Arctic Temperatures Fall 2007 At 9F Above Averages - All Time Record Warmth

[hatrack]

WASHINGTON — Temperatures in the Arctic last fall hit an all-time high — more than 9 degrees Fahrenheit (5 degrees Centigrade) above normal — and remain almost as high this year, an international team of scientists reported Thursday.

"The year 2007 was the warmest year on record in the Arctic,'' said Jackie Richter-Menge, a climate expert at the Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory in Hanover, N.H, and editor of the latest annual Arctic Report Card. "These are dynamic and dramatic times in the Arctic,'' she said. "The outlook isn't good.''

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Although the Arctic is warming overall, its effects vary from place to place. The Bering Sea, for example, is in a cooling spell, and an unusually severe winter has bulked up Alaska's glaciers. At the same time, the huge Greenland ice cap shrank by 88 square miles (220 square kilometers) as a result of an unusually warm spring and summer, according to Jaxon Box of the Byrd Polar Research Center in Columbus, Ohio.

Greenland dumped at least 24 cubic miles (100 cubic kilometers) of melted ice into the ocean. The report said the result was an "unprecedented'' rise of nearly 0.1 inch per year. The Arctic warming trend began in the 1960s and has been accelerating in the past decade.

EDIT

http://www.bnd.com/yourlife/story/584638.html

[jpak]

1. Deniers can STFU

n/t