.
What is your data to prove this?
Can you provide a link to it?
I’m not trying to be sarcastic. I’m trying to be empirical.
“Back2Bat (21:24:28) :
Don’t be too hard on the Greens. Most of our problems can be traced to the unstable banking and money system. It takes counterfeit money to really wreck the environment.”
Not sure we disagree at all…so what’s your point??
I can guarandamntee you that your mantra of “bring on the cold” while many of us share your SENTIMENT….you really don’t want that.
Yeah sure it kills pests and riff raff.
But the pestilence….ugh.
As I said before….fear the cold not the warm.
That is way the AGW are so bass-ackwards and leading this world astray.
They got it all wrong.
CHRIS
(My name is Chris)
Norfolk, VA, USA
Weather Channel just had a home video of a kid in Ct. saying “This is just crazy, it’s snowing in OCTOBER. In OCTOBER! Holy Cr.. ” and more..
Looks like the folks who grew up in the last 15-20 years are having a certain amount of “reality reentry shock” 😉
Somehow I think it is going to get a lot easier to move the “young ones” from “it’s warming” to “it’s Dnmm COLD!”
Hmmm… So anyone over about 55-60 has “seen this before” what warming?
And anyone under about 25 to 30 will be “This is colder than it has ever been before!!” (in there life).
Looks to me like the “hard demographic” will be the 30-50 folks. Seen just enough cooler to say “this cold is just weather” but not enough to say “Ah, just like in the 1950’s…” and run through the indoctrination machine enough to be signed up as a “dedicated believer”. (The old folks tend to be more cynical, having seen more fads come and go; while the kids are more fickle and change with the seasons.)
It’s going to be fun watching reality set in. I predict the “old folks” will recognize it first, and the young folks will be just behind them in about 2 years. At that age, 2 years is forever… and being cold “forever” will bite.
Unfortunately, those late “boomers” and early gen-X ers and gen-ys are going to be stuck in the rut for a while.
4 billion (19:40:27) :Considering Arctic summer sea ice extent has rapidly decreased by over twenty percent over the last thirty years, it seems perfectly fair to expect this trend to continue leading to the ultimate result of nil summer ice coverage.
I just came from “the little room” where I lost 2 pounds in 2 minutes. It seems perfectly fair to expect this trend to continue to the ultimate result of nil me in about 3 hours.
The rate of decline is incredibly fast in Geological terms.
The rate of decline is incredibly fast in Dieting terms.
The problem with both these assertions is that they attempt to stretch a very “fast short term” event into a very long process, and it just is not a valid thing to do.
Look at the ice chart on the right bar. More ice forming, fast, every day. Next year will be even colder and even more ice. The PDO has flipped, and with it, the fate of the arctic.
If you would predict the arctic, you need a baseline of hundreds to thousands of years. 30 years is barely a hickup.
Bulldust (21:00:01) : Standard industry parlance I am afriad – dirty in the gas industry equates to a lot of non-hydrocarbon gas impurities (in Gorgon’s case, a lot oc CO2).
Capstone Turbine CPST makes a gas microturbine that runs directly on “dirty” gas. They make gen sets in 30 kW, 60 kw, and 200 kW IIRC and they can be “ganged” for larger capacities. Oil drillers are using their ruggedized units on drill rigs. Might consider just burning the gas and selling the electricity…
Oh, and they have a nice combined heat and power unit too. They put one in at my kids high school. The gas they were using to warm the swimming pool now provides a warm pool AND a lot of their electricity. Better solution than a cold pool or no pool… It’s been running a few years now. Air bearings don’t seem to wear much 😎
Neat picture of inside the turbine here:
http://www.capstoneturbine.com/prodsol/products/index.asp
Continuously or On-Demand
Stand alone or Grid Connect
Individually or Multi-pack
Run on a variety of fuels
Low or High Pressure Natural Gas
Biogas (landfill, wastewater treatment centers, anaerobic)
Flare gas
Diesel
Propane
Kerosene
Wish I had one… wish they made a 3 kw unit… Oh well.
Then again, if it gets cold enough…
Oh, and they have a hybrid engine package that fits in busses. Maybe I could get one in an RV 😎
hotrod (22:27:51) : The massive drop in ice recently was not due to temperature but due to changes in the prevailing winds pushing large amounts of ice out of the arctic basin. … The loss of ice was not due to melting but physical transport out of the arctic due to the wind.
Every time I hear this I wonder if running ice breakers up and down both Canada side and the Russian side contributes significantly to the breakup and flush. I’m certain that it will have an effect (destroy the anchor to land and it must let the ice drift or move easier). The part I don’t get is the magnitude.
Is it in the low single digit percents? The fractional millionths of a percent?
