Above: Photo taken at eye level of a sign already elevated because of seasonal snow issues. See below for photo of sunken boats in Valdez harbor due to snow loading.
The Valdez Alaska Dispatch writes:
All the experts say the effects of climate change will be felt most in Alaska, home of the ex-governor who contends climate change is no big deal.
Good thing she wasn’t in Valdez this week when the citizenry got buried under a record snowfall. We’re not talking about your ordinary little dump here. That was in Copenhagen, where world leaders were meeting to discuss what to do about global warming and the Bloomberg news service was warning that Barack Obama and the rest would “face freezing weather as a blizzard dumped 10 centimeters (4 inches) of snow on the Danish capital overnight.”
Valdez, Alaska got more than four inches per hour at the height of the snowstorm that began there Monday and ran through the week. By the time the citizens of Alaska’s only oil port finally caught a break, the snow was piled 5 feet, 8 inches deep.
Yes, you read right.
Five feet, 8 inches; over the head of your average American woman, up the nose of your average American man. The National Weather Service called it record.
================================
So much snow that snow loads sunk one boat in the harbor while other owners try to keep up with snow removal.
From NBC TV in Washington DC:
History has been made in Washington, DC also. The snow has already broken the 1 day record for DC. The old record of 11.5″ on December 17,1932 is now in 2nd place since National Airport has over 15″ with snow still falling. This storm is now in 6th place all-time and the February 1983 storm total of 16.6″ may yet be eclipsed.
h/t SPPI
Is “El Gordo” (the fat one) visiting Alaska?
This is last thing we need:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/12/20/philippines.volcano/
It is cold enough as it is. Global warming, bring it on!
Remember everyone this cooling is really just part of the warming.
5’8″ of Global Warming OMG… it’s just like The Day After Tomorrow right?
So poetic!
HAM Weather map of Dec 19 snow records in USA
http://mapcenter.hamweather.com/records/7day/us.html?c=maxtemp,mintemp,lowmax,highmin,snow
JonesII:
No, Gordon Brown is off round the world trying to make the ‘Copenhagen accord’ legaly binding.
He would like this done within six months.
I bet he does,With a coming general election that will see the buffoon outed.
A Nobel prize awaits Gordon while the next British Prime minister has to rebuild the UKs shattered economy with one arm tied behind his back.
Selfish bastard socialism at its best.
It is something to read the comments the Alaska Dispatch got, after it began its article with,
“All the experts say the effects of climate change will be felt most in Alaska, home of the ex-governor who contends climate change is no big deal. Good thing she wasn’t in Valdez this week when the citizenry got buried under a record snowfall…”
It looks like the general public is getting fed up with the MSM bull.
Cue the “more frequent extreme weather events are consistent with the theory of global warming” quote.
All the experts say the effects of climate change will be felt most in Alaska, home of the ex-governor who contends climate change is no big deal.
—-
Um, no, in fact, former Governor Palin established a sub-cabinet while governor specifically to address climate change. Try again.
Headline (breathlessly)
“Clinton and Obama stop global warming by buying off UN with 100 billion per year, effects felt immediately in Valdez ” Pachauri in full agreement with hand extended.
Gaia strikes again!
The sunken boat is a reminder why those brave man in “The deadliest Catch” need to hammer ice of their boat now and then.
Overhere in the Netherlands we got somewhere between 4 and 8 inches of globalwarming. Wich in Dutch terms translates as (almost) no public transport, even the highways are still frozen and snowed under so every official institute warns not to go from home unless it is really nessecary. And on top this, no pizza-deliveries because of the road-conditions, oh noes.
In Germany we just had one of the coldest December weekends in a long time.
Supposed to get milder in the days ahead. But the 15 day forecast shows colder than normal temps.
Oh look, Barry and Flash Gordon are so good that in 24 hours they’ve already overdone it. Could someone leave them a memo to turn up the Sun slightly; I’m already chilly.
Oh, while your at it, ask Barry to part the Atlantic please. I’m due on a plane to DC, but I’m afraid of hitting a patch of turbulent global warming.
vukcevic (08:55:32) :
Joe Bastardi (from 12/11/09) on ‘the triple crown of cooling’— ocean currents, solar activity, volcanic activity
8 minute video
http://www.foxbusiness.com/search-results/m/27870481/the-real-problems-with-climate-change.htm#q=imus+bastardi
The way the intro to the article reads, I think the Dispatch is attributing the heavy snowfall to “climate change”. No mention if its human caused or not. Anyway, no matter what the weather, they can always attribute it to climate change. How convenient.
With the population’s short attention span, the last “weather” wins. Tough tulips, carbonophobes!
Ex governor Palin has pretty broad shoulders, I’m sure she’ll take the Dispatch’s misinformed jibe, so as to let them save face….. She’s that sort of person, she’ll give ’em a wink though.
Alaskan’s are really gonna need that gas pipelines revenue and gas if the winters start getting harsher. Palin helped that happen.
They can hide declines on graphs but they can’t hide real snow, although they have proved it to be Rotten…
It is still quite chilly in Europe http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8423442.stm
Record fall in Valdez, Alaska: 5′ 8″ of snow and 10′ of BS.
