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NBC News Correspondent Kerry Sanders recently returned from Antarctica, where he chronicled the dramatic changes in the world's last wilderness. Below is his main report; you also can click on the map above for more dispatches from across the breathtaking seventh continent.
By Kerry Sanders, Correspondent, NBC News
ANTARCTIC PENINSULA — There are serious changes taking place here at the bottom of the world.
Increasingly, experts say, the ice is disappearing at a disturbing rate in the Antarctic Peninsula and that in turn impacts the future -- and perhaps the very existence — of at least half of the world’s 18 penguin species, who depend on ice and frigid waters that support krill, the penguin diet mainstay.
"When cheetahs or lions get hunted, or elephants decline, there’s a big uproar. And I think, because you see penguins in large numbers [in some places] people are ignoring the larger rate of their decline," said Oxford University penguinologist Tom Hart. "The general public doesn't realize the penguins are declining so fast."
But it’s not just the penguins we have to worry about, Hart says, it’s the health of the planet itself.
"The last wilderness on Earth is impacted by us now," he said, describing the region’s decline as a "grave indicator" of what’s to come.
Marine biologist Fabrice Genevois speaks with NBC's Kerry Sanders about Gentoo penguins and their extraordinary way of swimming which at times can appear as if they are "flying."
Life’s cycle disrupted for Antarctica’s penguins
It’s the end of the breeding cycle for most penguins here as summer comes to a close. The Gentoos, Adelies and Chinstraps are nudging their newborns from the rocks of Antarctica’s peninsula toward the waters of the Southern Ocean.
Experts say about 50 percent of the eggs will produce a penguin chick that makes it to sea. And about half of those will survive the hungry predators below, as they plunge into the frigid waters for their first swim. Leopard seals are lurking -- and for the newborns, avoiding their mortal enemy is not easy. Many will die. Those that do survive are subject to climate change that is threatening their food supply.
Hart has spent nearly a decade studying the creatures that have captured the world’s imagination for centuries. Each year, for three to four months, he positions himself along the Antarctic coast to observe, measure and chart penguin colonies. Some colonies have been followed since polar explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton and his men headed here some 100 years ago.
Modern-day expeditions to Antarctica are a more pampered escape than the harrowing ordeals they once were, but a couple men remember the heroes of previous expeditions a little better than most. NBC's Kerry Sanders reports.
"When you look at all penguins they are largely in trouble," said Hart. "We're so concerned because we're seeing massive changes to their populations. They’re probably not going to go extinct anytime soon, but the environment is changing very fast.
Chinstraps populations seem to have declined up to 50 percent in the last 30 years," he added.
Hart, like most experts, is cautious to speak in absolutes because the harsh environment here makes it difficult to get a clear picture of what’s happening. Experts use time-lapse cameras and sit at computers, laboriously counting penguins one by one to compare colony sizes from year to year.
To keep track of the penguin population in the extreme conditions of Antarctica, scientists turn to time-lapse photography as an important tool for research. This video shows years of the animals' migration patterns.
Krill decline quickly as sea ice disappears
Ice is the source of all life in Antarctica. It may seem at odds to think that ice gives life, but when you connect the dots, it’s a straight line to a penguin’s belly.
Algae live on top of the ice and underneath it too, providing a grazing ground for the krill that amass beneath -- the way a raccoon chooses to hide in a garbage can.
Krill mostly stay put under the frozen Southern Ocean. But as the ice sheet disappears due to climate change, that habitat shrinks and moves further south.
"The West Antarctic Peninsula has increased three degrees since 1951,” Hart said. "We’ve seen a large reduction in sea ice over the same period."
Although the climate has always undergone oscillations in temperature, Hart says the recent changes are happening much faster than normal.
NBC's Kerry Sanders takes a look at some of the unusual and fascinating wildlife that inhabits Earth's coldest continent.
Logically, less ice has resulted in less krill, say marine biologists. And since krill is the main diet for penguins, seals and whales, less food has in turn meant fewer births. That theory is widely accepted by scientists like French marine biologist Fabrice Genevois.
He says it’s mostly Americans, who have confused politics with science by questioning global climate change.
"We have all the information now, that's clear enough,” said Genevois. "There's no argument any more. You have to be either a liar or be crazy not to understand what we are doing to change the climate. We are responsible, that's for sure."
Add to that equation: Fishing. Less ice has opened areas to more fishing boats that in turn have targeted krill as a profitable catch.
