Global Weather Phenomenon-Natural/Technological Disasters-Space Events-Epidemic/Biological Hazards-
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Jason Rumpca of Beresford was driving to Sioux Falls from Pierre Sunday night when a bright streak lit up the sky.
"I could see glowing orange debris (and) fragments falling from it as it entered the atmosphere," Rumpca said.
He wasn't the only one to catch a glimpse of the meteor-like flash, which prompted social media posts and calls to authorities.
The
Charles Mix County Sheriff's Office received a call around 9:15 p.m.
from a Lake Andes woman reporting a bright light in the sky, kind of
like lightning. A nearby officer verified the sighting, according to the
sheriff's office.
"(It) looked like a large ball of fire with
pieces falling off as it got closer to the ground," Bobby Mousseau, a
police officer in Santee, Neb., said. "It disappeared well before the
ground."
The National Weather Service in Sioux Falls heard reports about the flash but was unable to confirm the meteor claim.
1. RADIATION IN FLIGHT Radchick: During normal solar activity, radiation
levels at 10-11 kilometers cruise altitude are about 2-3 uSv/h, which is
20 to 30 times the radiation you're exposed to on the ground (prior to
Fukushima). Thus, you get about the same dose as from 1-2 chest x-rays
if you fly for 11 hours (but distributed to all of your body - not just
the chest, of course).
Waters M, Bloom TF, Grajewski B. The National Institute for
Occupational Safety and Health/Federal Aviation Administration
(NIOSH/FAA) working women's health study: Evaluation of the
cosmic-radiation exposures of flight attendants. Health Phys 79(5):
553–559; 2000. <------Notice year of study
Radiation dose levels represent a complex function of duration of flight, latitude, and altitude.
Based on data collected for this study, radiation dose levels that
would be experienced by a flight crew are well below current
occupational limits recommended by the ICRP and the FAA of 20,000 uSv
y-1.
The National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements (NCRP)
recommends a monthly equivalent dose limit of 500 uSv. The ICRP
recommends the radiation limit during pregnancy be 1000 uSv.
Only flight crews flying both a large number of hours during
pregnancy (for example, 100 hours in a month) and strictly the highest
dose-rate routes (typically global routes such as United States to
Buenos Aires or United States to Tokyo) would exceed the NCRP monthly
guideline. http://www.hps.org/publicinformation/ate/faqs/commercialflights.html 2. RADCHICK: MY PERSONAL RADIATION IN FLIGHT EXPERIENCE Radchick: On my flight to Cancun, we were exposed to
900-1400 cpms for 2 hours. While ascending and landing rad levels
dropped considerably, it was at the cloudline before they resume
'normal' ranges of 200 cpms. The majority of the journey, from Charlotte
to Cancun leg was 4 hours long. Using the uSv to cpm conversion (which
is being highly debated right now in radiation measurement circles) our
total exposure on just one leg of our journey was approximately (of
course this is dependent on the model of Geiger and type of radiation --
In my case I was using an Inspector reading cpm and a Soeks uSv)
108,000 counts in just 2 hours. Overall a 4 hr. flight was approximately
200,000 total counts over 4 hrs. or 50,000 counts per hour 833 cpm
rough average. And that is using the lower range to estimate of 900.
Assuming a conversion factor of 100 cpm per uSv, my exposure was
approximately 8.33 uSv.
Just this flight would expose an airline worker to 1/10 of their
yearly exposure limits. ASSUMING as all flights encounter this level of
rads within 10 4-hour flights a person would reach guidelines for
airline industry workers of 20 uSv/year. That's only 40 hours of
flying!! Flight attendants fly an average of 80 hours a month. Pilots
75-85 hrs. per month. Within 2 weeks they would have reached their
exposure guidelines. NO WONDER the pilots are dropping dead. I would
also like to remind you I went into kidney failure within hours of
landing, and my 28 y/o daughter was hospitalized for kidney failure 2
weeks after we returned from our trip. A number of students on the trip
as well suffered from skin problems, swollen eyes and other ailments
during and after. I also observed that 2 out of 4 stewardesses on this
particular flight had some major skin problems, possibly eczema? on
their face. It was severe enough that I was surprised they were
working/not on sick leave.
