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Thawing a Desert of Ice
Tue Nov 08, 2005
Listen in RealAudio 
In Canada’s Far North, elders of the native Inuit say the time has come when the blowing wind no longer speaks to the hunters or the elders. They fear they are watching the end of their world. Hi, I’m Bryan Yeaton with The Weather Notebook’s Climate Change series.
Indeed, the Inuit world is fading before their eyes. Icebergs and glaciers melt, thousands of summer lakes disappear, polar bears grow thin, and a ring around the moon has lost its weather lore meaning. The sky now claps as thunderstorms roll through.
Many researchers agree with the elders. There is increasing evidence the Arctic desert of ice and snow is thawing . . . and changing. First autumn freezes occur later and the following winters are no longer as cold. Never before seen mosquitoes and other insects are now found in a land once too frigid for their survival.
Climate change models predict polar regions will be the first to experience global warming and exhibit the greatest changes. Measurements by Environment Canada are confirming this. Average temperatures in Canada’s Western Arctic have risen 2.7 Fahrenheit degrees over the past 40 years. A recent eight-nation study concluded the Arctic is heating almost twice as fast as the rest of the planet.
And as Arctic lands thaw, the ubiquitous permafrost melts deeper. Scientists fear accelerated warming if this melting releases immense stores of greenhouse gases. Estimates suggest 14% of the world’s carbon may be held in the arctic soil and wet meadow tundra, mostly as methane. Warming the subsoil by less than 4 degrees could more than double the methane released.
It is not only the Inuit who are feeling the heat; thawing permafrost has destroyed buildings from Russia to Canada, and destabilized oil pipelines, roads and airports around the Arctic.
Thanks to our contributing writer, meteorologist Keith Heidorn. Our show is funded by Subaru of America.
Today's Links
Seasons of Change: Evidence of Arctic Warming Grows
http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/environment/Arctic_Warming_ESU.html
The Arctic Perennial Sea Ice Could Be Gone by End of the Century
http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/environment/Perrenial_Sea_Ice.html
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