Is there even a way to know?
Gene,
“This comment assumes that there is proof this happened”
Yes, I provided the data.
“You seem to be stating that this can’t happen when there is a quiet sun.”
That’s not what I’m stating at all. Obviously it can happen if it did happen.
“I deduce from you that you have read a work that shows what happened from June to Sep (if indeed it did happen) happened “despite a solar ebb”.”
El Nino + GHGs.
The data, again:
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata/GLB.Ts+dSST.txt
If you thinkCopenhagen is cold now, wait til Al Gore goes
there! ( Gore Effect).
Juraj V. (23:36:48) O´really?
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com 008/03changing- artic_monthly_wx_review.png
http://i680.photobucket.com/albums/vv161/Radiant_2009 /popularmechanics1957-2.jpg
here is plot for coverage since 1900
http://espanol.wunderground.com/climate/SeaIce_Fig04.asp?MR=1
Of course we have no data to say if such a decrease in coverage has occurred over such a time period previously.
Correct. We have semi-reliable satellite data since 1978.
The graph above is bunk, since if NW Passage was passable in 1944, arctic sea ice could not be much higher than in 2007, 2008 and 2009.
On further searching for historical Arctic sea ice coverage I found this Data going back to 1953
http://nsidc.org/sotc/sea_ice.html
And this study going back to 1870,
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2008/2007GL032507.shtml
figure 8.13, found here, suggests ice coverage to be markedly lower now than any time in last 140 years
http://www.climatescience.gov/Library/sap/sap1-2/public-review-draft/sap1-2-prd-ch8.pdf
Juraj V. (23:36:48) :
O´really?
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/changing-artic_monthly_wx_review.png
http://i680.photobucket.com/albums/vv161/Radiant_2009/popularmechanics1957-2.jpg
here is plot for coverage since 1900
http://espanol.wunderground.com/climate/SeaIce_Fig04.asp?MR=1
Of course we have no data to say if such a decrease in coverage has occurred over such a time period previously.
Correct. We have semi-reliable satellite data since 1978.
The graph above is bunk, since if NW Passage was passable in 1944, arctic sea ice could not be much higher than in 2007, 2008 and 2009.
Kinnard et al 2008 studies arctic ice extent back to 1870, finding Arctic sea ice extent to be markedly lower now than any time in the last 133 years.
figure 8.13 shows results
http://www.climatescience.gov/Library/sap/sap1-2/public-review-draft/sap1-2-prd-ch8.pdf
4 Billions – I guess you and Kinnard et al have not seen the photo of the USS Skate when it surfaced at the North Pole March 17th 1959. Surfaced in MARCH of 1959 to VIRTUALLY NO ICE! At the North Pole. In March. Not July or August, MARCH! I could claim Santa Claus had his workshop there until 1940 using contrived graphs and misinformation, and without satellite observations this case could be argued. Let’s not lead with conjecture, let us lead with known and established facts first.
Interglacial John (06:50:04) :
4 Billions – I guess you and Kinnard et al have not seen the photo of the USS Skate when it surfaced at the North Pole March 17th 1959. Surfaced in MARCH of 1959 to VIRTUALLY NO ICE! At the North Pole. In March. Not July or August, MARCH! I could claim Santa Claus had his workshop there until 1940 using contrived graphs and misinformation, and without satellite observations this case could be argued. Let’s not lead with conjecture, let us lead with known and established facts first.
The image found here
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/04/26/ice-at-the-north-pole-in-1958-not-so-thick/
of the North pole, 18 May, 1987, when Sea ice extent was around 16 million km2,
http://nasadaacs.eos.nasa.gov/articles/2006/2006_seaice.html
shows there can be open water at North pole at sea ice coverage maximum. This invalidates the claim that Sea ice coverage must be lower in the 1920’s 40’s etc because open water was found at North pole, open water at North pole does not necessarily mean a diminished Sea ice extent.
The graph you deride is compiled from historical records of Ice charts and settlement records.
3rd Symposium on the Impacts of an Ice-Diminishing Arctic
on Naval and Maritime Operations
June 9-11, 2009
U.S. Naval Academy, Annapolis, MD
The 100-year historical record from ships and settlements going back to 1900 shows a decline in Arctic ice extent starting about 1950 and falling below pre-1950 minima after about 1975 [Naval Operations in an Ice Free Arctic, 2001]. According to satellite records available since late 1978, an overall downward trend in the extent of Arctic sea ice is present. This trend seems to have been accelerating during the last decade.
Perhaps the Navy is using contrived graphs and misinformation as well
Odd. Arctic ice was quite steady during the 1979-1998 warming. Yet you say it shrunk during the cool period from 1950 to 1975. And it has shrunk since 2002, another period of net cooling. I wonder what is at work, here.
