Henrik Svensmark collapses at Copenhagen

So glad to learn of Svensmark’s recovery. He is a hero among researchers. I’m going to mail out a Get Well / Appreciation card first thing Monday; I hope he receives hundreds more in kind.
Henrik Svensmark,
Danish Space Research Institute, Juliane Maries Vej 30,
DK-2100 Copenhagen.
Phone +45 3532 5741 Fax +45 3536 2475
Email: hsv@dsri.dk

Genuine good wishes to Mr Svensmark.
My disagement with his positions >.——————————————–<

Hope that Dr.Svensmark recovers fully from his pacemaker incident.

Poor guy – hope he recovers fully.

My father has a defibrillator that engages when condition it’s meant to combat manifests itself…it doesn’t happen very often, maybe twice, but it looks like that. Hopefully he fully recovers.

Pacemakers, as a rule, do not fail. But they can be messed up by microwaves. Hence, the warning on convenience store doors that a microwave oven is in use. This is to avoid complications for pacemaker patients.
Microwave generation requires a focusing attenna. So, a microwave generator is essentially a microwave gun with razor-sharp accuracy.

Reading the translation of the article I suspect he has a implanted defibrillator.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implantable_cardioverter-defibrillator

Any word on his condition?

What up with the guy who touches him just before he fell?

Glad to hear he’s ok. Pretty tough crowd there, might make me skip a heartbeat.

The Edgar family wishes Dr. Svensmark a prompt and speedy recovery, Also, Thanks Erik for the mailing address, we’ll be sending a card as well.

Oh my god. 🙁

The link must have caused my comment to be eaten by the filter.
Reading the link at the end of the post it sounds like he has an implanted defibrillator.
[Reply: several comments were in the spam filter. They’re posted now. ~dbs, mod]

David P (15:59:41) : My father has a defibrillator…
Right. It was the defibrillator doing its job. I wish you all the best Dr. Svensmark. I saw your excellent TV documentary – fantastic piece of work!

Best wishes and a full recovery for Dr Svensmark.

Glad to hear he is doing better.

I wish Dr Svensmark a speedy recovery, hopefully it looked worse than it really was and the defibrillator worked well.

That was obviously a high stress situation, and as many others have said, Get well Dr. Svensmark!
Larry

Yes, the defib did its job. My wife had a defibrillator/pacemaker and although it never went off, she was advised it would feel like a mule kick in the chest if it did.

My best wishes for a speedy recovery to him and his family.

Best wishes for a speedy and complete recovery!

I offer my sincere wishes for a swift recovery and a return robust good health!
As for those who think there is some sort of “justice” in this I can think of no worse punishment than to be them.

Worked under contract at a local pacemaker maker (there are THREE in Minnesota) for about a year.
Contract involved “radiation effects on semiconductors”.
Primary problem, cosmic ray induced neutrons.
Lots of exposure to cosmic ray intensities, variations, etc.
Lots of background in pacemakers too as a result of the work. One article said Dr. Svensmark has a “brachycardia”.
I hope this is the case! The first implanted human was Arne Larson (from Sweden) in the mid ’50’s. Arne had brachy and was 43 at the time. Wise move for Arne, he lived to be 86. (So I think Dr. Svensmark’s prognosis is good.)
Irony is that cosmic rays can effect everything from climate to pacemakers.
One other great thing to know however, is that unlike the simple pulse generator first installed on Arne Larson, the modern pacemaker has a vastly capable microcomputer in it. Unless it fell into “safe mode” for some reason, the likelihood is that the whole incident was “caught” on the recording function in the pacemaker. Henrik’s cardiology team will probably be able to make some changes which may keep this from happening again.
GodSpeed Dr. Svensmark. Remember: WE NEED YOU!

dorlomin (17:14:28) :
I offer the best of wishes to Henrik. A credit to science.
Hear hear!

Copenhagen stalls decision on catastrophic climate change for six years
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/copenhagen/article6955237.ece

Please do everything to keep the real scientist healthy!!!

Ron de Haan (17:46:00) :
Copenhagen stalls decision on catastrophic climate change for six years.
Now if only the EPA were to review the IPCC conclusions before they decide to regulate.

God’s blessings to you, Dr. Svensmark. Swift recovery.

