Friday, February 20, 2009

 

It's Not Aliens, It's Us


I have posted recently about problems with the measurement of sea ice in the Arctic. At the Cryosphere Today, things didn't add up and the photos showed areas of vast, one day melting in the Northern Ocean, including a ring around the North Pole. After a few days of at least problematic data, the ring is back along with new unreliable data in the Beaufort and Chuckchi Seas. The other site, Arctic Sea Ice News and Analysis put out by the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, CO, has recently given up the ghost and admitted that its satellite data is junk recently. They showed a sea ice extent of just over 14 million square kilometers, and they now believe that it is just under 15 mil. That revised figure is actually slightly above the 'normal' one would expect, at least the 21 year normal of 1979 to 2000, not the winter melting and disappointing sea ice recovery the site has been talking up since the satellite sea ice sensor went bad in mid-December.

I'll report again when they have their act together

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Comments:
Rog,

I missed your Oscar picks. Meanwhile, I heard that NASA launched a new satillite OCO which is the Orbiting Carbon Observatory.

The story was oon Morning Edition on NPR.

T
 
Rog,

Yikes! The rocket carrying the OCO satellite launched from Vanderberg AFB failed to make orbit after a rocket malfunction and the rocket and satellite crashed into the ocean near Antarctica.

8 years and who knows how many millions has come a cropper.

T
T
 
Sorry I was late on the Oscar picks. I know about the satellite, such a disappointment, but you just stole a subject for posting. Come to trivia Wednesday night at 7:30 at Spankey's--Evans and Williams.
 
Love to but Wednesday is crazy.

T
 
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