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Nicolo E. DiGirolamo, SSAI/NASA GSFC, and Jesse Allen, NASA Earth Observatory
About 40 percent of Greenland's ice sheet thawed at or near the surface on July 8. Four days later, the melt had dramatically accelerated and an estimated 97 percent of the ice sheet surface had thawed.
Three satellites found that 97 percent of Greenland -- the land mass second only to Antarctica for its volume of ice -- underwent a thaw never before seen in 33 years of satellite tracking, NASA reported Tuesday.
Satellite experts at first didn't trust their readings, especially since they showed an incredible acceleration. Over four days, Greenland's ice sheet -- which covers 683,000 square miles -- went from 40 percent in thaw to nearly entirely in thaw.
"This was so extraordinary that at first I questioned the result: Was this real or was it due to a data error?" Son Nghiem of NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena, Calif., said in NASA's statement about the findings.
Scientists on the ground in Greenland had been reporting an unusually warm summer thaw, including damage at a snow airfield and strong runoff threatening a bridge, Tom Wagner, who manages NASA's ice research programs, told NBC News.
Ice cores from Greenland's highest region do reveal that such island-wide thaws have happened every 150 years or so, at least over the last few thousand years, but the fear now is that it might occur much more frequently due to warming sea and air temperatures.
"We can't lose sight of the fact that Greenland's ice sheet is losing 150 gigatons of ice a year," Wagner said. That translates into raising sea levels by one-one hundredth of an inch. Additionally, the danger of greater warming and greater melt persists.
"If we continue to observe melting events like this in upcoming years, it will be worrisome," said Lora Koenig, a NASA glaciologist who helped analyze the satellite data.
Monitoring stations on land "showed temperatures above freezing, confirming that the surface was melting for the entire ice sheet," Konrad Steffen, director of the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research, told NBC News.
Since then, he added, "temperatures have fallen below freezing for the higher elevations but still are melting below 1500 meters."
The director of the top ice research center in the U.S. said the discovery fits into "the larger picture of a strongly warming Arctic."
A large glacier, twice the size of Manhattan, split off on July 16. NBC's Brian Williams reports.
"Arctic sea ice extent this summer is so far tracking at very low, near record levels, and the ice cover is unusually diffuse," Mark Serreze of the National Snow and Ice Data Center told NBC News.
On top of that, he said, the seasonal melt that followed the 2012 winter "started unusually early over most of the Arctic Ocean."
The center's latest report, issued Tuesday, noted that" Arctic sea ice continued to track at levels far below average through the middle of July, with open water in the Kara and Barents seas reaching as far north as typically seen during September."
Thomas Mote, a University of Georgia climatologist who looked at the satellite data, said the melt followed an unusual series of warm air ridges over Greenland since late May, with the strongest coinciding with the rapid thaw in mid-July.
Each successive ridge, Mote told NBC News, was "stronger than the previous one" and it looks like the pattern has finally broken down.
The ridges happened just as a cyclical weather phase known as the North Atlantic Oscillation shifted. "Together, they produced near perfect conditions for this event," Mote added.
Related: Huge Greenland iceberg breaks off glacier
Because they hold so much ice on land, Greenland and Antarctica have the potential to raise sea levels significantly if warming continues or worsens.
Sea levels have already risen by about 8 inches in the last century, partly due to some ice melt but also thermal expansion caused by warming seas.
The U.N. climate panel estimates sea level could rise between 7 inches and nearly two feet this century -- the latter a scenario that could prove catastrophic for many coastal areas around the globe.
NASA said researchers had not yet determined whether this summer's Greenland thaw would be significant enough to raise sea levels.
Greenland has enough ice to raise sea levels by 23 feet if it all melted off.
A recent study found that it could take a long-term increase in global temperatures of just 2-3 degrees Fahrenheit to completely melt Greenland's ice sheet in 2,000 years.
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Leave a Comment:
Perhaps all this melting ice will stir up some rain soon; perhaps 40- days and 40- nights!!!