There’s a 620,000 ton catch limit for krill in Antarctica, which is only about 1 percent of the total estimated mass in the region.
NBC's Kerry Sanders pays a visit to Antarctica, one of the world's last wilderness areas, to see the penguins that are being threatened by the increasingly rapid melting of the ice that dominates the landscape.
But it’s the location of the krill fisheries — all aggregated in the Antarctic Peninsula near the South Shetland Islands — that is the main cause of concern.
The boats increasingly drop their nets in the same waters where penguins search for food. The nets are not catching penguins indiscriminately but they are competing for the krill that the wildlife eats to survive.
Where do those captured krill end up? In part, they’re used as fish food at salmon farms, desirable because krill help color salmon “pink” which increases sales at the supermarket.
Click here and here for more on managing the krill catch.
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See photos from NBC's Kerry Sanders' voyage to Antarctica.
Canary in a coal mine
The entire population of Emperor penguins, Chinstraps and Adelies live in Antarctica — if the ice continues to retreat those species are at risk. Meanwhile, the potential for disease outbreaks increases.
"As regions of Antarctica warm it has much more potential as a petri dish," said Hart, citing disease from the north, in particular avian disease, as being a main concern.
The penguins, marine biologists say, are giving us a warning.
"We don't need to necessarily fear change," said marine biologist Maria Clauss, who works with tour company Quark Expeditions. But the penguin’s decline "will change the world as we know it," she said. "And we should not kid ourselves."
Day 1: Greeted by dirt, not ice
Day 2: Climate change decimates food supply for penguins
Day 3: Watching Mother Nature in action
Day 4: How to sleep outdoors in Antarctica
Finale: Trips to the seventh continent are not just for scientists
Leave a Comment:
Excuse my typing errors by the way
Right now, the Antarctic has more, not less, ice on March 10, 2013 than at any March 10th in the past 30+ years. It is a massive increase - more than 2 standard deviations above the mean. Go to the Sea Ice Index website, and you can check daily records of the amount of sea ice and, while you're at it, inform yourself. If someone hasn't referenced this site, yet, it's this:
This article is a good example of how scientists pervert an issue by selective data mining. The money right now is with the global warming crowd, and, unfortunately, so are the lies.
The planet is losing ice, schema. Lots of ice. Period.
As a physicist, I know of only one thing that can do that. Perhaps you know others. I'd be interested in knowing what they could be.
Physicist-retired the problem is too many idiots do not care. The stupid, that cannot because of their pride in being uneducated morons, will not accept the truth about climate change occurring. I am an Independent and conservative but I have also studied this for decades and the FACTS are being ignored by most conservatives.
The simple facts are the earths natural processes took ONE BILLION YEARS to create fossil fuels and we can burn them in mere centuries of times. As an example, is takes 50 to 100 years to grow a really large and strong tree, and mere minutes to cut it down, and only a few days to burn it up completely.
The Antarctic passed its summer minimum ice extent, reaching the second highest level in the satellite record at this time of year, primarily due to continued higher-than-average ice in the Weddell Sea.
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
Not the comment I would have expected, given your moniker, Libs ;-)
But it's much appreciated. When did science become a matter of politics or opinion? For someone who grew up during the peak of scientific accomplishment in this country, it's simply amazing to watch.
Yes, we can (and are) rapidly changing the planet's climate. And it isn't just the temperature change that's an issue - it's the rate of change that will be deadly.
55 million years ago, the planet warmed by 6C over a timeframe of 20,000 years. Many lifeforms couldn't adapt, and we saw a Great Extinction Event (the PETM) as a result of that rapid change.
Now we're on track to see a similar change over the course of 150 years. Perhaps schema can do the math.
Sam, that's classic cherry-picking, and I suspect you know that. The planet is rapidly losing ice. To point to one small area of the ocean, where high winds whipped up by by decreasing ozone in the upper atmosphere are spreading sea ice over a wider area (just as climate scientists predicted would happen years ago) as some sort of 'proof' that the planet isn't warming is either deceptive or ignorant.
Those are the two options. Which are you exhibiting?
Well said Lib. The so-called retired physicist is to caught up in his sub standard belief system. We should get this guy a guest shot on the show (The Big Bang Theory).
