River ice in Alaska: "pretty good proxy for climate change in the 20th century"

Backing Smokey backing Peter Hartley
Don’t forget the late (and missed) John Daly’s comment on this event:
http://www.john-daly.com/nenana.htm
John Daly noticed a significant increase in snowfall over the time of the Nenana Ice Classic, as well as the UHI effect. Snow would tend to destabilize the ice causing dynamic breakup. Daly noted gross cherrypicking of dates for the 2001 paper “Climate Change in Non-traditional Data Sets” plus its publication date timed for a climate conference. A whole catalogue of bad science.

OT anybody following the Catlin Arctic Survey? http://www.catlinarcticsurvey.com
These people are pretty amusing. My niece makes better preparations for going to the mall than they did before attempting to walk to the north pole. Sure hope nobody gets hurt and they achieve all their objectives, which seem to primarily be finding ways to make climate models appear to be accurate.

Don S: I think that Arctic expedition was mentioned here. Apparently the most important part of a modern global warming expedition is a blog. They’re using a satellite phone for public events, while “navigation is being conducted by means of more traditional methods, relying on the position of the sun and wind direction.” Yeah, sure this is a scientific expedition. Scientists would be using GPS for navigation and precise sample measurement. Indeed, there is mention of a GPS beacon which the base can access, but not a navigational device.

Yes indeed Anthony…

George said:
So I gather that Alaska has some sort of gravity shielding dome over it that prohibits tidal forces from operating in the State ? That’s a pretty cool trick if you can pull it off.
Here in California, we have lots of places that aren’t near any coast; but they still get their fair share of earthquakes that get triggered during the proper tidal phases. And they pretty much come on schedule just when that USGS outcast Jim Berquist (I think that’s his name) says they will.
Maybe California should ask Obama for a gravity shield too.”
George, your faith in the man is astonishing! But you could give it a shot; he should have time to look into it pretty soon.
Would you actually want one?
I think the problem with the tidal method of moving ice in northern rivers would be an inadequacy of “proper tidal phases” to provide a break-up phenomonen for each of hundreds of tributaries and main courses, and all at somewhat different times. Then, of course, there are the lakes that would require a hell of a surge, maybe a couple of weeks later. But then, if you’ve got that schedule you were talking about, you could clean up on all the little lotteries from Whitehorse to Marshall. You’d have to get Sarah to reinstate gravity. Come to think of it, she must have started on that already as the snow-melt seems to consistently flow down into the rivers, some years earlier than others.

Tonyb, Shawn, Don
It reminds me a bit of the Lewis Pugh expedition last summer. Remember that? He was going to Kayak to the N pole to raise awareness about how the Arctic ice had all melted. Except that he got stuck in the ice having only got 1/10 of the way there 🙂
Of course this fact was never reported in the media, though his enthusiastic start was.

TonyB,Shawn,AnonyMouse:
My mind presented analogies to Shackelton and Scott when I first read the communications from the Catlin team, as it did last year when the abortive kayak trip took place. TonyB, I concur completely that no actual science is likely to be accomplished on this venture. Pen Hadow is the sole redeeming factor on the expediton, but I wouldn’t go elk hunting involving a six mile walk in the Montana snow with a flask I couldn’t open with my gloves on. Nor would I take gear I had to sleep with in order to keep it functional.

George,
I spent the winter of 1978 camped on the Klondike, chopping holes in the ice for drinking water. By the time spring came, I was hauling water from the far side of the river because I was hitting gravel on my side at a depth of about four feet. The outside bow of the river was deeper because the water runs faster.
A couple of years prior to that I had been the first of the year to put my boat in the Yukon at the abandoned settlement of Minto. I’d been camped on the bank for about 3 days waiting for the ice to go out. There were a few others camped there at the time, waiting to do the wilderness paddle down to Dawson 200 miles away. We knew the river was going to open because it was Spring and the snow had been melting. Snow melts, swells river under ice, ice breaks and is carried downstream, piling up in noisy, enormous jams that are terrifying to approach in a canoe.
It would take more than one beer to convince me that the moon has any more to do with break-up than it does with germination of radish seeds.
I’m sure you’ve seen Mike Monce’s elegant handling of gravity on the “Heavy” thread.
As for LarsenB, of course, that makes sense. In the arctic, even more so, perhaps.

Catlin Arctic Survey
Total distance travelled
28.89 km
Average daily distance
2.9 km
Estimated distance to North Pole
925.63 km
Time on Arctic Ocean
10 days
Now they seem to be going backwards.
Total distance travelled
26.67 km
Average daily distance
2.42 km
Estimated distance to North Pole
927.85 km
Time on Arctic Ocean
11 days

Looks like it is getting close to breaking up. They are predicting this weekend as local conditions have been in the upper 70s recently.