FYI: Comparisons with X-rays and CT scans “meaningless” — Inhaling
particles increases radiation exposure by “a factor of a trillion” says
expert http://enenews.com/comparisons-with-x-rays-and-ct-scans-meaningless-inhaling-particles-increases-radiation-exposure-by-a-factor-of-a-trillion-says-expert
3. OTHER INFLIGHT READINGS (3) A. Connie Fogal, Former Vancouver, BC Parks Board Commissioner:
Date of flight: 1/11/2014 Average Alt. 35,000 feet Air Canada
Vancouver, BC (YVR) –Heathrow UK (LHR)
Average Geiger counter reading 2.45 uSv/hour
Date of flight: 1/19/2014 Average Alt. 35,000 feet Air Canada
Heathrow UK (LHR) - Vancouver, BC (YVR)
Average Geiger counter reading range:
2.89 - 3.60 uSv/hr. B. Tom Clearwater, Lawyer, Vancouver, BC:
Readings On Flight From Vancouver, BC To Hong Kong
Date/Vancouver time/altitude in feet/reading in micro Sieverts per hour uSv [locational data]
16/11/Vancouver (home) 0.06 uSv
16/13/airport (departure) 0.04-0.08
16/13:30/plane (ground) 0.04-0.06
16/14:00/13k 0.25-0.32
16/14:08/26k 1.02-1.18
16/14:15/30k 1.71-1.80
16/14:30/30k 1.63-1.86
16/15:30/32k 1.70-2.09 (held above my fish dinner)
16/16:30/32k 1.84-2.06
16/17:30/32k 2.10-2.20 [W of Alaska] uSv
16/19:11/32k 1.53-1.91 [E of Kamchatka]
16/19:50/32k 1.76-1.95 [S of Kamchatka]
16/21:45/32k/1.31-1.53 [just SE of Sapporo Japan]
16/22:00/32k/1.42-1.53 [NE of Sendai
16/22:15/32k/1.20-1.46 [just NE of Sendai]
16/22:30/32k/1.27-1.46 [just N of Sendai, over land]
16/22:45/32k/0.98-1.30 [just S of Niigata]
17/1:11/32k/1.35-1.53 [E of Shanghai]
17/2:45/28k/1.02-1.07 [descent for Hong Kong]
17/3:00/11k/0.12-0.15
17/3:25/ground/0.19-0.23 uSv
We flew almost directly over Fukushima.
On Flight From Hong Kong To Johannesburg
I also checked rad levels on our flight from Hong Kong (HK) to
Johannesburg. Flying time was night until we reached J. Levels were
consistently 50% of those on our day flight to Hong Kong, so 0.1 uSv
thereabouts until the sun started rising, then levels equaled to-HK
levels. I interpret this data to suggest that sun exposure was the main
determining factor apart from altitude. Under this interpretation, there
is no or negligible Fukushima rad in the air.
Also notice that to HK levels slowly dropped as sun exposure faded.
C. Chile to Portland, OR Flight (Reported by Rense.com)http://bit.ly/1faGQkQ
Date of Flight: July 1, 2013
Chile, South America – Portland, OR (USA)
Geiger counter readings (CPM)
Chile 366 CPM
Equator 614 CPM
Oregon 1208 CPM
1208 CPM is about the same as 20Bq. NOTE: Assuming a conversion factor of 100 cpm per uSv, the exposure level over Oregon was approximately 12.08 uSv. PILOT'S BLOG - MAPPING RADIATION LEVELS Radchick: From a pilot's blog who is mapping rad levels, excellent info:
"So, finally, with all the flying I’ve done lately, I’d like to say
that I’m getting a very firm grasp on where the radiation is and what
you can do about it. What I’ve discovered, to date, can be summarized
like this:
Aircrew get more radiation than nuclear power plant workers.
Aircrew are classified as radiological workers by the NCRP (National Center for Radiation Protection)
On average, north of 35 degrees north-latitude, radiation increases
rapidly above about 35,000′. Pilots who do not need to go higher than
that, operationally, might as well stay at a lower altitude if they want
to avoid high radiation levels.
Altitude has little affect on the radiation level when flying at
latitudes south of about 30 degrees north. I’ve seen almost zero
variation between 35,000′ and 45,000′ when flying from 30 degrees all
the way down to the equator.