My Prayer is that Dr. Svensmark receive a hasty recovery and a complete restoration of health. God bless him.
Bill Derryberry

at risk of calling it too early, REASON WINS !
Ron de Haan (17:46:00) :
Copenhagen stalls decision on catastrophic climate change for six years
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/copenhagen/article6955237.ece
i hope this is right.

Speedy recovery for Henrik. You must get better soon. We desperately need and appreciate great talent like yourself.
I have read the Chilling Stars by Nigel Calder and I am very supportive of the research that Henrik is doing. I appreciate his efforts to try and shed new light on the complex climate conundrum. Whether he is right or wrong on his hypothesis – the book and several papers I have had the pleasure of reading suggest that he is a very very very very very rare breed these days, almost an extinct race, a true scientist!
Sadly I cannot say the same for the vast majority of politically or industry motivated nonsense out there that is couched as “science”…but Henrik is a bright bright light….may he recover and continue to shine!

I don’t want to watch the vid–my dad also had one of those, and it was grim when it occasionally went off. But it did what it was supposed to do and saved his life, more than once.
Thank God for modern medicine.

All best wishes and a speedy recovery to Dr. Svensmark .

I pray for the speediest of recoveries for the good Doctor!

It’s been a strange time in Denmark this year.

As long as he is ok, that’s the main thing.
I’d say Dr Svensmark will be cursing his luck at the timing of this ill turn of health.
It’s not often one gets a world hearing as an AGW skeptic or as a ordinary scientist slogging through the thankless task of presenting new concepts to hostile colleagues.

Well, my Jesus argument wasn’t that good. The cosmoclimatology is better.

Finally I get a percentage accurate or not. Dr. Svensmark included.
“The solar-cloud theory holds that changes in the sun’s activity produce changes in the earth’s cloud cover. Remember, the sunspot index has a very strong 79 percent correlation with our thermometer record over the past 160 years. The CO2 correlation with our temperatures is a meager 22 percent.”
Why not the Sun;
http://americandaily.com/index.php/article/2812

I really like stories like this. They are not boring like what comes out of the New York Times.
“The impact of the CRU e-mail release has been no less than extraordinary, particularly since the story was limited almost exclusively to the net for the first two weeks. The legacy media, without exception and in a process that we have become inured to, sat on the story, evidently in the hope that it would go away. (This started even before the story proper did. A month prior to the e-mail release, BBC reporter Paul Hudson was offered the files but refused to acknowledge them. We’re getting close to the point where the dictionary definition of “journalist” will have to be altered to read, “A media personality who attempts to stifle news stories out of cowardice, ideology, or for pay.”) But as we’ve also come to expect, the story instead traveled from server to server and screen to screen, bypassing newspapers, broadcast and cable news — with the exception of Fox — and all other conventional “news” sources. If the Net had been available as a mature instrument as far back as the 60s, recent history would have unfolded very differently. ”
The Wages of Climategate
http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/12/the_wages_of_climategate.html

Conspiracy Busts are so much more entertaining.

Anthony, I’ve sent him an email wishing him well. I hope all WUWT readers will do the same. Kind regards

So sorry to here what happened to such a great guy – one of the few to buck ‘consensus’ climate rubbish and do some real experimental science.
Here’s wishing him a full and speedy recovery.

Bad morning because of this news.
I met Svensmark a week+ ago in Berlin where he gave an excellent talk about cosmoclimatology – also including very cool animations.
Wishing him a full recovery. I am gonna to see my doctor now, to check my broken rib. Of course, it was broken by a tip of a hockey stick 😉 three weeks ago – and one probably can’t quite exclude some correlation of Svensmark’s incident with the ungracious stories taking place in most of Copenhagen, too.

Something needs to be done about the Weather Channel. They never stop spewing their global warming propaganda. The Antarctic is now melting, maybe we could ship the USA’s blizzard snow to the Antarctic. Do they even question the reason for the last two year’s early blizzard seasons?

In other news,
NASA: “Earth’s upper atmosphere is heated less by the sun and it is therefore less “puffed up.”
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2009/01apr_deepsolarminimum.htm
OK, so it’s old news. Don’t get all puffed up.

