More Proof Of Global Warming. The Arctic Sea Ice Minimum Extent, 2009.

Joseph Raglione
Gentle readers of this American Chronicle, on-going measurements of the Arctic Sea Ice is proving that during the last three years, the Arctic has and continues to melt and is being replaced only by thinner ice. The evidence is on the books. The proof is impossible to ignore except by selfish and heartless fools who continue to sell you internal combustion engine Cars on Television.

While visiting NASA's Earth Satelite Web site, check out the size of the Ozone hole. http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=40212&src=eoa-iotd

Recommend this image (to your local TV stations.)

On September 12, 2009, sea ice in the Arctic Ocean most likely reached its minimum extent for 2009, said the National Snow and Ice Data Center. The reach of Arctic sea ice fluctuates through the year, growing in the winter and shrinking through the summer. In September, ice stops melting and begins to re-freeze as temperatures drop. This image shows the minimum extent for 2009 as observed by the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer for EOS (AMSR-E), a Japanese sensor flying on NASA´s Aqua satellite.

This image illustrates the 2009 minimum on September 12, when ice covered 5.10 million square kilometers (2.97 million square miles) of the Arctic Ocean. The average minimum between 1979 and 2000, outlined in yellow, was 6.71 million square kilometers. The 2009 minimum extent was 1.61 million square kilometers or 24 percent below average. According to the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), the 2009 sea ice minimum was the third lowest since the start of satellite measurements in 1979. The only two years with less sea ice were 2007 and 2008.


The graph illustrates the difference between 2009, 2008, and 2007 sea ice extent and the average extent. Sea ice covered a smaller area in 2009 compared to 2008 until August, at which point ice loss in 2008 surpassed 2009. Neither year came close to 2007, which was low from the start of the melt season. All years were significantly below average.

Though sea ice didn´t melt as much in 2009 as it did in the previous two years, NSIDC scientists believe that the long-term decline in summer sea ice extent will continue. Sea ice in the Arctic is now dominated by younger, thinner ice, which is vulnerable to melting, said NSIDC. To see how sea ice has changed since 2000, see the Earth Observatory´s World of Change entry on Arctic Sea Ice.

References

National Snow and Ice Data Center. (2009, September 17). Arctic sea ice reaches annual minimum extent. Accessed September 18, 2009.

Scott, M. (2009, April 20). Sea Ice. NASA´s Earth Observatory. Accessed September 18, 2009.

NASA images created by Jesse Allen and Rob Simmon, using AMSR-E sea ice concentration data provided courtesy of the National Snow and Ice Data Center. Caption by Holli Riebeek.

Instrument: Aqua - AMSR-E
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Joseph Raglione

About Joseph Raglione
Hi! I am the executive director of the World Humanitarian Peace and Ecology Movement. I began as an environmental activist in 1969 and basically, never stopped! I Graduated College in Social Science and registered as a non-profit corporation in 1988 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. I am one of a very few non-profit and generic freedom loving journalists left on Earth, and I continue today to study and to understand the problems connected with human activity on this Planet. My affiliates include: GreenPeace, the Nature Conservancy, the Bio-diversity organization, the Sierra Club, the David Suzuky foundation, the WWF, Amnesty International, World Vision, the IUF organization; as well as the wonderful and independant N.A.S.A. scientists studying our Planet's weather systems. Of course NASA also studies the mysteries of the Eternal Universe with satelite generated images and, over the years, have generously allowed me and thousands of our world scientists to study over their shoulder's via the Internet.
In spite of some past U.S. government repression, NASA continues to provide solid evidence of global warming.
NASA has provided me with pictorial evidence of Rainforest deforestation within: Jakarta, Peru, Africa, Brazil and even in Western Canada!
The motivation for such destruction continues to be (often illegally) for: lumber, for bio-fuels, and for Cattle ranching. Today, the perceived future profits for Palm Oil and for Bio-Fuels are prime motivators for environmental destruction. Small crop farming also contributes but that may be changing as farmers learn to protect the Rain-Forest.
With NASA imaging, there is proof that large city heat traps are helping global warming, and with (infrared images)there is proof that several hundred million gas burning vehicles (including ship and airplanes) presently create a hugh quantity of pollution tracks across both Oceans and Sky.
With oil, gas, Coal and Bio-Fuel heated buildings around the world creating C02 emissions, and with Methane release from all animal species...giant Ozone holes have been created and continue to exist above the North and South Poles. Ozone holes allow the Sun to radiate the Ice Caps and to accelerate the Ice melt, which releases more Methane into the atmosphere, which continues to thin out the Ozone. A vicious circle created by human need and also, unhappily, by human greed!
I have been asked to write to the Prime Minister of Japan to ask him to stop the murderous assault on endangered Whales. Every year, thousands of Whales are killed in the Antarctic with GreenPeace volunteers placing themselves between the Whales and the grenade tipped harpoons, and peope like myself, (I did not forget this is my "Bio," putting my old neck on the line attempting to change the situation by writing thousands if not millions of words!
Are words dangerous?
Over three hundred journalists were killed within the last ten years. You tell me if words are dangerous!
As I write these words, the desperate and starving in Darfur are waiting for rescue. I motivated a few kind hearted California Actors to visit the region and to report back. They did! They then created the Darfur coalition and they continue to fight to save the innocent victims trapped in tents in the desert of the Sudan. Darfuri's were attacked and moved from their homes because somebody believes there is Oil under the Sudan desert.
As I write this, a few sick and desperate people in Iraq are wrapping bombs around themselves in order to die in the name of God, and the list of humanitarian disasters continues. I also contribute information to the Reuter's news service. It is time for a change. Please help make it happen!