Flying over the North pole is the most hazardous of all. Radiation
levels will normally be 12-18 micro-Seiverts per hour, at 40,000′. From
31,000′ upwards, the radiation level will double about every 6500′.
Pilots need to check on solar flare activity because, sometimes, levels
can exceed 100 uSv/hr.
An affordable dosimeter, that accurately measures all of the
different types of radiation at flight altitude, does not seem to be
readily available. There is 3x more up there than just Gamma. I think
the other main components are radioactive electrons, protons and X-Rays.
"Currently, the best prediction center, I’ve found, for flight radiation, is the NAIRAS website.
"Above excerpt from: http://jetradjamesblog.wordpress.com/
Geoengineering the
planet's climate: even when applied on a massive scale, the most that
could be expected is a temperature drop of about 8%, new research shows.
Photograph: Nasa/REUTERS
Large-scale human engineering of the Earth's climate to prevent
catastrophic global warming would not only be ineffective but would have
severe unintended side effects and could not be safely stopped, a
comparison of five proposed methods has concluded.
Science academies around the world as well as some climate activists have called for more research into geoengineering techniques, such as reflecting sunlight from space, adding vast quantities of lime or iron filings to the oceans,
pumping deep cold nutrient-rich waters to the surface of oceans and
irrigating vast areas of the north African and Australian deserts to
grow millions of trees. Each method has been shown to potentially reduce
temperature on a planetary scale.
But researchers at the
Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, Germany, modelled these five
potential methods and concluded that geoengineering could add chaos to
complex and not fully understood weather systems. Even when applied on a
massive scale, the most that could be expected, they say, is a
temperature drop of about 8%.
The potential side effects would be potentially disastrous, say the scientists, writing in Nature Communications.
Ocean upwelling, or the bringing up of deep cold waters, would cool
surface water temperatures and reduce sea ice melting, but would
unbalance the global heat budget, while adding iron filings or lime
would affect the oxygen levels in the oceans. Reflecting the sun's rays
into space would alter rainfall patterns and reforesting the deserts
could change wind patterns and could even reduce tree growth in other
regions.
In addition, say the scientists, two of the five
methods considered could not be safely stopped. "We find that, if solar
radiation management or ocean upwelling is discontinued then rapid
warming occurs. If the other methods are discontinued, less dramatic
changes occur. Essentially all of the CO2 that was taken up remains in
the ocean."
Geoengineering Ineffective Against Climate Change, Could Make Worse
By Charles Q. Choi, Live Science Contributor | February 25, 2014 11:40am ET
A diagram of the geoengineering projects people have
proposed to combat climate change. The laws surrounding such projects
are still uncertain. Credit: Diagram by Kathleen Smith/LLNL
Current schemes to minimize the havoc caused by global warming by
purposefully manipulating Earth's climate are likely to either be
relatively useless or actually make things worse, researchers say in a
new study.
The dramatic increase in carbon dioxide levels
in the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution is expected to cause
rising global sea levels, more-extreme weather and other disruptions to
regional and local climates. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas that traps heat, so as levels of the gas rise, the planet overall warms.
In addition to efforts to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, some have
suggested artificially manipulating the world's climate in a last-ditch
effort to prevent catastrophic climate change. These strategies,
considered radical in some circles, are known as geoengineering or climate engineering.
Many scientists have investigated and questioned how effective
individual geoengineering methods could be. However, there have been few
attempts to compare and contrast the various methods, which range from
fertilizing the ocean so that marine organisms suck up excess carbon
dioxide to shooting aerosols into the atmosphere to reflect some of the
sun's incoming rays back into space. [8 Ways Global Warming is Already Changing the World]
Now, researchers using a 3D computer model of the Earth have tested the
potential benefits and drawbacks of five different geoengineering
technologies. Will it work?
The scientists found that even when several technologies were combined,
geoengineering would be unable to prevent average surface temperatures
from rising more than 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius)
above current temperatures by the year 2100. This is, the current limit
that international negotiations are focused on. They were unable to do
so even when each technology was deployed continuously and at scales as
large as currently deemed possible.
"The potential of most climate engineering methods, even when
optimistic deployment scenarios were assumed, were much lower than I had
expected," said study author Andreas Oschlies, an earth system modeler
at the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research in Kiel, Germany.