Coldest 20th December since 1981 here in Germany, as i just read in the news. Keeps snowing. German leftists (Greens and Social Democrats) fuming about failure of COP15 to save mankind, mention future suffering of children and children of children (What surprise), ignore cold conditions (Weather being no climate).
I’m kinda worried about the vinyards in New Foundland and along Hadrians wall in north England.
Are they still around?
John Philips,
“The way the intro to the article reads, I think the Dispatch is attributing the heavy snowfall to “climate change”. No mention if its human caused or not. Anyway, no matter what the weather, they can always attribute it to climate change. How convenient.”
Could this be a reference to a new cooling trend?
JonesII (08:54:46) : “Is “El Gordo” (the fat one) visiting Alaska?”
I believe in this case is should be spelled El Goredo.
Things here in the Pac NW are setting up for another cold snap me thinks… All that cold in AK is shifting South. Look for another cold ridge to form as far South as N. Cal. (possibly) 8>)
Record cold in Switzerland. “La Brévine” in the Jura is a valley which acts like a bowl for the cold air. With -34.2 °C they recorded the coldest December temperature since 2001 when it was -37.8°C.
Lucerne -16.1°C, the lowest in December sind 1931.
Meteo Switzerland expects a temperature upswing by almost 20°C byi Tuesday.
you know, there is a difference between weather and climate? That we have winter storms in the US in December, doesn´t mean there is no GW. 😉
As it’s buried (= snowed under) in a thread below, it gives me great pleasure to repost the link to this timely cartoon, which appeared in yesterday’s TIMES:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00661/TTM191901CC_RGB_ONL_661678a.jpg
photon without a Higgs (09:41:14) :
“Joe Bastardi (from 12/11/09) on ‘the triple crown of cooling’— ocean currents, solar activity, volcanic activity”
Yes, Solar activity, volcanoes, ocean currents and I believe geomagnetic field, they all have contribution, forget CO2 (it’s all a political propaganda, and believe me, I do know one when I see it).
Where the Sun may be heading is not a pretty scenario for next 20-30 years,
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/LP-project1.gif http://www.vukcevic.co.uk/GandF.htm)
but the geomagnetic may save us from the worst. I’ve just started looking into oceans’ currents; here is first chapter of my initial attempt http://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/41/83/04/PDF/NATA.pdf
We all have to do our bit in our own way, may not be right most of the time, but there is always a chance to come up with something worthwhile.
For most of the taxpayers may be – the people vs. power.
Thousands stranded by Eurostar as chief executive ‘cannot guarantee’ when service will resume.
It is thought that the “extremely acute” wintry conditions in northern France caused snow to build up underneath the trains.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/topics/weather/6851657/Thousands-stranded-by-Eurostar-as-chief-executive-cannot-guarantee-when-service-will-resume.html
“Climate change” of course is MSM code for manmade climate change, and is the ultimate fallback position of liars, since anything and everything can be blamed on it.
What hubris, and total idiocy to believe man is in any way responsible for such a snow storm. No wonder the MSM is going down the tubes.
The importance of weather events like these can not be known until we “adjust for homogeniety”…under strict peer-reviewed guidelines-of course.
photon without a Higgs (09:41:14) :
Sorry, second link is: http://www.vukcevic.co.uk/GandF.htm
Robert van der Veeke (09:35:39) :
And on top this, no pizza-deliveries because of the road-conditions, oh noes.
Wouldn’t be good for some areas the US—Brett Favre is on tv tonight.
Hey children!
It is Climate Change, not Global Warming. We just need some Climate Hope also, to make the picture perfect.
Minus 19C in Denmark last night.
Coldest in 8 years.
Could this be the start of a rapid cooling. Seems like there has been some good size recent activity.
http://www.sveurop.org/gb/news/news.htm
18 inches of fluffy white warming in Southern New England last night. Something about a record snowfall for December in the news.
Various websites and news reports are making a lot of the 2010 prediction for record temps. I’m no expert, but just comparing ENSO numbers and assuming it and SOI are reliable indicators for global temperature forecasts, it does appear 2010 may very well rise to or exceed recent years, including 2005 and 2007.
Are there instances in the past where strong El Nino does not translate to high global temps?
vukcevic (10:32:17)
Very interesting thoughts, I am particularly impressed with the close correlation between the Hudson Bay Area Mag Flux and the North Atlantic Temp Anom. Have you any clues as yet to the blips in circa 1950 and 1965?
Please keep pursuing this.
Interesting that no one has mentioned that Piers Corbyn predicted this weather last month.
It’s a great planet! I wouldn’t live anywhere else!
Don’t you silly people realise “Climate Change” means unlikeable weather. So that will be the new catch cry beware UW. To be serious Monckton made the comment that the solar activity is coming back does anyone have a reference?
The Philadelphia area hed 24 inches of algore between yesterday and this morning.
I just finished digging my car out.