The picture implies there is no ice left in Greenland, right now. Then it says this 'thaw' raised the sea levels by 1/100 of an inch. Then it says, if all the ice in Greenland melts it will raise the sea level by 23 feet. There is something very wrong with either the picture or the predictions of what happens to the sea level when Greenland melts.
But the caption makes clear that the color means thawing at the surface only.
how hot is it????????
it's so hot that chicken farmers are haveing to feed ice chip's to thier hen's so that they quit laying hard boiled egg's
that's why the ice in green land suddenly disappeared
what if the entire alutian chain erupted and burned for a year. everything that's on the earth is from the earth. the earth doesnt lose or gain weight. the same amount of water has been here for many thousands of years. the earth heals itself.stop breathing and using the water if you cant deal with it. go to greenelands coast and gather water and haul it inland to the center and dump it to rebuild the ice if you want to make a difference, goobers on the left.
It took a century for the industrial revolution to raise temperatures a degree. Mt. St Helen's lowered it a degree in a matter of days. The power and resilience of nature will dwarf anything man can throw at it.
If you look at the NOAA data, there is no noticeable dip in the global average temperature for 1980, the year of the St. Helens eruption. There may have been a regional dip for a few days or weeks. Even the larger 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo only caused about a 0.2 deg C dip in global temperatures for a year or so. Compare that to nearly 0.7 deg C warming since the 1970s. But I do hope you're correct that we'll be "off carbon" in this century.
Whaaaat in english this time phucktard!
Yep, warm winter, cold summer in the Pacific Northwest. That isn't normal either.
I'm not complaining! :<)
I'm so happy if climate change is true. The golf season will be extended.
So what this means nothing and it is not caused by humans burning gas and oil or tree's. Earth is a living planet and it goes through it's own living cycle, which we are in the latest cycle of the last ice age. Nothing we humans have done or can do will destroy Earth. However I believe that the most harm Humans are doing is the east coast citie's dumping millions of tons of their trash out in the ocean twice every day. If this continues it will start to kill off all sea life, this is something that does need to stop now! once people realize the damage done to the sea it will be too late and can not be fixed period.
WELL! Do You Want IT WARMER or COOLER! Huh Huh Huh!
I really get a kick out of the deniers, they simply are a hoot. Why? Because they are anti science yet they agree with their "chosen" very tiny infinitesimally small group that says global warming is not real. These anti science are A:mostly republicans and B: listen to and get their talking points from the talking dregs on talk radio, that as we all know are world renowned experts in the field. They are absolutely hilarious in their denial. You can just picture them screaming at their monitors after they get their "truths" from Fox or old Flush, et al.
So the ice is melting all over Greenland, at an astounding rate! Quote from the article:
"We can't lose sight of the fact that Greenland's ice sheet is losing 150 gigatons of ice a year," Wagner said. That translates into raising sea levels by one-one hundredth of an inch. Additionally, the danger of greater warming and greater melt persists. "
One-one hundredth of an inch! Per year! That's one inch in a hundred years!
Doesn't really sound like the 10-30 feet per hundred year predictions we've been hearing, does it now?
Are you aware, Royaul, that Greenland is not the only place on Earth with ice? And some of the other ice is melting, as well? And as more ice melts, the warmer it gets on Earth, thus melting more ice?
I don't know if it'll be 10-30 feet per hundred years (and I hadn't heard that prediction), but it's possible that the increase will be enough to @!$%# up your grandchildren's summers.
Can you say WATER WORLD! LMAO
It happens regularly, but this time the scientists that get funding and moron brainwashed idiots (who in the past tossed a few virgins in volcanoes over this stuff) are fearful... ha ha ha ha.
BTW, it's the height of summer, nice try but go back to hitting the bong you lefties.
Time to do some MAJOR mining, oil drilling and exploration of all that land while it's exposed..... yum yum I smell money! ; )
Troy,
Aren't you aware that it was the anti-science crowd who were throwing virgins into volcanoes?
