New Zealand Local Weather Forum
Weather Discussion => International => Topic started by: Mark on June 20, 2021, 07:28:03 PM
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Antarctica is experiencing an unusually cold start to winter, cold which is threatening to break the icy continent’s lowest temperature ever recorded–the -89.6C (-129.3F) registered at Vostok Station on July 21, 1983.
‘Spare a thought for the hardy crew who are wintering down in Antarctica,’ reads the opening paragraph of a recent newshub.co.nz article, ‘who are experiencing near-record breaking cold this week of -81.7C (-115F)‘–logged at Japan’s Dome Fuji Station.
Antarctica New Zealand science tech Jamie McGaw, who is camped 2,400km away from Dome Fuji, at Scott Base, says he “can’t even imagine that extreme cold”.
“I mean, the coldest I’ve experienced here, even in wind chill, is the -60Cs and that is pain — that is any bare skin exposed feels like it’s on fire.”
https://electroverse.net/antarctica-is-suffering-a-near-record-breaking-winter-10c-colder-than-usual/
(http://nzpws.net/nzwn/images/antarctica.png)
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https://electroverse.net/antarctic-sea-ice-extent-largest-since-2015-and-growing/
According to the June, 2021 report recently released by the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), it is revealed that the ice locked at Earth’s poles is actually GROWING.
The opening paragraph of the report reads: “Sea ice in the Southern Ocean surrounding Antarctica was well above the 1981 to 2010 average extent in June, rising above the ninetieth percentile near the end of the month”.
But that’s as far as the NSIDC go…
They have plenty to say on the Arctic –which is experiencing its sixth lowest extent on record (big whoop)– but when it comes to Antarctica, I hear nothing but “crickets” — clearly, the icy continent GROWING in mass, and so offsetting the comparatively small losses registered by its northern cousin, is seen as a dampener to the AGW party.
Or perhaps the NSIDC are just letting the data speak for itself:
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Sea ice at the South Pole has rebounded in 2020 and 2021, to the levels of some 3-decades ago.
The Changing Jet Stream
Play Video
Moreover, the trend of the past 40+ years (the satellite era) remains one of significant growth (of approx 1% per decade).
In 2021, Antarctic sea ice is actually tracking well-above the multidecadal average (shown below).
It is the doomsday scenario that has disappeared, not the ice:
https://electroverse.net/antarctic-sea-ice-rebound-surprises-scientists-msm-silent/
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https://www.sott.net/article/458372-Ozone-hole-above-Antarctica-is-one-of-the-largest-ever-its-still-growing-and-may-be-linked-to-the-COOLING-stratosphere
A giant ozone hole has opened up over Antarctica this year. Already larger than the entire ice-covered continent, the ozone hole has surpassed the size of 75% of ozone holes measured since 1979 and is still growing. Scientists believe climate change might be the cause.
The Montreal Protocol, signed in 1987, is frequently described as the world's great success story in battling human-caused destruction of the environment. The agreement banned harmful chlorofluorocarbons and other substances known to destroy the protective ozone layer, which absorbs damaging ultraviolet UV radiation coming from the sun. The concentrations of the damaging substances in the atmosphere have leveled off since the protocol came into force and are slowly decreasing, providing the foundation for the layer's gradual healing. But worsening climate change is now slowing down the recovery.
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'Surprising' and 'statistically significant' cooling trend over Continental Antarctica
© NASA/Chris Larsen
East Antarctica, which covers two thirds of the South Pole, has cooled a whopping 2.8°C over the past 4 decades; West Antarctica approximately 1.6°C. ..only tiny Antarctic Peninsula saw statistically insignificant warming.
German climate website Die kalte Sonne posted its 64th climate video here and examined a new paper on Antarctica by Zhu et al (2021): "An Assessment of ERA5 Reanalysis for Antarctic Near-Surface Air Temperature"
The European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) released its latest ERA5 reanalysis dataset in 2017 and Zhu and his researchers compared the near-surface temperature data from ERA5 and ERA-Interim with the measured data from 41 weather stations.
They found that the temperature trend from ERA5 is consistent with that from observations. The result: a cooling trend dominates East Antarctica and West Antarctica while a warming trend exists in the Antarctic Peninsula. Note that the regions of east and West Antarctica combined are vastly larger than the tiny Antarctic Peninsula.
https://www.sott.net/article/458405-Surprising-and-statistically-significant-cooling-trend-over-Continental-Antarctica