I wonder how many are there in Copenhagen with the thought, “In an odd way this is cheering news!”
Svensmark is an amazing scientist. Not just for grief he has endured for dare suggesting something that suggests that their might be other factors that contribute to climate change besides what is allowed within the current AGW orthodoxy/canon – not because he didn’t jump, with glazed over eyes onto the mindless, mantra-spewing activist bandwagon. Svensmark has been remarkable in keeping his composure, and quick, unlike the AGW crowd, to understate his own certainty.
I wish him a very speedy recovery.

Michael (22:21:43) :
“Something needs to be done about the Weather Channel.”
I’m planning on shooting it. But I’m going to wait till Xmas cause I might get a plasma tv.

Michael (18:57:45) :

Query;
Are successive years of reduced irradiation due to solar minimum Cumulative?

In terms of joules of energy, no. You need to look at it from a thermodynamics perspective. Cooling is the same as warming except that outgoing radiation exceeds incoming instead of visa-versa. The size of the imbalance varies over time subject to all the same climate mechanisms in play as for warming. And the same unknowns!
There’s a long way to go before assertions can be made about a solar minimum that may or may not persist. Fundamental physics still needs to be done to prove Svensmark’s cosmic ray mechanism. Watch this recent video about the CLOUD project at CERN to see where things are at about now.
Even if the results vindicate Svensmark’s theory in principle, quantitative evidence of its operation in the atmosphere is still required. CLOUD may suggest what to look for and where best to find it but that could take years. For what it’s worth (and I’m no scientist), when all that’s done I wouldn’t be at all surprised we still don’t have the full picture. Don’t make a leap of faith as others would have you do for the extent of CO2’s role.
The Independent’s conclusion writes off a hypothesis still in play in favour of one that’s already been falsified by Lindzen & Choi’s ERBE based quantitative evidence + inadequate correlation with the temperature record. A “travesty” indeed, never mind Climategate.

I wish Dr. Henrik Svensmark a speedy recovery. I am a proud owner of his book The Chilling Stars, which is an excellent read. I would highly recommend that regular visitors here purchase a copy.

Glenn (23:21:02)
Excellent, is that the sound of banjos in the background?
I loved the story about the guy who shot his mower, ‘I can do that, it’s my mower and my yard!’ A real life version of ‘The Straight Story’.
And the one who tried to get the wheel (lug?) nuts off with a shotgun but got hit by the ricochet when they fought back.

What would Phil Jones say?

In a way, this is cheering news

I hope he recovers. He doesn’t look well in that photo. There’s a small fanclub on facebook, if anyone is interested.
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/group.php?gid=7803307909

For the comfort of fellow bloggers distressed by the video and I believe without impinging too much on Dr Svensmark’s privacy, he appears to have experienced 3 shocks from an implanted defibrillator, one while seated, second while leaning on the bench and third while lying down off camera.
These shocks are administered by a defibrillator (AICD) the size of a mobile phone implanted under the skin in people prone to lethal cardiac rhythms, who may have heart disease or may be otherwise perfectly well – may even be professional athletes.
If the device detects the heart rhythm suddenly accelerating to dangerously rapid rates or enter a lethal disorganized rhythm called ventricular fibrillation, they charge a capacitor and discharge up to 700 Joules across the heart to restore normal rhythm, often saving the person’s life. The person typically reports being “kicked in the chest by a mule”, but is OK to walk within a minute or two of the incident. Occasionally if the person gets very excited and raises his heart rate rapidly and the device is not set perfectly, a shock can be delivered “inappropriately” causing pain but no harm (it is possible this happened in this case). The devices have capacity to deliver several hundred shocks.
The reason I explain this, is threefold:
1. Dr Svensmark was probably and thankfully not in as big a danger as it appeared and is likely to return to his excellent work very quickly.
2. The video actually shows a wonderful event – the pinnacle of advanced medical technology intervening to save a person’s life, which previously more often than not used to lead to tragic sudden cardiac death of a young person.
…and finally, at the risk of being slightly opportunistic,
3. When one person’s life is at stake, the science and claims of efficacy of medical devices such as the defibrillator are extensively tested by an independent almost adversarial FDA, and research and manufacturing facilities are regularly inspected without notice by government investigators some of whom carry firearms. They spend days inspecting every and any document for compliance with quality standards and for fraud. We and the government expect nothing less, and it has been so for decades. Why, oh why, is Climate Science excused from any of this scrutiny. Why is it blindly accepted even in the face of evidence of compromise of quality from ClimateGate and well before that, when it will affect the lives of millions, possibly billions of people. I just don’t understand it.
I sincerely hope that Dr Svensmark is as well as I hope and I wish him a speedy recovery.

