UPDATE: see the latest excuse below.
The satellite tracking map has been like this for two days. Follow the yellow brick road for an about face and head to land.
WUWT reader “strawbale” reports in Tips and Notes that:
Listen to the Row to the Pole latest news on their website, they have spent today iced in and unable to move. Apparently the climbed up a hill to see how far the ice stretched and its goes to the horizon.
…spent today “licking their wounds” is how their audio report put it…
Hopefully when cloud cover conditions improve we’ll see just how far that ice extends on the NASA MODIS page: http://rapidfire.sci.gsfc.nasa.gov/realtime/
UPDATE: The latest RTTP post from their website:
As the current path is blocked by more ice sheets, the crew use the downtime to put in some drill practice, moving the Old Pulteney up onto the ice.
UPDATE2: Well here’s the problem, they are still thinking like it is 2005! Too much listening to Dr. Mark “death spiral” Serreze of NSIDC, not enough time looking at observational data. From the RTTP Facebook page:
UPDATE3: they are on the move again, along the coast, trying to find an opening
H.R. says:
August 12, 2011 at 2:02 am
(“Yo! Who’s that fellow wandering by over there? Is that… is that Pen Haddow? Maybe we can all get a lift back to town from Clarkson and Mays.”)
Top Gear reference…love it! Toyota Hilux dominates in a so called AGW world
Some wonder why they are rowing to the 1996 site of the North Pole.
But all the CAGW-ers are stuck in the mid-90’s, when it could last be said that the climate was warming. Since then the pole has moved on, the climate has been “stable”, and Al Gore has become a crazed sex poodle.
Bruce Cobb says:
August 12, 2011 at 8:14 am
I like this paragraph from your link:
The magnetic pole, as certified in 1996, is located at 78°35.7N 104°11.9W / 78.595°N 104.1983°W and was first reached by Sir James Clark Ross of the British Royal Navy in 1831.
Apparently, the Brits reached it 165 years before they even knew where it was. 🙂
I wonder if there is a rescue plan. It seems they’re not going to give up yet, they’ll take any way forward even if it means getting iced in. The end of the summer melt may be predictabe but the winds that blow the ice around is not.
Hard liquor, frozen tundras and absurd behavior::
“Being set on the idea
Of getting to Atlantis,
You have discovered of course
Only the Ship of Fools is
Making the voyage this year,
As gales of abnormal force
Are predicted, and that you
Must therefore be ready to
Behave absurdly enough
To pass for one of The Boys,
At least appearing to love
Hard liquor, horseplay and noise.
[…]
Assuming you beach at last
Near Atlantis, and begin
That terrible trek inland
Through squalid woods and frozen
Thundras where all are soon lost…”
W. H. Auden, “Atlantis” (1941)
strawbale says (August 12, 2011 at 3:23 am): “Today is a no go as well, iced in again.
Instead today is spent practicing hiking over the ice with the canoe in tow.”
Practicing? I would have thought the time to practice was before they started their little trip. Hope they brought comfy hiking boots/showshoes/skis.
They should just get constant shipments of Old Puteneny to use to melt the ice in front of them as they “row” to the pole. Oh wait, we wouldn’t want to pollute the arctic with bad whiskey, sorry, bad idea.
It looks like the annual reestablishment of seasonal sea ice has already begun in a number of locations. It’s not been enough yet to result in the overall sea ice extent bottoming out, but certainly, it will get us to that point soon.
Reading their facebook page. If they do manage to Island hop and row to Ellef Ringnes Island this will be down to global warming and If they do not manage to Island hop and row to Ellef Ringnes Island this will be down to global warming.
Cake and eat it.
We should be thankful for the annual pilgramage of us Brits trying to find new and exciting ways to pass the time in the Arctic and keeping everyone else entertained as we wait for the sea ice minimum.
i’m thinking of trying it on a pedalo next year, unless someone’s already beaten me to it.
An interesting comparison. Ice edge in the Spitzbergen area in the middle of the Litlle Ice Age on August 12 1664:
ttp://acsys.npolar.no/ahica/quicklooks/1650/16640812.jpg
and on August 12 2011:
http://retro.met.no/images/image_000140_1313161278.jpg
More ice today.
Plenty of balls but not a lot of brains, but even so I hope they make it ok. – And if they do, – maybe 2015 will be a good year to once again try it on as by then, the Arctic may be completely devoid of summer ice & snow (According to the AGW theory that is).
However I always thought it to be pointless proving that the Earth is getting warmer, – colder – or that it’s average temperature remains unchanged. ——-
The question I have, is this: “How do AGW enthusiasts (including “Luke-Warmers”) explain the theory which says that energy (temperature) removed from point A – (Earth’s surface) – and then transported to point B – (Greenhouse gases (GHGs) can increase the warmth (temperature) of A once that energy (or maybe, at best, just one half of it) is returned to A?
@tty
Does that mean that the ice edge didn’t go down to Svalbard during the little ice age even?
What’s the point of rowing to the magnetic north pole if you know it is located far far south of the actual north pole.
What’re they going to claim? We rowed to the south of the actual north pole. I mean, wow, what an accomplishment… especially for proving how “little” ice there are around the actual north pole.
The extent of the stupidity of communism is otherwise only shown by Putin, like OMG even the chinese ruling communists aren’t that stupendously lame.
“The bear! It took Bruce! This is worse than we thought!”
“Just say he fell overboard and drowned due to lack of ice!”
Don’t rescue them with helicopters; it produces too much CO2 emissions.
There’s a new point dated 8/12 20:00 (GMT?). They’re heading east along the coast now.
The good news? They made 4 kilometers today.
The bad news? Ummm guys, I thought you were headed north, please turn left. Oh, and say hello to the poler bears when they see you. Aren’t they fluffy? And remember, the bears are endangered and you are not. Right?
Friends:
I notice there are several comments about a possible rescue mission. This puzzles me.
Surely Darwinian selection leads to an improved gene pool?
Richard
Let’s just hope the Poley Bears don’t have tranquilizer guns. They (the “rowing” team)are very near open water.
The Poley Bear scientists are sure to blame dead hipsters in the water on Global Cooling.
They’re off again – down the coast! Further away from rescue and safety.
It’s the worst of both worlds, not solid ice and not open water
How do you get a plane in there to rescue the misdirected?
Let’s all hope their MMGW/AGW/CC/GCD zealotry doesn’t take them the way of the Titanic
You can’t suspend reality
Scott: “We shall stick it out to the end, but we are getting weaker, of course, and the end cannot be far.”
Oates: “I’m just going outside and may be some time.”
Row to the Pole!!!!
What the #&@ur momisugly%!!!!
I am 50%+ Polish and I resent that!!!
:^)
John
At least Sir John Franklin’s lost expedition had a purpose, to find the Northwest passage. What exactly are these people doing other than trying to promote a political agenda?
Reminds me of this:
http://youtu.be/G0CHmM3GugM