MikeO (11:44:09) :
Don’t you silly people realise “Climate Change” means unlikeable weather. So that will be the new catch cry beware UW. To be serious Monckton made the comment that the solar activity is coming back does anyone have a reference?
http://www.solarcycle24.com has daily data, trend charts etc etc. The current burst of sunspots is the first really decent set of numbers of this cycle. ISS of 46 on one day I think and about 10 days now of continuous activity. This is most likely IT.
Dirk (10:27:11) :
“Climate is what you expect, weather is what you get.”
-Lazarus Long in Time Enough For Love
by Robert A. Heinlein
We had boats tipping & capsizing last winter in southwestern BC. The roof of a large public swimming pool facility also collapsed under the weight of (heavy, wet, very deep) snow. It pretty-much snowed round-the-clock for 3 weeks. I remember snowshoeing around the roof of my car only a day after shoveling it out of a similar scenario …more than once. I also remember a guy trying to “shovel” his sporty BMW out with a tennis racquet. (In case it isn’t obvious, he did not succeed.) The great thing about the lack of snowplowing turned out to be snowshoeing up & down the mountain to go sea-kayaking. Good memories.
THE SIBERIAN EXPRESS IS COMING
Siberian Express brings Arctic blast across the States by Steph Ball
Over the last few days high pressure has been continuing to build across Siberia bringing unusually cold weather.
On Wednesday weather warnings were issued by Russia’s Emergency Situations Ministry after forecasters predicted a fall of temperature to –55C
(-67F). On Saturday night the temperature in Ojmjakon, Siberia actually fell to -60.2C (-76F). January temperatures across the larger Siberian cities normally range from –15C to –39C (5 to -38F).
Over the last few days this cold air building over the Polar regions of Canada and Siberia, has now been sent southwards across the States in a phenomenon commonly known as the “Siberian Express”.
The Siberian Express is a meteorological term in the United States which describes the plunge of an extremely cold air mass. When high pressure extends north from the extreme western states of the US into northern Siberia it allows this Arctic blast to surge southeast wards across Canada and central and eastern parts of the US, sometimes as far as the Deep South. It often brings with it significantly below-average temperatures.
Over the last few days and into the weekend, the Siberian Express has been felt as far south as the Gulf Coast. Most of south Mississippi, as far east as the western Florida Panhandle, was placed under a winter weather advisory on Saturday. Freezing temperatures were forecast as well as snow. Up to 7.5cm (3 inches) of snow fell across southern Mississippi during the day, before the storm headed east bringing snowfalls across Alabama and Georgia.
Across both the US and Siberia, the cold weather is forecast to intensify over the coming days.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/world/news/20012008news.shtml
(Occassionaly they cut the crap about climate and just give us the near-time weather forecast, which one could actually believe)
Give CRU and IPCC time and this NH wide snow event will be disappeared the same way the MWP was disappeared. Remember, this is the warmest decade EVEAH!
Politicians and activists in the UK have encouraged the overstatement of the effects of global warming for years. Since Kyoto, exaggerated forecasts for sea level rises, floods, droughts, famine, polar ice cap disappearance etc., have been and continue to be made. This approach has been official government policy for some time now; the ridiculous Stern report mirroring IPCC’s stuff in order to grab the attention, they feel, of the ‘apathetic public’ who can’t even be bothered to vote these days.
So of course it is no surprise in the UK that the CRU researchers at East Anglia University can’t see what all the fuss is about concerning the leaked emails. They can’t see that they have done anything wrong as their biased approach to science just reflects government and opposition policy backed by a non debating submissive media.
They won’t be faced with prosecution in the UK or EU for any wrongdoing as the mention of any bias on their part is met with open mouthed incredulity and not even discussed.
So when they are faced with litigation for fraud in the US courts their protestations of innocence may be extremely difficult to defend.
“The importance of weather events like these can not be known until we “adjust for homogeniety”…under strict peer-reviewed guidelines-of course.”
Let me help with the homogenization. I’m in South Florida, and it’s 61F and overcast. For the snowbound, that would be wonderful, but for us, that’s a chilly 17 degrees below the average for this time of year.
Robert Morris (11:37:10) :
“vukcevic (10:32:17)
Very interesting thoughts, I am particularly impressed with the close correlation between the Hudson Bay Area Mag Flux and the North Atlantic Temp Anom. Have you any clues as yet to the blips in circa 1950 and 1965?
Please keep pursuing this.”
There are regular magnetic jerks in the polar regions, usually first in the Antarctica and 2-3 years later in the Arctic, if I remember correctly. I suppose it might be something to do with it.
“It is thought that the “extremely acute” wintry conditions in northern France caused snow to build up underneath the trains.”
Why can’t people ever learn from the experience of others?
We found out many years ago in Sweden that when there is fine, cold snow about, it is whirled up by the train and sucked into the cooling air intakes. Since it is so fine it is very good at getting into the smallest cracks. It’s no big deal as long as it stays cold since snow is a pretty good insulator, but once it gets warmer the snow melts, and water is not an insulator. Fzzt-boom, and that electric train ain’t gonna go anywhere until it has been thoroughly dried out and the blown fuses replaced.