According to a new study due to be published in 2014, Geoengineering field research is not only allowed, it is encouraged.
The study was authored by Jesse Reynolds at Tilburg Law School in the
Netherlands. Reynolds researched the legal status of geoengineering
research by analyzing international documents and treaties.
Geo-engineering is the science of manipulating the climate for the
stated purpose of fighting mad made climate change. These include Solar
Radiation Management (SRM), the practice of spraying aerosols into the
sky in an attempt to deflect the Sun’s rays and combat climate change.
“The term “geoengineering”
describes this array of technologies that aim, through large-scale and
deliberate modifications of the Earth’s energy balance, to reduce
temperatures and counteract anthropogenic climate change. Most of these
technologies are at the conceptual and research stages, and their
effectiveness at reducing global temperatures has yet to be proven.
Moreover, very few studies have been published that document the cost,
environmental effects, socio-political impacts, and legal implications
of geoengineering. If geoengineering technologies were to be deployed,
they are expected to have the potential to cause significant
transboundary effects.
In general, geoengineering
technologies are categorized as either a carbon dioxide removal (CDR)
method or a solar radiation management (SRM) method. CDR methods address
the warming effects of greenhouse gases by removing carbon dioxide
(CO2) from the atmosphere. CDR methods include ocean fertilization, and
carbon capture and sequestration. SRM methods address climate change by
increasing the reflectivity of the Earth’s atmosphere or surface.
Aerosol injection and space-based reflectors are examples of SRM
methods. SRM methods do not remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere,
but can be deployed faster with relatively immediate global cooling
results compared to CDR methods.“
Reynolds’ study will be published in the Journal of Energy, Climate and the Environment
around the same time that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
presents its Fifth Assessment Report. The study continues the calls
for an international body to regulate the controversial weather
modification techniques.
Some believe the answer is international agreement for international
tests but low-risk domestic research should continue to assist in the
overall decision of what to do with geoengineering.
One of the many dangers of manipulating the weather are the loss of blue skies. According to a report by the New Scientist,
Ben Kravitz of the Carnegie Institution for Science has shown that
releasing sulphate aerosols high in the atmosphere would scatter
sunlight into the atmosphere. He says this could decrease the amount of
sunlight that hits the ground by 20% and make the sky appear more hazy.
Solar Geoengineering: Weighing Costs of Blocking the Sun’s Rays
With prominent scientists now calling for
experiments to test whether pumping sulfates into the atmosphere could
safely counteract global warming, critics worry that the world community
may be moving a step closer to deploying this controversial technology.
by nicola jones
In 1991, Mount
Pinatubo in the Philippines erupted in one of the largest volcanic
blasts of the 20th century. It spat up to 20 million tons of sulfur into
the upper atmosphere, shielding the earth from the sun’s rays and
causing global temperatures to drop by nearly half a degree Celsius in a single year. That’s more than half of the amount the planet has warmed
Studies have shown that such a strategy would be powerful, feasible, fast-acting, and cheap.
due to climate change in 130 years.
Now some scientists are thinking about replicating Mount Pinatubo’s
dramatic cooling power by intentionally spewing sulfates into the
atmosphere to counteract global warming. Studies have shown that such a
strategy would be powerful, feasible, fast-acting, and cheap, capable in
principle of reversing all of the expected worst-case warming over the
next century or longer, all the while increasing plant productivity.
Harvard University physicist David Keith,
one of the world’s most vocal advocates of serious research into such a
scheme, calls it "a cheap tool that could green the world." In the face
of anticipated rapid climate change, Keith contends that the smart move
is to intensively study both the positive and negative effects of using
a small fleet of jets to inject
Arlan Naeg/AFP/Getty Images
The 1991 Mount Pinatubo eruption lowered temperatures nearly half a degree Celsius.
sulfate aerosols high into the atmosphere to block a portion of the sun’s rays.
Yet even Keith acknowledges that there are serious concerns about solar
geoengineering, both in terms of the environment and politics. Growing
discussion about experimentation with solar radiation management has
touched off an emotional debate, with proponents saying the technique
may be needed to avert climate catastrophe and opponents warning that
deployment could lead to international conflicts and unintended
environmental consequences — and that experimentation would create a
slippery slope that would inevitably lead to deployment. University of
Chicago geophysicist Raymond Pierrehumbert has called the scheme "barking mad." Canadian environmentalist David Suzuki
has dismissed it as "insane." Protestors have stopped even harmless,
small-scale field experiments that aim to explore the idea. And Keith
has received a couple of death threats from the fringe of the
environmentalist community.