4 billion (18:55:02),
The fact that you only post about the Arctic says it all. The key question concerns global ice extent, which is increasing, not your cherry-picked hemisphere: click
evanmjones (19:00:17) :
Odd. Arctic ice was quite steady during the 1979-1998 warming. Yet you say it shrunk during the cool period from 1950 to 1975. And it has shrunk since 2002, another period of net cooling. I wonder what is at work, here.
Can you point me in the direction of data showing Arctic ice was steady between 79-98,
Data showing Arctic sea ice wasn’t steady during 1979-98 can be found here.
http://nsidc.org/sotc/sea_ice.html
Smokey (20:29:18) :
4 billion (18:55:02),
The fact that you only post about the Arctic says it all. The key question concerns global ice extent, which is increasing, not your cherry-picked hemisphere: click
SH extent has increased 2.1% over thirty years, NH has decreased by 33.6%
Total increase in SH sea ice extent over last thirty years is 0.3927 million square K’s
Total decrease of NH sea ice extent over last thirty years is 2.35 million square K’s
Total decrease in Global ice extent over last thirty years is 1.9593 million square K’s
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/about_images.html
Some recent articles at…
http://www.iceagenow.com/Upcoming_winter_will_be_a_shocker_to_millions_across_the_world.htm
Upcoming winter will be a shocker to millions across the world
17 Oct 09 – (Excerpts) With all the heavy snow falling either out West over Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Colorado or over the Midwest ….and even the 20% snow cover across America and it’s only mid-October, is there anything more to all this than just a wacky pattern that appears every once in a while?
I have been amazed when I see “highs in the teens” and lows below zero this early. Not to mention the rarity of Billings, Montana recieving “4 straight days below freezing” The fact that Polebridge achieved a nighttime low of -13 degrees is remarkable for so early. The previous night saw -11 at Utica, Montana.
Denver is another amazing example of just how cold it’s been … a frigid high of just 26 degrees. ..The high there should be 69 degrees for this time of year!!
Countless records were broken for coldest, so early!
Is this a sign of a global cooling?
We have now seen records for BOTH SNOW AND COLD from the Rockies to Midwest and Lakes all the way to East with State College, Pa STILL getting snow this morning … Europe’s central region is getting blasted also by heavy, record-breaking snow and cold … as science is proving on many levels, the thermostat of earth is getting turned down…
Whether it be late summer arrivals with so called “freak April, May or June snowfalls” or “freak September, October snowfalls” … there has been a rapid cool down since throughout the year and I see an INCREASE in record snow and cold as well as record or unusual late season snow and cold…I believe Canada may be the first country in the Northern Hemisphere to say goodbye to global warming with cooling summers and rapidly growing colder winters. Major mountain ranges are seeing INCREASED SNOWFALL…
The large reaction to the Nina of 2008 is playing a role is the large-scale pattern that’s established now and is very dominant and will likely play a major role in this upcoming winter which I believe will be a real shocker to millions across the world…
The signs are all around us of large-scale, global changes to a cooling world. Each year for the next 20 years will see increasing snowfall and coverage that, in turn will reflect a vast portion of sun’s energy back to space, therefore creating a very cool world.In the next 20 years, we shall see new stunning cold records written, a new era of cold is arriving and this winter approaching may be the start to a trend.
See entire article, entitled “Is there something in all this early season cold and snow?”
http://truthbehindthescience.blogspot.com/2009/10/is-there-something-in-all-this-early.html
Thanks to Joe D’Aleo for this link
Chicago: Chilliest October in 133 years
15 Oct 09 – “Chicago’s average temperature over the month’s first 15 days slipped Thursday to 47.3-degrees—the city’s chilliest October open in the 133 years since 1876,” says WGN-TV Chief Meteorologist Tom Skilling.
See Chicago: Chilliest October in 133 years
http://www.iceagenow.com/Chicago-Chilliest_October_in_133_years.htm
For summer ice, you are right. (That’s definitely the biggest drop-off.)
For year-round ice, yes, it does go down a bit, on closer examination, but it doesn’t start to drop sharply until after 1998, which seems strange to me.
Look at the 3rd graph across.
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/
I have doubts about the pre-satellite record. There are reports of severe melting in the 1920s that do not show up in any way on the graphs I’ve seen. (If I recall correctly.)
Apologies to Smokey, I used September SH data, please ignore my post.