Richard (12:04:02) :
“THE SIBERIAN EXPRESS IS COMING”
You can see the Siberian express approaching here.
http://images.intellicast.com/WxImages/SatelliteLoop/hinpole_None_anim.gif
However as far as I can conclude the Great Plains of Siberia also play important role in the North Atlantic basin climate, but with a number of years delay.
Here comes the next Ice Age glaciation. I think the tipping point was 1998.
btw, have we named the next glaciation yet? I know an effort made to name the new solar minimum, although I have forgotten who won. But have we done the Gorecene yet?
The Valdez snow is not such surprising news. 5′ 8″ = 68″ fell over the whole week not in a day. December is the “snowiest” month in Valdez averaging 72″ (NOAA).
The main road into Valdez comes down thru Thompson Pass which is the “snowiest” place in Alaska. It averages 551.4″ of snow a year and has a record of 974.5″ (more than 80 feet). It holds the Alaska Record for Most Snow in a Day at 62″. So, Valdez has a long way to go to beat its neighbor just a few miles a way.
Warmists will no doubt point out that global warming causes weather extremes, including cooling and after corrections and adjustments the temperatures will still show warming.
OT, but if anyone is interested in a striking visual proof of UHI, have a look at this MODIS picture:
http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/realtime/single.php?A093541215
In the lower left-hand corner is England. All of Eastern England is snow-covered except for London. There is even a “comet-tail” of snow-melt in the downwind (SW) from the city.
JBean (12:10:07) : “I’m in South Florida, and it’s 61F and overcast. For the snowbound, that would be wonderful, but for us, that’s a chilly 17 degrees below the average for this time of year.”
Well if you think the southern hemisphere is warm – its not. Not where I am. Right now it is exactly 16C (60.8F), so about the same as south florida
Lars Seiersen (10:56:11) :
Minus 19C in Denmark last night.
Coldest in 8 years.
———————
Gore Effect
Didn’t quite break the all time record for DC. Came in at 16.2″ for the one day total. We even had a salt dome (road salt storage facility) collapse. They had to shut down the buses and the above ground portion of Metro.
What is the predictive power of UK Met Office seasonal forecasting?
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/science/creating/monthsahead/seasonal/
Do we have some statistics for the deviation between predictions and observations the last 10 years? I found this link:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/09/06/uks-met-office-blows-another-summer-forecast/
However, a more complete overview would be more useful – it would be interesting to see whether a Bingo forecast would outperform UK Met Office…
No biggie.
I lived in Valdez for several years, before and during the Exxon Valdez oil spill. That winter of the spill, 1989, we had fifty feet (yes, feet) of snow. On March 24, 1989, my sailboat was still in my yard covered with six feet of snow.
During the winter in Valdez, driveways are shoveled out with Euclid front end loaders. The streets look like hallways, with slots cut in the snow wall for driveways. Residents spray paint their house numbers on the snow wall so you know who lives inside. Most houses are two story, with the entrance on the second floor.
I shoveled snow UP off the roof of my mobile home for an hour every morning and evening when it was snowing. Once when I was shoveling snow UP off the wood shed, I fell down into the snow. Fortunately, I hung onto my snow shovel and was able to dig myself out.
In order for global warming to happen in Valdez, the sun would have to be visible from behind the mountains from November to February.
The 5′-8″ Valdez storm total I can identify with:
On the east slope of the North Cascades there was a town near me that for a while held the record for the most snow in WA in one 24-hour period:
4 feet. That record was subsequently surpassed by stations on Mt. Baker and Mt. Rainier.
So when Copenhagen gets in a tizzy about 4 INCHES of snow; and cities on the east coast of US more-or-less shut down with a foot or so of new snow:
Those of us who live in the mountains can’t help but smile a bit; and think that people in the big cities back east have NO IDEA what a heavy snowfall really looks like. . . .
It isn’t snow, its just a statisical anomaly. which can be safely ignored..
(sarcasm mode off)
As is next years and the year after, we have the proof the figures dont lie.. therefor anything different is just a figment of your imagination
The Alps are melting, no ski slopes, no snow, hot weather – NOT.
http://www.planetski.eu/news/1102
http://www.planetski.eu/news/1150
Ernest,
I’ve lived in Valdez the last 20 years, and
actually that 68 inches was over three days, not a week. Tuesday was a record for that particular day in December at 38.7 inches. Normally in Valdez when it snows a plow with a long blade comes down the street and pushes all the snow into the center of the street so there is a big berm there and you can get out on either side of it. People generally then push their driveway snow into the center, if they get up early enough. Tuesday was different. For the first time in many years the snow removal crews couldn’t keep up so they came through a a big front end loader and plowed one big path down the center and then took a swipe out at each driveway so that people could get out (once you removed a 4 foot berm). Biggest problem I had was where to put the snow. Also, the snow was pretty dense and heavy so I was only able to get one car clear. Fortunately, I have a metal roof so most of the snow came off, reburying my yard again. As I write this the private snow removal guy I use is finally here with his bobcat to clear things before the next big dump.
Frankly, I prefer the snow to the deep cold we had last winter about this time. Driving back from Anchorage last winter post-xmas, it was -40F in Glenallen. The car’s suspension does not function well at -40F below, let me tell you.