A C Robertson whoever the he// that is is a complete and total spaming moron. Why is it that articles about SCIENTIFIC FACT attract these horse flies? I don't get it. Antarctica is melting. CO2 is a heat trapping gas. Humans produce billions of tonnes of it daily. It's simple physics unless you're like ol' A C Robertson who never made it past the 6th grade. Maybe if you'd take you head out of the AC for a while your brain freeze would go away and you could put those two brain cells to work. It's BASIC PHYSICS but don't go expecting a Republitard to understand it. They still think Mitt Romney is ahead in the polls. It's called being a graduate of the Karl Rove school of math for the mentally challenged and apparently it's contagious.
Of course the post right above my last one from "Schema" is also fact free manure. More proof that home schooling doesn't work. Try that out Schema. wattsupwiththat.com is probably where you're getting your misinformation if I had to take a wild guess. Anthony Watts doesn't even have a college degree. Google it.
If you really want to know what's happening go here:
It wouldn't surprise me if Schema worked for Exxon/Mobile.
The earths biggest polution problem is airplane fuel, that stuff falls on us all including the ground and water and is highly toxic , so if you want to continue to save the animals and mankind.....stop flying!
Yes, aviation fuel emerged as the largest source of lead emissions in the U.S. once lead was phased out of automotive gasoline beginning in the 1970s. While jets, which comprise the majority of commercial aircraft, don’t use leaded fuel, smaller, piston-engine planes use enough leaded aviation fuel (nicknamed “avgas”) to account for half of the lead pollution in American skies, making it a real air quality issue.
Some of the health effects of repeated exposure to lead include damage to the central nervous system, kidneys and red blood cells, and decreased function in the cardiovascular and immune systems.
A 2011 Duke University study found that kids living within 500 meters of an airport where leaded avgas is used have higher blood lead levels than other children, with elevated lead levels in blood found in kids as far as one kilometer away. The EPA estimates that 16 million Americans live close to one of 22,000 airports where leaded avgas is routinely used—and three million children go to schools near these airports.
Aircraft exhaust produces contrails—condensation trails in the atmosphere about 5 miles above the Earth's surface. At these high altitudes, contrails and cirrus clouds form depending on the quantity of water vapor and atmospheric conditions.
Contrails and cirrus clouds both reflect sunlight that would otherwise warm the Earth's surface. At the same time, they absorb heat from the ground instead of allowing it to escape. Do they contribute to global warming or global cooling? The scientific community is still trying to answer that question.
Contrails contribute to the phenomenon known as "global change." Right now this effect is small, but it is growing.
Roger, please listen to this interview and please share....
http://www.zengardner.com/censored-dane-wigington-geoengineering-interview-pulled-from-youtube/
Thanks for the link brink, that IS EXACTLY what I have been trying to tell people for years now.
Jet/aviation fuel is killing us all and everything around us.
We don't need a plane taking off every 3 minutes in this country.
The politicians and elite have no problem contaminating us all from the sky above!
the sky is falling,the sky is falling!!!!!!!Help!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This has been said for so many years and NOBODY is listening instead they creating larger and larger planes to do more damage to everything and everyone on earth.
Roger nd Carol...I hate to tell you this, but airplanes will continue to fly and humans will continue to use fossil fuels to heat their homes and fuel their cars for the foreseeable future.
So whatcha gonna do?
Carol needs to take a flight to the carribbean and lay on a beach have a few beers and get some. Waaayyyyy to uptight Carol.
so instead you would rather believe in Al Gores theory, talk about dumb, the facts are CLEAR, don't be ignorant and buy into ANOTHER money pit
Apparently you can't post links to other sites on this comment thread. skepticalscience.com is what I attempted to post.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/
Oh No the Sky is falling, the Sky is falling. Way to Go Kerry Sanders you wasted NBC money and tax payers money this BS.
Humans need to eliminate all other life forms so we can have a more convient lifestyle.
200 spieces going extinct daily, fungus is killing bats, anphibians, trees, and infecting humans, the suns rays have been decreased 20% but yet the tempetures are rising, ocean currents are flowing the opposite directionbringing warm currents where cold used to flow, arctic ice is melting faster than ever in history and exposing methane gas reserves which are of serious concern....why is this happening you ask? Listen to this interview and please share as widely as possible...
http://www.zengardner.com/censored-dane-wigington-geoengineering-interview-pulled-from-youtube/
So now penguins are the new "poster children" for the global warming(oh sorry I forgot, climate change) crowd. What polar bears aren't cute enough, to sell this BS anymore?
Open your damn eyes and follow the money you gullible sheep.........and you will understand why you can't find a job.
Obama counted on almost 700 billion, in new "so-called" revenue, for his budget, by auctioning off "carbon credits" to help compensate for some of his over-spending(look it up).