Smokey,
On further research, NH summer ice extent has decreased by 2.35 million square kilometers over thirty years, NH winter ice extent has decreased by 1.27 sqkm’s
SH summer ice extent has increased by 606000 square kilometers over thirty years. SH winter ice extent has increased by 392700 square km’s.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/index.php?report=global&year=2009&month=mar
So the Global sea ice extent during NH winter has decreased by 664000 sqkm’s and during NH summer has decreased by 1.957 million sqkm’s
4 billion (00:54:45),
The nsidc has been called to account for its fudging the numbers. Search the archives for Dr Walt Meier. Dr Meier is in a tough position. He has to toe his boss’s party line. But as has been shown, global sea ice is flat to rising; Arctic sea ice was declining, while Antarctic sea ice has been increasing. The NOAA’s own chart: click.
And Antarctic sea ice has been increasing a lot: click
Even the nsidc admits Antarctic sea ice is well above average: click.
Another excellent reference comes from the late, great John Daly: click.
John Daly passed away several years ago. The current increase in S.H. sea ice is shown here: click.
If you can spot a decline in Northern Hemisphere ice, please point it out to us: click.
You have to understand that there are big bucks involved with the reporting of sea ice extent. There is enormous pressure to show alarming ice loss. So government funded agencies “adjust” the charts: click [it’s a blink gif, give it time to load].
In reality, the current climate is very benign. There is nothing unusual occurring: click.
Summer ice extent is irrelevant. According to the AGW hypothesis, global warming should show up in the winter [and at high latitudes, and at night], not in the summer. But winter ice extent doesn’t support AGW, so they show summer sea ice instead.
Finally, it should be remembered that changes in sea ice extent are a function of wind. A global change in temperature of 0.6° C over the past century is not sufficient to melt millions of square kilometers of ice. Rather, wind blows the sea ice into warmer waters, where it melts. AGW has little or nothing to do with sea ice extent.
Smokey (06:03:14) :
Summer ice extent is irrelevant. According to the AGW hypothesis, global warming should show up in the winter [and at high latitudes, and at night], not in the summer. But winter ice extent doesn’t support AGW, so they show summer sea ice instead.
NH Winter extent has decreased by 1.27 million skm’s
You have to understand that there are big bucks involved with the reporting of sea ice extent. There is enormous pressure to show alarming ice loss. So government funded agencies “adjust” the charts: click [it’s a blink gif, give it time to load].
Seems a bit extreme to say that NOAA, NSIDC are adjusting charts to overstate Arctic Ice loss. No doubt accidents happen.
Finally, it should be remembered that changes in sea ice extent are a function of wind. A global change in temperature of 0.6° C over the past century is not sufficient to melt millions of square kilometers of ice. Rather, wind blows the sea ice into warmer waters, where it melts. AGW has little or nothing to do with sea ice extent.
Ice extent is not solely a function of wind, it is also a function of water temperature, and atmospheric temperature. It should also be noted the Arctic has been warming at greater rate than the rest of the globe, I also note that the Arctic was as warm in the 1940’s as today (though this is pre-satellite data obviously)
http://www.junkscience.com/MSU_Temps/Arctic1880-2004_3.gif
Graphic of Arctic ice and Arctic sea SST
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/GW_4CE_PolarIceCaps_files/image010.jpg
Walter Meier on causes of Arctic ice decline and warming
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/10/16/nsidcs-dr-walt-meier-answers-reader-questions-on-sea-ice/#more-3704
The warming of the last 30 years cannot be attributed primarily to the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) or the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO). The AMO does not have a significant influence on the Arctic. On the Atlantic, side, the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO)-a regional expression of the Arctic Oscillation (AO)-is the most influential mode of variability in the Arctic. As I’ve mentioned previously, there are natural variations in climate that do indeed affect Arctic temperatures in the Arctic and the sea ice. The NAO/AO is a particularly prominent one and a substantial amount of the decline in the sea ice during the late 1980s and early 1990s could be attributed to a strong positive mode during winters because the positive mode favors the loss of thicker ice that is less likely to melt during summer.
However, since about 1995, the AO has mainly been in a neutral or negative state. Under such conditions, the Arctic sea ice should have started to recover. Instead, sea ice extent has not only continued downward, but the decline rate has accelerated. The AO may have been a “trigger” for the precipitous decline, but we wouldn’t have the ongoing decline without the documented warming trend (Lindsay and Zhang, 2005).
I am looking at the maximum snow-depth. It is rather large for this early in the season.
So what we have here are a bunch of remote sensing stations placed in many hundreds of locations all over the US to complement the existing weather stations. At least one of them was placed in a location that experienced the beginning of a new glacier. In 2003 the snow-depth at that location was less than 23 in. Now it is 728.8 inches. That this is glacier pack snow can be seen in the fact that it’s water equivalent is 403.4 inches, which means that more than half the snowpack over the years has been converted to ice. Another strong indicator that some glaciers disappear, others get formed and grow.
Is this observation right?