Clearly, there are good reasons for concern. Solar geoengineering would likely make the planet drier, potentially disrupting monsoons in places like India and creating drought in parts of the tropics.
The technique could help eat away the protective ozone shield of our
planet, and it would cause air pollution. It would also do nothing to
counteract the problem of ocean
Some worry that solar geoengineering would hand politicians an easy reason to avoid emissions reductions.
acidification, which occurs when the seas absorb high levels of CO2 from the atmosphere.
Some worry that solar geoengineering would hand politicians an easy
reason to avoid reducing greenhouse gas emissions. And if the impacts of
climate change worsen and nations cannot agree on what scheme to
deploy, or at what temperature the planet’s thermostat should be set,
then conflict or even war could result as countries unilaterally begin
programs to inject sulfates into the atmosphere. "My greatest concern is
societal disruption and conflict between countries," says Alan Robock, a climatologist at Rutgers University in New Jersey.
As Keith himself summarizes, "Solar geoengineering is an extraordinarily powerful tool. But it is also dangerous."
Studies have shown that solar radiation management could be
accomplished and that it would cool the planet. Last fall, Keith
published a book, A Case for Climate Engineering,
that lays out the practicalities of such a scheme. A fleet of ten
Gulfstream jets could be used to annually inject 25,000 tons of sulfur —
as finely dispersed sulfuric acid, for example — into the lower
stratosphere. That would be ramped up to a million tons of sulfur per
year by 2070, in order to counter about half of the world’s warming from
greenhouse gases. The idea is to combine such a scheme with emissions
cuts, and keep it running for about twice as long as it takes for CO2
concentrations in the atmosphere to level out.
Under Keith’s projections, a world that would have warmed 2 degrees C by
century’s end would instead warm 1 degree C. Keith says his "moderate,
temporary" plan would help to avoid many of the problems associated with
full-throttle solar geoengineering schemes that aim to counteract all
of the planet’s warming, while reducing the cost of adapting to rapid
climate change. He estimates this scheme would cost about $700 million
annually — less than 1 percent of what is currently spent on clean
energy development. If such relatively modest cost projections prove to
be accurate, some individual countries could deploy solar geoengineering
technologies without international agreement.
‘The thing that’s surprising is the degree to which it’s being taken more seriously,’ says one scientist.
The idea of solar geoengineering dates back at least to the 1970s;
researchers have toyed with a range of ideas, including deploying giant
mirrors to deflect solar energy back into space, or spraying salt water
into the air to make more reflective clouds. In recent years the notion
of spraying sulfates into the stratosphere has moved to the forefront.
"Back in 2000 we just thought of it as a ‘what if’ thought experiment,"
says atmospheric scientist Ken Caldeira
of the Carnegie Institution for Science, who did some of the first
global climate modeling work on the concept. "In the last years, the
thing that’s surprising is the degree to which it’s being taken more
seriously in the policy world."
In 2010, the first major cost estimates of sulfate-spewing schemes
were produced. In 2012, China listed geoengineering among its earth
science research priorities. Last year, the Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change’s summary statement for policymakers controversially mentioned geoengineering for the first time in the panel’s 25-year history. And the National Academy of Sciences is working on a geoengineering report, funded in part by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.
Solar geoengineering cannot precisely counteract global warming. Carbon
dioxide warms the planet fairly evenly, while sunshine is patchy:
There’s more in the daytime, in the summer, and closer to the equator.
Back in the 1990s, Caldeira was convinced that these differences would
make geoengineering ineffective. "So we did these simulations, and much
to our surprise it did a pretty good job," he says. The reason is that a
third factor has a bigger impact on climate than either CO2 or
sunlight: polar ice. If you cool the planet enough to keep that ice,
says Caldeira, then this dominates the climate response.
A view from the space
shuttle Atlantis of three layers of volcanic dust in the Earth's
atmosphere, following the 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the
Philippines. Photograph: ISS/NASA/Corbis
Reversing climate change
via huge artificial volcanic eruptions could bring severe droughts to
large regions of the tropics, according to new scientific research.