=================================
Ernest Campbell (12:52:17) :
The Valdez snow is not such surprising news. 5′ 8″ = 68″ fell over the whole week not in a day. December is the “snowiest” month in Valdez averaging 72″ (NOAA).
The main road into Valdez comes down thru Thompson Pass which is the “snowiest” place in Alaska. It averages 551.4″ of snow a year and has a record of 974.5″ (more than 80 feet). It holds the Alaska Record for Most Snow in a Day at 62″. So, Valdez has a long way to go to beat its neighbor just a few miles a way.
Methow Ken (14:17:44) :
It’s all relative.
I grew up in Northern Virginia. There were two really bad snows I remember as an adult, 1995 and 1996. One was a January snow, one was a late March snow. I can’t remember which was which at the moment, but one of the was two days, totaling about 30 inches. Good thing I had my Toyota 4×4, but even then I bottomed out a lot. Took me two hours to drive to work (10 miles) for a couple days. Some people talk about 1983 as a bad snow time there, but I was in the Army in Germany then, dealing with Snow in Wildflecken (4 feet of snow in 8 hours one day).
Now I live about 70 miles north of Seattle. A couple inches here will throw things into chaos. And last December (2008) we got over a foot over 3 or 4 days. Some roads didn’t get touched for weeks.
Joe Romm (Soros socket puppett on Climateprogress) as all bent out of shape about calling 4 inches of snow on Copenhagen a blizzard. Of course that is a distraction. He can’t admit this Valdez weven is Historic and nasty.
Hide the decline mantra means re spinning every weather event.
Doesn’t look so hot to me. Where exactly is this warming?
There is a level rising here, but it’s not the oceans, it’s not the temp of storms.
They have grown colder.
More snow in the UK.
More snow in the NE, NW, Midwest.
More snow in China.
Snow is not warmer than rainfall, no matter how much the data is fudged, nudged or cooked.
With all this global warming about you can understand why our “leaders” are so keen to have some legally binding emissions cuts and carbon trading systems in place before the 2012-2014 timeframe as I reckon there will be lots of brass monkeys about by then.
rbateman : Add “more snow in Japan” to your list. Watched the news here and according to them the December snowfall is WAY above average. Somethig like between 4 to 7 times the average amount for the prefectures along the Japan Sea coast.
” vukcevic (08:55:32) :
This is last thing we need:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/12/20/philippines.volcano/
It is cold enough as it is. Global warming, bring it on!”
Volcanoes don’t do much when there is a warm forcing (solar/ocean), but I’d love to see one with a cold driver (ocean/solar). Bring it!
C’mon AMO…go cold baby…go cold. It’s the only way out of this madness…
Volcanic activity happens at an increased rate/intensity during solar minimums.
I cannot tell you why it does that.
I’m not even sure if there are any papers on it.
Must say it just crossed my mind that it would be an idea to form an ‘Anticlimactic’ party to fight in the UK elections [and US?]. In the UK over 50% of people are ‘skeptic’ but no party represents them – the environmental representatives of all three main UK parties all seem to be weeping copious tears over the failure of Copenhagen, and vowing to battle on.
MikeO (11:44:09) :
Don’t you silly people realise “Climate Change” means unlikeable weather. So that will be the new catch cry beware UW. To be serious Monckton made the comment that the solar activity is coming back does anyone have a reference?
If you look at Spaceweather now you see three spots.
Nor does a hot month in summer mean there IS GW.
Doesn’t this weather prove that Hopenhagen was a great sucess in forcing climate change? Just see how it got cold and snowey even before they went home :-D.
For solar activity, see
http://www.solen.info/solar/
this has a running account, in line graph form, of the past 3months of solar activity.
God really does have a sense of humor!
As I noted in my previous post, no one should use the Valdez story as an indicator of warming or cooling. Valdez is nature’s almost perfect snow machine. The reason is geography and geology rather than climate.
Valdez was chosen as the terminus of the Alaskan pipeline because it’s the northern-most, ice-free port. Geographically, it sits at the deadend of a warm Pacific current. Heat Energy from this current is expended by evaporating moisture which forms low lying clouds which pack into Valdez.
Geologically, Valdez is a partially submerged valley/fjord surrounded by very high mountain range (Chugach) whose passes are filled with Glaciers.
Past those mountains, the land is mostly flat all the way to the North Pole (The Artic Circle is a few hundred miles north of Valdez above Fairbanks).
So, the frigid air blows south over the glaciers and hits the moisture in the constantly available low clouds. That creates the snow just like a snow machine does for as long as the sea is warm enough to evaporate moisture and the wind coming over the Glaciers is available to precipitate that moisture out.
As Kim Mackey pointed out above, when the temperature drops to 0 and below, the air can’t carry enough moisture and the snow stops.
Notice that snowfall in Anchorage, Fairbanks in much less. And Barrow, the northern-most town, get practically none. They are not geographically and geologically suited to get snow as Valdez is.
–
Now that is “Climate Justice”. I couldn’t make sense of slogan until I found out that Washington and Copenhagen both got dumped on.