All the best Mate!
regards
Michael

I think that the UK Telegraph is one of the more balanced newspapers. They even have an item on the “alternative” COP15 here:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/copenhagen-climate-change-confe/6762640/Copenhagen-climate-summit-global-warming-caused-by-suns-radiation.html
where Svensmark is quoted: “Professor Henrik Svensmark, a physicist at the Danish National Space Center in Copenhagen, said the recent warming period was caused by solar activity.
He said the last time the world experienced such high temperatures, during the medieval warming period, the Sun and the Earth were in a similar cycle.”
Lord Monckton is also busy at work: “Lord Monckton, a former adviser to Margaret Thatcher, said he was speaking to delegations from the US and Canada about question marks over the science. ”
In view of the Timesonline article quoted above things seem to be happening that may first modify and then perhaps eventually nullyfy the IPCC position if global temperatures start declining and HAD/CRU & GISS/NASA temperature timeseries are analysed and any bias removed.

Two articles in the UK newspaper “The Independent” today – one on the front page! Both purporting to debunk Svensmark, although no evidence is given – just the some “trustme, I’m a scientist” stuff from the usual suspects.
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/sunspots-do-not-cause-climate-change-say-scientists-1839867.html
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/sun-sets-on-sceptics-case-against-climate-change-1839875.html

Dr. Henrik Svensmark is one of many respected scientists that have integrity in this field. The reactions from some betray their clouded and muddled thinking. We must have always open debate and scrutiny. I wish him well.

Hmm … interesting link posted in one of the comments at the Independent:
http://www.pepke.dk/BerlingskeTidende.pdf

[quote]Something needs to be done about the Weather Channel. They never stop spewing their global warming propaganda.[/quote]
The Weather Channel is owned by NBC, which is in turn owned by GE. GE also owns GE Energy which stands to make a fortune off of carbon credits and various government grants for “green power” like hydro, electric and solar.
The stance the MSM has taken regarding the climate isn’t based on science or even politics. It’s based on cash. See this video for more details:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bdneX1djD0

Sorry Anthony, I always had a high regard for your ethical way of moderating this blog, but the posting of this video I find insensitive, sensationalistic and a demonstration of poor taste.
REPLY: If it were a covert video, or one filmed privately I’d agree with you. However this video was aired on live public television, seen by millions. Reality is sometimes distasteful. And of note, I did not post this to YouTube, where it will get thousands more views, without the simple caveat like I posted.
Why then did you click below the “read more” line and ignore the warning I posted? -A

Please Henrik, get well. We need you and we need you fit.

I hope Mr. Svensmark makes a speedy recovery. We need him and the power of his sound mind making the case. Get well soon, sir.
Also, re: Copenhagen being delayed; How can they delay it if there is imminent catastrophe if we don’t do SOMETHING, LIKE YESTERDAY! IT MAY BE TOO LATE ALREADY!!! AHHHH!!!! But wait, lets get together again in six years!, I know they have no shame, or even integrity, but do they think that the world has no common sense?

REPLY Anthony: “Why then did you click below the “read more” line and ignore the warning I posted? -A”
With all due respect, I find this a gratuitous response. Maybe I saw it on Youtube or on TV or, for what it is worth, I may be someone with a hunger for sensationalism, but that does not justify for the WUWT to feed that hunger.

I did not watch the video and felt ashamed that I did not. I don’t see how a good man suffering can be thought as “sensational.” I pray that he recovers quickly.

