 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| . |  |
. |
Canadian And US Scientists Tag Arctic Ice Island Bigger Than Manhattan
Ottawa (AFP) May 24, 2007 US and Canadian researchers landed on a massive ice island this week to install beacons to follow its movements as it floats through the Arctic Ocean in Canada's far north. Ayles Ice Island, which is 16 kilometers long and five kilometers wide (10-by-three miles), tore away from Canada's Ellesmere Island close to Greenland in August 2005, but was only identified late last year. The break was so violent that it caused tremors that were detected by Canadian seismographs 250 kilometers (155 miles) away, but at the time no one was able to pinpoint what had happened. Geographer Luke Copland of the University of Ottawa, who reconstructed the chain of events by piecing together data from the seismic readings and satellite images, and his colleague Derek Mueller of the University of Alaska Fairbanks landed on the berg on Tuesday, Sophie Nadeau, a spokeswoman for Ottawa university, told AFP. The satellite tags installed on the island will track its movements as its drifts toward Alaska, where it could pose a danger to offshore oil rigs. According to the Canadian Ice Service, relying on satellite images, the island has traveled less than 100 kilometers (62 miles) to the south since its rupture. In an interview with AFP in December, when the discovery was announced, Copland said: "This loss is the biggest in 25 years, but it continues the loss that occurred within the last century." Almost 90 percent of the ice cover in the region had been lost since it was first discovered during a polar expedition in 1906, he said. With global warming, Copland now fears the five area glaciers clinging to Ellesmere Island will not rejuvenate themselves, as they once did, and crumble into the ocean. The Earth's polar regions have been most affected by warming, believed to be caused by greenhouse gas emissions, with temperatures in the Arctic rising twice as fast as elsewhere over the past century. The ice cover and thickness will be substantially reduced by 2100, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has predicted.
Source: Agence France-Presse Email This Article
Related Links
Permanent Ice Fields Are Resisting Global Warming
Paris, France (SPX) May 17, 2007The small ice caps of Mont Blanc and the Dome du Gouter are not melting, or at least, not yet. This is what CNRS researchers have announced in the Journal of Geophysical Research. At very high altitudes (above 4200 meters), the accumulation of snow and ice has varied very little since the beginning of the 20th century. But if summer temperatures increase by a few degrees during the 21st century, the melt could become more marked, and could affect the "permanent" ice fields. |
|
|
| The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2006 - SpaceDaily.AFP and UPI Wire Stories are copyright Agence France-Presse and United Press International. ESA PortalReports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additionalcopyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement,agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by SpaceDaily on any Web page published or hosted by SpaceDaily. Privacy Statement |