On Friday, Stars & Stripes carried a full-page “report” on AGW.
According to the AP, this has been the warmest decade *evah*, with Eskimos startled by the sight of robins, Arctic ice at the lowest extent in history, and millions in India dying of thirst because the Himalayan glaciers are melting.
‘Bout the only bit of truth in the entire article was Eskimos seeing robins — but they shouldn’t have been startled, since the American robin’s summer range extends all the way to the Arctic Circle.
A letter to the editor is in the offing…
Well maybe the Eskimo’s were startled by the sight of Robbins, are the robins still around startling the Eskimo’s? There have been quite a few ooh’s and ah’s recently.
Including Obama and Washington DC being startled by the Blizzard of Ah’s…
Here in Oceania there will soon be no snow. There will only be precipitation. This will come about with the publication of the next edition of the Newspeak dictionary. Until then, please practise saying “precipitation”. For your own good.
Including Obama and Washington DC being startled by the Blizzard of Ah’s…
I don’t think “Ah” was the expletive they were considering…
Piers Corbyn’s latest predictions – see particularly Dec.28-30 major SWIP (solar weather impact period):
‘ere wasn’t that UN conference in Copenhagen successful. Only two days after they got everyone to agree that temperatures must not go up by more than 2 degrees and the biggest snowstorm for a 100 years brings the temperature right down. And of course as with all the UN’s great sucesses there is the usual daily death toll. But what is that set against such a great achievement.
Brian BAKER
in The Hay Barn, (freezing my nuts off)
England
Point taken Rob. Okay boys and girls, learn these two sentences off by heart:
“Heavy winter precipitation is caused by climate change”
“Summer heat waves are caused by global warming”
Can I be taxed now?
“Unprecedented winter weather in France”…causes Eurostar trains to break down. “Snow shields used to protect the electrics of its trains had worked for the 15 years it has been running services through the tunnel. But the company said the weather in northern France over the past few days had been worse than anything previously experienced in that time.”
rbateman (17:44:32) :
“Volcanic activity happens at an increased rate/intensity during solar minimums.
I cannot tell you why it does that. I’m not even sure if there are any papers on it.”
Hi Mr. Bateman
Here is an example of pseudoscience, pure speculation, which I posted elsewhere (eventfully to be banned from). May I point out that we are all free to speculate on this and maters of our interest (possibly 99.9% of the time wrong, but there is always that tiny chance of finding a nugget of gold).
The Earth’s iron core (source of the Earth’s magnetic field, i.e. the Earth’s dynamo) does not rotate around the same axes as the Earth itself, hence dislocation of magnetic poles. Jupiter-Saturn gravitational forces which pull the Sun around the barycentre also pull the Earth’s mass centre away from its orbital trajectory, due to its eccentricity the Earth’s iron core reacts differently to the rest of its bodily mass (liquid interior). It follows that a certain major planets configuration will cause disturbances within the Earth’s interior which may initiate major earthquakes (already linked to times of sunspot minima) and volcanic eruptions. It is important to state: the sunspot periods may be affected by a configuration of major planet’s magnetospheres, which follow similar but not exactly same timing as their astronomical configuration. Therefore, earthquakes and volcanoes appear to be linked to sunspot periods because they are initiated by the same cause.
Maybe just a coincidence, when confronted with lack of conclusive proof, my defence is : the nature is adverse to a coincidence; it is ruled by a cause and the consequence.
R. Kessel, F. Freund, G. Duma
Lab for Solar and Space Physics, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD 20771 [ramona.l.kessel@nasa.gov
Department of Physics, San Jose State University and Ecosystem Science and Technology, NASA Ames Research Center, MS 242-4, Moffett Field, CA 94035-1000
http://www.cosis.net/abstracts/EGU06/01705/EGU06-J-01705.pdf
Most detailed work in this field was done by Frank Glasby in his book Planets, Sunspots and Earthquakes where he presents
http://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en&id=3VYThj_nYQMC&dq=frank+glasby&printsec=frontcover&source=web&ots=2j9ATJm87T&sig=kXt80beKvMlSVu6LMVPWcd2OIRE&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result#v=onepage&q=&f=false
vukcevic (10:32:17) :
“…but the geomagnetic may save us from the worst. I’ve just started looking into oceans’ currents; here is first chapter of my initial attempt http://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/41/83/04/PDF/NATA.pdf…”
Good stuff, I really enjoyed reading through your document and it could be a big part of the puzzle of why sudden cooling occurs, and we see conditions in NH suddenly turning nasty.
To build on your ideas and hopefully give a more complete picture, it may be worth your while looking at the following areas, which came out of a one-man brainstorm session:-
1. Strength, temperature and salinity of Gulf Stream, which feeds energy to Arctic basin, where it more easily radiates to space. Some information here (although for some reason not updated since November 2008?) :-
http://polar.ncep.noaa.gov/gsf/
Perhaps changes in amount volcanic activity of North Atlantic ridge have short/long-term effects on Gulf Stream?