I have read:
”Solar activity and Terrestrial Climate: An analysis of some purported correlations” by Peter Laut
Reply by Henrik Svensmark:
Comments on Peter Laut’s paper: ”Solar Activity and terrestrial climate: an analysis of some purported correlations”
Peters reply to the reply:
Comments by Peter Laut on: Henrik Svensmark’s Comments on Peter Laut’s paper: ‘Solar activity and terrestrial climate: an analysis of some purported correlations’
After reading Peter Laut’s papers I’m absolutely astonished of the brutal language he uses in his articles. I’m equally repulsed by people reffering to Peter Laut’s work, as if it were scientific. I dont know how serious the ”Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics” are, but the posting of the first article mentioned above, do not bode well.
I am a physicist, though with my speciality in another field (nuclear), I do understand everything Henrik Svensmark writes in his reply. He explains each accusation (which CAN be explained) made by Laut exact and to the point. In his second attack on Svensmark Laut seem even more agitated and foul-mouthed.
I would suggest a thorough going-through of the before mentioned papers by someone posessing the adequate skills. If the conclusion is, as for me, that ”Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics” should dedact the approval of Peter Laut’s paper, a petition should be started.
Sorry for any and all bad grammar (I’m Norwegian).
HLx

I’ll add a me too to the get well soon notes, and for those not familiar with the Dr. Svensmark I found this article to be a useful introduction/overview:
http://discovermagazine.com/2007/jul/the-discover-interview-henrik-svensmark

So Stockholm has now become a select few of the selected few. Who would have thought that international governmental co-operation and a prescribed dictat would have such insenstivity, such exclusivity? Dr. Svensmark may now be unable to take part in this for now, but whose loss is it? A more open international debate should have taken place, it was never to be. Perhaps another time another place, another organiser. After all some of us do not adhere to the world drowning itself or being fried in a few years time.
———————————————————-
United Nations Kicks NGOs Out of COP-15 Climate Conference
Washington DC: The United Nations announced today it is permanently
banning thousands of accredited non-governmental organizations from
the COP-15 climate conference in Copenhagen.
The restriction was announced today outside the Copenhagen conference
center after several thousand accredited NGO conference delegates,
including three from the National Center for Public Policy Research,
waited outside for eight hours or longer in 32-degree F temperatures
for admission.
NGOs apparently are being banned because the United Nations
accredited 45,000 people for a building with a capacity of 15,000,
although the stated reason was “security concerns.” The “security
concerns” may be related to the fact that, after waiting several
hours in the cold, delegations began to chant, “Let us in! Let us in!”
“To be an “accredited” or “admitted” NGO to a COP conference, NGOs
must apply months in advance, and typically only make travel plans to
attend after receiving complete credentials from the United Nations,”
said Amy Ridenour, president of the National Center for Public Policy
Research, an accredited COP-15 NGO organization that is as of now
banned from the conference. “To give credentials to 45,000 people
while choosing a building that holds 15,000 people is insane, though
the United Nations, to be fair, has never been known for competence.”
“What makes this an even greater travesty,” said Ridenour, ” is the
COP-15 conference ostensibly is trying to find ways to reduce the
burning of fossil fuels. If 30,000 people fly to Copenhagen for no
reason, doesn’t that put unnecessary greenhouse gases into the
atmosphere?”
Ridenour has formally asked the U.N., which is permitting some NGOs
to have many delegates inside while others are permitted none, to
limit each NGO to one representative as long as space limitations
remain a concern.
“Some of these NGO delegations are from rich countries like our own,”
said Ridenour, “but for some NGOs, raising the funds to attend a
conference in Copenhagen is a real financial hardship. The least the
U.N. can do is let in at least one member of these delegations so all
of their money won’t be wasted.”
For more information, visit http://www.nationalcenter.org or call.
Contact: David Almasi at (202) 543-4110 or
dalmasi@nationalcenter.org, or Judy Kent at (703) 759-7476 or
jkent@nationalcenter.org
_____________________________________________________________________________

Shocking – very best wishes for a full recovery Dr Svensmark. Climate Science needs you.

Thank God for modern medicine.

Another contradiction…

Well, if they delay action for 6 years from now…perhaps we will have moved to a solar maximum by then, with warmer temps and more hurricanes, eh? It sounds like a backhanded compliment to Dr. Svensmark’s work to me. Of course, even if we have 6 more years of cooling, that also sounds like a backhanded compliment to Dr. Svensmark’s work–a verification, that is.

His work is great only just watching his video now and thought I would check to see if he had been threatened at all… I hope he recovers fully… It was definately a warning to him from the likes of Maurice strong… no 2 ways about it.
Peace