I personally don't know enough about the science myself to make any grand statements, but if approximately 98% of the world's credible scientists agree, I'm definitely going to hedge my bets.
Its fun to watch the crazies on both sides of this argument come out.
I'm sure those little solar eruptions have nothing to do with our weather ? If we do pay a carbon tax ? Who gets the money ? Old man winter ? I thought so. Go try and shake down some 1% drug dealers. They can afford it ! LMFAO
If that was in this country there would be surfers. Does this mean the UN will have to relocate out of NY maybe the U.S. when sea levels rise?
I've got some future beach front property, in Arkansas, thats up for sale.
Anyone old enough to remember Canned Heat's song "Let's Work Together"? I am indeed employed in earth science as a geophysicist exploring for oil and gas. I know what the rocks tell me about changing sea levels over the last 400 million years. The earth will indeed see rising sea levels, human activity does contribute to this (to what degree is not understood). For some reason the conservative folks out there seem to demean anyone who claims the earth is warming up, or CO2 levels are increasing. I'll never understood why the neo-cons got so nasty, was it because of Gingrich, Bush, Chenney, or Rove? Maybe it was embracing the evangelical right, I know a lot of self-professed born-agains who seem to hate and judge a lot more than forgiving and loving.
The world will not be flooded in my lifetime so after I am dead who cares.That is someone elses problem.
Too bad we don't have satellite imaginary data from the period when the first Viking settled on "Greenland." The little "lack of point" that I enjoy about all these "climate" stories is the "on record" but they never report when the "record" was started. With a planet that is approximately 4.5 billion years old, a "record" of some 100+ years is less than an eye blink in geological terms. Since the continents and oceanic plates have been and are still continuing to move, since mountains are still rising and eroding, I wonder what effect these natural processes may also have on the weather. I love this term "normal" ... as if "normal" actually exists. We tend to pick the best weather period in our short "records" and claim that "normal" and then judge all other weather against this arbitrary "normal." If you don't like the weather ... just wait ... it will change!
So what you're suggesting is that we don't know if there was an "Ice Age" because we have no satellite image of it?
Because that seems to be common knowledge.
There are ways to learn about the past without having been there. (Psst: that's how they know the planet is approximately 4.5 billion years old.)
When the only chunk of land left that is not underwater is smaller than Long Island the lying GOP will still cling too the lie that there is no "Climate Change" happening...
Such an Unintelligent lot they are except when it come too stealing $ from the Working Middle Class...
Wake up and vote these self serving Republican Politicians out of office..
way to go GOP - NOW WHAT - it took a million years for that ice to form to help us cool properly - it now melted in 40 - gee who could have saw it coming - smart people with no agenda thats who - crooks
It's time to build a bigger boat and head for higher ground. Or buy beach front property in Arizona! Consider this, in Anartica there is an ice shelf 350 square miles about to break off adding to some more higher sea levels.
Believe it or not, we are heading toward another ice age. You wouldn't think with the melting, but this is the pattern of an impending ice age. This global warming theory is a money making scam.
The ugly fact is global warming is Real! 98% of the scientific community believes the evidence and it's time for the American people to stop denying the evidence. I've been reading books about this since 1980 and it's taken scientists 32 years to gather the proper empirical data and go public with the findings. Well it's here folks and there is no more denying it. The U.S.A. and China are the biggest users and should lead the world in doing something to reduce our carbon footprint! The time to act is now (check out Aug issue of Rolling Stone for a good article) REDUCE YOUR CARBON FOOTPRINT - BUY ELECTRIC CARS and REDUCE REUSE RECYCLE!
I believe like Reagan did, that global warming could be more of a positive than a negative. More crops could be grown in regions impossible before, more areas suitable for human habitat, more cattle and grazing land, Reagan was always the optimist, never the pessimist. To him the glass was always half full, not half empty.
Some areas may well benefit, but many other areas will become less suitable. Abd the rate of change makes it very difficult (and expensive) to adjust rapidly enough. Most comprehensive studies suggest a net loss of trillions of dollars.