That is the real reason this BS fell off the radar for awhile, the Chinese(whose carbon output far outweighs ours), they told Obama to stick his "carbon credits", where the sun don.t shine, and they weren't gonna play that.
Then you take into account the leaked East Anglia e-mails, the recent leaked UN Inter-global Panel on Climate Change report (2/11) which admits "over estimation", and anyone but the most devout "environmental wacko", will see this is nothing more than, or less than, industrialized blackmail.
With existing regulations and taxes, already bleeding the corporate World dry, how is this newest tax scheme going to promote jobs?
But you IDIOTS on the left cling to this crap, ridicule others for "questioning the science" behind this, and then complain about jobs migrating to China (who AGAIN told Obama to shove his "carbon credit" tax).
But keep "swallowing" this BS, at least you can "feel good" about yourselves, because you are trying to help those poor little cute penguins.......even if you are jobless, homeless, and starving(when your unemployment runs out), with no HOPE of ever finding a job, .......its all about those cute little penguins.
The issue I have with all this is not whether it is an issue or not but should it be an issue how does one expect to change the earth? We can't agree on ths simple things in life let alone how we would fix worldly problems.
a different take on this
if you stopped saving the seals maybe more penguins would survive.....
isn't the penguin already being used as the "gay" mascott?
those gays, they will do anything to stay in the spot light....
I am all for clean air. But the left are way to extreme with solutions that will make about 0.001% change in the Worlds air.
Middle class (me too), as I said its all about the money, Obama's "budget" was based in part on the expectation, Al Gore could sell this crap, and the new "revenue" from "carbon credits".
By the way Al Gore made billions on "climate change" and used some of the profits to build a beach front mansion.....beach front,........ on the same beaches Gore claimed would be swallowed up by...... rising sea levels.
people on this post have said anyone who disagrees about global warming didn't make it past 6th grade... excuse me but i do remember 7th grade science class which told me that global warming started about 20,000 to 30,000 years ago... if it didn't start then how is it that california and new york aren't still covered by ice????? this is the end of the ice age... not one person can answer "what is the largest of all the greenhouse gases??? most say co2 because that is what AL GORE said!!! look it up better yet look up in the sky you can see it!!!! 60 to 70 % of the green house gas is H2O but it isn't created by some monster we can associate with so we blame the oil companies. what creates 2.5 pounds of co2 every day????? a human breathing!!!!! do the math on that one 7 billion people live on this earth today 365 days and AL's big change started in the 1850's or so when there were only 400 to 500 million people living on this earth.
so if you think that global warming was started by man don't just blame the people now blame Fred Flintstone and all his fires he used to warm his food and vehicles he drove back then that started the global warming that caused the ice to receed 6000 miles and was 1000 feet deep across the land we know today.
but i did have fun in the 9th grade.... missed a lot of science then
The future of the whole world basically lies in our hands, my generation, and sadly I fear that not all young adults are aware of this. It is up to us to try to save the world, or just make it worse. Everyone needs to be aware of this worldwide problem, young or old, and only time can tell what is going to happen. Think about the future, the future of humanity and nature, don't be blinded by the present.
So open your wallet Jose and pay your penance for being born a human and as such, RESPONSIBLE for decimating nature.....just like if you are born WHITE.......you now OWE penance for that "guilt" as well.
Sadly, most of the supporters of man-made global warming myth are scientific illiterates. They are led by the emotions by a bunch of so-called scientists with an agenda. As an earth scientist with over 30 years of experience in earth science, it appalls me to see how easily people are misled. The fraudsters in acedemia were revealed by exposing their collusion to manipulate faulty data, they cooked the books in order to promote their agenda driven "science" and even say so in their revealed emails. They suppressed dissenting opinions and corrupted and violated the basic tenets of the scientific method in order to push the myth. Aided by politicians and organizations who stood to gain, most notably the UN, who sees it as a way to siphon money from the developed countries, to themselves. The article, like many before it fails to mention the isolated area of ice reduction, just as similar articles on the Arctic do. They do not trumpet the episodes of ice expansion. Undoubtably the same organizations who support MMGW run junket tours for the media and take them for photo ops to see the poor starving penguins. Who cares? They do the same thing for the polar bears. Who took care of these creatures when the earth heated up in the past? The earth has a climate system driven by a myriad of imputs such as solar flares, solar winds. What man can and has done is infintesimal in the greater scheme of things. To think we can stave off changes to a system that is so great is an act of hubris that could only come from politicians paying for the feeble attempts with others money.