2. Precipitation in Arctic basin and corresponding amount of fresh-water being discharged by the larger Arctic rivers.
3. Strength, location and configuration of Arctic Polar Vortex which can vary greatly during NH winter. Does a breakdown of the vortex allow cold air to spill out and cause rapid short-term NH cooling?
Is it possible that the polar vortices are driven by electromagnetic effects and correlate to your work on ocean currents (perhaps features like the Beaufort Gyre are also driven by electric currents, rather than the other way round – cause and effect are often difficult to unravel when dealing with turbulent systems)?
4. Amount/position of ozone ‘layer’ in Arctic atmosphere. Link to ozone ‘holes’ and other compounds involved in atmospheric chemistry. Rapid Arctic atmospheric warming events may also provide some clues as to how these energy exchange mechanisms work.
5. Extra terrestrial gravity changes due to LOD, solar and planetary positions. Do these effect air and sea circulation patterns?
6. Effects of none TSI changes of sun during solar cycle – wavelength of light, solar wind speed and density, fluctuations in Earth/Sun coupled magnetic field – gamma ray bursts – x-ray bursts – large flares and CME’s… e.t.c.
With your ideas and the above list, I’ve just had a thought:-
Supposition.
THE PERFECT STORM CLIMATE CHANGE EFFECT
All climate is local! At no point on Earth would an observer experience the global mean.
Earth climate is driven by deterministic chaos. It exhibits fractal behaviour and has bifurcations caused by strange attractors pulling it from cold to warm mode, then back again over time.
Many different mechanisms act together to regulate the energy in, out and stored despite fluctuations to input.
When a set of events coincide within these related mechanisms, they conspire to start the cycle of change into the higher or lower.
This local change in the NH then triggers a global effect as rapid growth of snow and ice causes an albedo effect causing rapid global cooling.
The above is not well thought through, so any ideas which confound or enhance the Perfect Storm supposition are very welcome.
Very slightly off-topic, BUT anyone else see the UK “Transport Minister” Sadiq Khan today on Sky News? He was, er, “talking” about the Eurostar mess.
What an utter, complete prat. I nearly fell out of bed laughing. Apart from liberally throwing in the usual expressions of “Let’s be clear”, and “lessons have/will be/are being learned”, the sum total of what he said was – nothing, and in a pidgin-English, man-off-the-street way.
How can such a dimwit as this be a minister? On second thoughts, you only have to look at the Miliband juveniles, Prescott, Ainsworth, Harman, etc., etc. to realise they’re all the same – UTTERLY USELESS.
I felt so ashamed to be British. Good job I live in France now. Not a lot better (Teacozy’s sold on AGW, too) here, but generally saner.
Dirk (10:27:11) :
That we have winter storms in the US in December, doesn´t mean there is no GW. 😉
So, record cold temperatures and early snowfalls (e.g., Boulder, CO, in September) are actually *evidence* of Gorebull Warming?
Okaaaaayyyyyyy…
Patrick Davis (16:20:15) :
With all this global warming about you can understand why our “leaders” are so keen to have some legally binding emissions cuts and carbon trading systems in place before the 2012-2014 timeframe as I reckon there will be lots of brass monkeys about by then.
But they won’t be reproducing.
Tenuc (02:01:47) :
“Good stuff, I really enjoyed reading through your document
( http://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/41/83/04/PDF/NATA.pdf )
and it could be a big part of the puzzle of why sudden cooling occurs, and we see conditions in NH suddenly turning nasty.”
Thank you for your note, it is appreciated, number of useful points there.
Gulf Stream of course, is the key, but as the North Atlantic basin climate is concerned, in addition to Hudson Bay phenomena, I believe that the Beaufort Gyre in conjunction with the Siberian geomagnetic anomaly (delay 2-4 or more years, with a built in feedback loop) are the main drivers. The draft of chapter two is in the pipeline and will be available on line soon. Also, the time line is extended back to 1600, showing a satisfactory correlation.
Today’s doublespeak
5 feet 8 inches? This is another global warming story. It would have been 6 feet without global warming.
Anyway, here’s another global warming story from Europe. Subzero temperatures in France are causing Eurostar trains to fail and leave tens of thousands of passengers trapped and stranded as the trains enter the warm tunnel and leading to condensation knocking out the electrical systems. Its caused by greater snowfalls than expected: They would have been even greater if it had not been for global warming. This global warming emissions case study has left the Christmas plans of 100,000 people in tatters
Thats global warming for you. Actually, I suspect its poor maintence and underinvestment – it ran very well until now
I have a nice photo of our record snowfall in the Virginia suburbs of Washington – which I enjoyed while reading about the demise of the Copenhagen summit.
See “The moral contradiction of global warming politics”:
http://vulgarmorality.wordpress.com/2009/12/19/the-moral-contradictions-of-global-warming-politics/
From Dr. Jeff Master’s blog (the founder of Weather Underground):
“Philadelphia, Pennsylvania has already recorded more than an entire winter’s worth of snow–a ridiculous 23.2 inches from this weekend’s storm, the second heaviest snowfall in Philadelphia history. The all time record is 30.7 inches, set during the January 1996 blizzard. The normal winter snowfall for an entire season is 19.3 inches.”