The controversial idea of geoengineering – deliberately changing the Earth's climate – is being seriously discussed as a last-ditch way of avoiding dangerous global warming if efforts to slash greenhouse gas emissions fail.
But
the new work shows that a leading contender – pumping sulphate
particles into the stratosphere to block sunlight – could have
side-effects just as serious as the effects of warming itself.
Furthermore, the impacts would be different around the world, raising
the prospect of conflicts between nations that might benefit and those
suffering more damage.
"There are a lot of issues regarding
governance – who controls the thermostat – because the impacts of
geoengineering will not be uniform everywhere," said Dr Andrew
Charlton-Perez, at the University of Reading and a member of the
research team.
The study, published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, is the first to convincingly model what happens to rainfall if sulphates were deployed on a huge scale.
While
the computer models showed that big temperature rises could be
completely avoided, it also showed cuts in rain of up to one-third in
South America, Asia and Africa. The consequent droughts would affect
billions of people and also fragile tropical rainforests that act as a
major store of carbon. "We would see changes happening so quickly that
there would be little time for people to adapt," said Charlton-Perez.
Another
member of the research team, Professor Ellie Highwood, said: "On the
evidence of this research, stratospheric aerosol geoengineering is not
providing world leaders with any easy answers to the problem of climate
change."
Coral is particularly at risk from acidification and rising sea temperatures.
Photograph: Paul Jarrett/PA
The oceans
are more acidic now than they have been for at least 300m years, due to
carbon dioxide emissions from burning fossil fuels, and a mass
extinction of key species may already be almost inevitable as a result,
leading marine scientists warned on Thursday.
An international
audit of the health of the oceans has found that overfishing and
pollution are also contributing to the crisis, in a deadly combination
of destructive forces that are imperilling marine life, on which billions of people depend for their nutrition and livelihood.
In the starkest warning yet of the threat to ocean health, the International Programme on the State of the Ocean
(IPSO) said: "This [acidification] is unprecedented in the Earth's
known history. We are entering an unknown territory of marine ecosystem
change, and exposing organisms to intolerable evolutionary pressure. The
next mass extinction may have already begun." It published its findings
in the State of the Oceans report, collated every two years from global
monitoring and other research studies.
Alex Rogers, professor of
biology at Oxford University, said: "The health of the ocean is
spiralling downwards far more rapidly than we had thought. We are seeing
greater change, happening faster, and the effects are more imminent
than previously anticipated. The situation should be of the gravest
concern to everyone since everyone will be affected by changes in the
ability of the ocean to support life on Earth." Coral
is particularly at risk. Increased acidity dissolves the calcium
carbonate skeletons that form the structure of reefs, and increasing
temperatures lead to bleaching where the corals lose symbiotic algae
they rely on. The report says that world governments' current pledges to
curb carbon emissions
would not go far enough or fast enough to save many of the world's
reefs. There is a time lag of several decades between the carbon being
emitted and the effects on seas, meaning that further acidification and
further warming of the oceans are inevitable, even if we drastically
reduce emissions very quickly. There is as yet little sign of that, with
global greenhouse gas output still rising.
Corals
are vital to the health of fisheries, because they act as nurseries to
young fish and smaller species that provide food for bigger ones.
Carbon
dioxide in the atmosphere is absorbed by the seas – at least a third of
the carbon that humans have released has been dissolved in this way,
according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
– and makes them more acidic. But IPSO found the situation was even
more dire than that laid out by the world's top climate scientists in
their landmark report last week.
It's official: The Arctic icepack reached its summer low on Sept. 13, the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) in Boulder, Colo., said today (Sept. 20).
The Arctic ice cover melted down to 1.97 million square miles (5.10 million square kilometers) — about the size of Texas and California combined.
The
final tally puts 2013 in sixth place out of the top 10 record low ice
years since tracking began with satellites 30 years ago. It also
continues an overall downward trend in the extent of summer sea ice, the
NSIDC said. (2012 is the top record holder, with the lowest summer ice extent ever recorded.)
The
rebound in ice cover after a record low year was expected, Walt Meier, a
glaciologist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.,
said in a statement. "There is always a tendency to have an uptick after
an extreme low; in our satellite data, the Arctic sea ice has never set record low minimums in consecutive years.