Number 1 answer is man kinds GREED. RAPE AND PILAGE THE EARTH. Blame the morons that profit from this.
like AL GORE he stands to profit most if carbon dioxide is the blame for global warming, the only quick way to stop this is move to another earth!!! it is going to happen no matter what we do just like 20 to 30 thousand years ago when the end of the ice age started
Agreed the damage is set in motion and it will catch up with us faster that we thought. Self destruction is in man kinds D.N.A.
Su you are admitting that nothing can be done about it.
Rex as the saying goes (We made our own bed and now we have to sleep in it). And YES it's to late. We are set on a course of no return and we all are to blame.
the whole article is a bunch of bullsh--!!!!!!!
the penguins are going the way of the do-do bird and the dinosaurs if they can't adapt to change so they die off just like 99% of all other species have died off when they can't adapt on this earth. mankind was not the cause of the extinction of that 99% it was mother nature (the earth itself)
Perhaps the answer to global warming is better air conditioners.
We never hear an uproar about the huge number of the most dangerous, destructive animal that ever existed.
Now we have more of this revolving crusted molten ball to ravage and destroy. Yeaaaaaaaaa!
The sad thing is humans are causing all of this and soon it will effect all of us and there is NO turning back we are painting ourselves in a corner and there is no getting out of it and when that happens humans as we are will blame God instead or ourselves.
Oh Carol, it's just going to be AWFUL, I tell ya. Whatever will we do?
what should we do lefties and earthies, should we all park our cars, should we all live in the woods and warm ourselves by the camp fires, should we stop our civilization as we know it. You sissies would last a week in a world without your little pussy ammenities so shut up about the damn penguines they'll survive there animals they adapt unlike you idiots who need obama and pelosi to tell you how to wipe your holes.
Forget about campfires. They cause some sort of gas that creates a hole in the layer above us - or did that theory go away?
Somebody woke up on the wrong side of the bed.
I never cease to be amazed at how egocentric humans are. We don't really know how we came to exist on this planet or even how the planet came to be, but we think we can control everything about our existence. We can't what really exists inside solid matter but we created the laws of science, based upon our ability to repeat events using the tools we created with our own imperfect senses. We even created several stories about a supreme being and insist that the version we choose to believe is the "right" one.
Scientists believe that the solar system (another theory that we have developed) formed between 3 and 4 BILLION years ago. Scientists also believe that the earth began as a molten mass and that it cooled slowly over millions of years. Despite their own calculations regarding the development of the earth the data they now use to tell us that the earth is warming is only about 100 years old.
The one thing we can count on is that whatever scratches we make on our environment are puny compared to what nature can do in the blink of an eye. To assume that our automobiles or our cattle are causing the world to warm up is typical of how we think. The earth has been evolving ever since we arrived here - whenever that was, and we can expect that it will continue to change until the day when we can no longer live here ourselves. If we want to spend time and effort on something that is really helpful we would focus our efforts on adapting to the changing environment rather than trying to control it.
exactly right, we need to find a way to survive the changes or we will be like the dinasaurs
So............ HOW MUCH??? We have been regulating and taxing for the "environmental destruction" we cause since the 70's....so HOW MUCH?
5 trillion, 15 trillion, 50 trillion,...........HOW MUCH?
How much do we need to pay to ease our conscious for being born HUMAN.....so as such the simple fact of our BIRTH.................devastates an otherwise "pristine" planet.
SO HOW MUCH? Do we return to the caveman days, rejecting all the trappings of "civilization" or simply commit mass suicide because of our collective guilt?
My conscience is clear and I feel no guilt, collective or otherwise.
NBC Journalist meeting ( using word journalist loosely )
"Nothing going on in politics that is the Republicans fault. Democrats are screwing everything up. We need something to make Republicans look bad. Anything? How about having Republicans kill penguins. Everyone loves penguins. Except Republicans that is. Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha. Democrats fall for this crap all the time. Print it!"
Middle class....don't forget about the "evil corporations" that want to...... kill off their customers.....by poisoning the planet.........for profit...........makes perfect sense.
Do you ever read anything but conservative chain emails? Food additives that "addict" people to junk food? Nicotine that addicts people to tobacco? The levels of toxins in our bodies due to the crap that's dumped into the food chain is at astronomical levels. Corporations have it all worked out. They just snow their customers BEFORE killing them.