Dr. Master’s is an AGW believer. The irony of this blog post of his is that right below these comments of winter records, is a comment on Copenhagen.
http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=1403
vukcevic (03:36:41) :
“…The draft of chapter two is in the pipeline and will be available on line soon. Also, the time line is extended back to 1600, showing a satisfactory correlation.”
Looking forward to reading part two when it’s ready. Thanks for letting us know.
vulgarmorality
After reading your link – its what i’ve thought for years. The AGW ideology is just a fromt for misanthropes to redesign the way we live. Those who hate people, those who hate the earth, and those who hate both. Climate change is doom, people are doom.. People cause this doom.
This is the only message that they really have. Its an emotional one. It is dangerous that people with power are misanthropes, whether they be in science or politics, or culture, and that their desires on humanity are miserable ones.
“Across both the US and Siberia, the cold weather is forecast to intensify over the coming days.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/world/news/20012008news.shtml”
Hmmm-No snow in Burlington Vermont from the big storm (or on the ground as I look about) and the forecast is for rain by the weekend As is usual in the last 10 years. Thank goodness for global cooling.
http://www.intellicast.com/Local/Weather.aspx?location=USVT0033
Someone’s got it wrong.
Re: Barry Foster (01:37:24)
I also found that interesting. Even engineers get caught in assumptions, possibly as companies foolishly force-compromise their designs. The anomalous weather turned up during a swip forecast by Corbyn last month.
Tenuc & vukcevic,
Interesting exchange there. Barkin writes about how the slow movement of the core (and relative motion of other shells, related to celestial bodies) results in slow hemispheric-scale atmospheric pressure changes. Arctic precipitation is related to temperature. Even the north Pacific is affected by the more dramatic Atlantic events you have discussed, particularly in winter. Geomagnetic activity is being affected by factors other than the sun. The pressure-pattern changes in the atmosphere are being affected by more than one factor showing up in geomagnetic indices. I’m not thinking of geomagnetic activity as a “driver”, but rather as an ‘indicator light’ that responds to celestial, terrestrial, & solar factors, which may not be having the exact same effect on atmospheric pressure-pattern dynamics (very fluid, so I wouldn’t expect continuous phase-concordance – in particular I would expect seasonal anomalies related to factors affecting polar motion). In other words, I think we have to avoid slipping into thinking-traps about what is driving what, given the complex context, until we have conducted more complex analyses, but I am encouraged by the nature of some of the notes being exchanged.
Meanwhile , over at Climate Progress , Joe Romm says the record setting snow in DC is proof of global warming .
Tenuc (02:01:47) :
Yes this is how cold periods and ice ages begin. Warming leads to heating of the equator, mainly oceans, precipitation increases, oceans lose this heat, and cooling at the poles occurs, chiefly the north pole, and this triggers a global cooling, as seen across the northern hemisphere in the last sever years.
*several*
DR (11:25:24) :
“Various websites and news reports are making a lot of the 2010 prediction for record temps. I’m no expert, but just comparing ENSO numbers and assuming it and SOI are reliable indicators for global temperature forecasts, it does appear 2010 may very well rise to or exceed recent years, including 2005 and 2007.”
Intrade.com will let you bet (after you’ve registered, etc.) on whether 2010 will be the hottest year on record. Click on:
Markets –>
Climate & Weather –>
Global Temperature –>
Will Global Average Temperatures for 2009-2011 be THE warmest on record? –>
Trade (in the 2010.GLOBALTEMP.WARMEST box)
PS: Then Click Buy (if you think 2010 will be the warmest on record, or Sell (if you don’t)
Bill Tuttle (22:17:11) :
“On Friday, Stars & Stripes carried a full-page “report” on AGW. According to the AP, this has been the warmest decade *evah*,”
Here’s a good comeback: But the last five years have been cooler than the prior five years.
(Would someone who knows the figures for the past ten years please post them, along with a link, to back this up?)
Earth is colling
Global hype on warming is not correct. The role of negligible Sunspot has roles to play in the temperature of the earth. It is requred to develop a global research group to study Sunspots and its effect on the earth. Please see some of the recent publications
Saumitra Mukherjee PhD
Professor, School of Environmental Sciences
Jawaharlal Nehru University
New Delhi-110067
INDIA
Mukherjee,S. (2009). Sun-Earth-cosmic connection to understand early
Warning of Earthquakes. Journal Earth Science India Vol.2 (II), April, 2009, pp. 83 – 93 http://www.earthscienceindia.info/
Mukherjee Saumitra. (2008).Cosmic Influence on Sun-Earth Environment. Sensors 2008, 8, 7736-7752; DOI: 10.3390/s8127736 http://www.mdpi.com/journal/sensors
Mukherjee, S. (2007). Changes in Heliophysical parameter influence on Environment of the Earth. Bull.Astr.Soc.India (2007) 35, 1-7
Mukherjee, S. (2006). Influence of Starflare on the Sun-Earth environment and its Possible relationship with snowfall. EGGS Sciences Letter, (Germany) EGU, Issue no.14 pp. 14-17, ISSN 1027-6343, http://www.the-eggs.org