Snowmobiler buried by avalanche – dug out!
January 24th, 2012 at 3:30 am by Bill Steffen under Bill's Blog, Weather
Click picture to enlarge or better yet, click here for the amazing video. The road to Paradise in Mt. Rainier National Park has been closed due to avalanche danger. The snow and wind out west has been incredible. Mt. Baker reports 103″ of snow in the past 11 days and they have a base of 165″ (nearly 14 FEET). Squaw Valley CA picked up 28″ of snow in 24 hours for a storm total of 60″ (five FEET). Alyeska, Alaska is up to 452.0″ since October 1st! Record cold is reported in northern Alaska. Look at these temperatures as cold as 56 below zero. Barrow has been down at least to -40 this morning. Kodiak, Alaska has had their snowiest January ever and a top-ten coldest day ever in January. Also, record snowfall in the European Alps. The Austrian weather service (ZAMG) said some places had not seen snow ‘so deep’ in more than 30 years. In Germany the 9,718ft summit of the Zugspitze, which only had 7.5 in of snow six weeks ago, now has 150 in. A cold wave is going to bring the coldest air of the winter to Europe, with temperatures expected to be as much as 20 degrees colder than average. Record snowfall has also hit northern Japan. NASA satellite data shows that the Earth now has the coldest average temperature at 14,000 feet (less than 3 miles above the ground) ever recorded (click on 600 mb, 14,000 feet – or other levels in the lower left). The Antarctic icecap is significantly bigger than it was one year ago and it’s well above average extent. Despite the fact that it’s mid-summer, the Antarctic icecap is well above the average and continues a trend of increasing ice since the mid 1980s (see graph at link). Finally, it looks like a cold weekend here in Michigan. Look at the GFS model for Sunday morning with the trough right over Michigan. Both the European model and the GFS model have our 1000-850mb thickness at 505 Sunday morning…that’s chilly. The model has another windy, Arctic shot around Feb. 4.
Guess that explains why ‘we’ have no snow. It’s everywhere else!
Happy for us…sorry for them.
So now that the ice caps are growing, what crisis will this cause for the polar bears?
I’m guessing you don’t care but polar bears live in the Arctic where sea ice extent is still way below average. Bill referenced the Antarctic which is indeed above average.
And, to ward off any more misunderstanding, most people cite a single subpopulation of polar bears when they state populations of the species are increasing. A few subpopulations are stable; most subpopulations for which we have data are in decline. The bigger tragedy here is that the fate of these animals has been politicized, and that people who would otherwise tend to be concerned about the fate of this majestic animal are instead hardened and indifferent due to the caustic human debate.
(And, this comment can be applied to people of all political persuasions; plenty of people on “my” side are more concerned with how polar bears can be used in debate than in their survival and persistence).
I agree that the polar bears have become the pawns in the climate change brawl; but sadly, the climate DOES change. And if some animals have developed a highly-specific way of obtaining food (like requiring sea ice to get their seal dinner) – yes, they are in peril when things change. As they say: “Evolve or die”. Their cousins who moved to populated areas to pick dinner from the garbage dump will carry on the gene pool. It’s not “majestic” – but it will sustain them until a seal overpopulation draws them back to the sea.
We’re selecting for the “weedy” species- both plant and animal. Interestingly, we can apply that metaphor to the human economy, too, as rapid consolidation eats niche markets.
Well said.
Are Polar Beards as good eating as black/brown bears? If so, I think I know where my next trip may be. Less misery, right Brad?
Dang. Typo BEARS
Quick everyone, run for the hills!
First, I note your selective compassion. There is great wailing over the alleged threatened polar bear, but nothing from you on how extreme cold has reduced the population of manatees: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/05/manatee-deaths-florida-2011_n_1186298.html lizards: http://www.tampabay.com/news/environment/wildlife/once-ubiquitous-floridas-brown-lizards-scarce-after-cold-winter/1087157 animals even dying in zoos because of the cold: http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2011/02/08/mexico-cold-zoo.html Your selective compassion exposes your true motive is political and ultimately financial.
Second, some stocks (groups) of polar bears have shown decreasing numbers, some have shown increasing numbers…however the more detailed land surveys of the Inuit across northern Canada reveal an overall stable population: http://cmsdata.iucn.org/downloads/nunavut_norisk_1.pdf and http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/polar_bear_pop.jpg The ICUN also reports a “stable population of 20,000 to 25,000″. Polar bears have been shown to be able to swim over 400 miles continuously and they live down past Churchill on Hudson Bay, where summer temperatures have been as warm as 100F and routinely reach the upper 80s in the summer. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Churchill,_Manitoba “The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service estimates that the polar bear population is currently at 20,000 to 25,000 bears, up from as low as 5,000-10,000 bears in the 1950s and 1960s.” http://kestencgreen.com/polarbears.pdf
Third, many of the pictures of polar bears sitting on small chunks of ice in an open ocean are photoshopped: http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/05/09/sweating-the-details-in-climate-discourse/ (note even the leftist NY Times and Andrew Revkin decry the deception). Note how the same picture is used with a penguin: http://thebenshi.com/2010/05/10/37-photoshopped-polar-bear-is-the-climate-science-community-really-really-really-this-clueless-yes/ Many pictures on prominent magazines are now “adjusted”: http://www.businessinsider.com/natgeo-cops-to-recent-photo-fraud-plus-10-major-photoshopping-scandals-2010-6#cbss-watch-magazine-slimmed-down-the-real-photo-on-the-left-to-promote-katie-couric-in-2006-
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=1ea8233f-14da-4a44-b839-b71a9e5df868
http://www.fcpp.org/publication.php/2571
More on “Ursus Bogus”: http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/timblair/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/ursus_bogus_maximus/
Polar bears have been around for 150,000 years. They have survived much warmer temperatures than current ones. They’re endangered only in the fevered imaginations of Climate Alarmists. They’re an effective propaganda tool for use on weak minds.
Global warming? Yeah right!
Bill — that link to the “coldest average temp at 14K feet” doesn’t work for some reason.
Try this: http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/amsutemps.html If that doesn’t work, let me know. There’s a chance that it recognizes my IP because I’ve been accepted before.
If it is warm here, it is cold somewhere else and the other way around. Bill says it all the time.
can you comment
http://theintelhub.com/2012/01/23/hot-rain-high-radiation-levels-recorded-in-michigan/
yes
What can you do?? If there’s radiation in our snow from Fukushima – then it’s everywhere. Where can you “escape” to??
I’m old enough to wonder how much radiation we received from N-tests conducted in the SW USA in the ’40s and ’50s? Above-ground nuclear explosions surely sent a TON of radiation across the country and we “Boomers” have survived THAT
Of course you have….with all the cancers in this country, you sure have.
And second hand smoke gets blamed!
I am suprised the Department of Energy hasn’t taken down that web site yet. I wonder what the Japanese are going to do about a cleanup of their redioactive mess?
We normally have six to eight squirrels that come to eat bird seed that falls out of our bird feeders. This morning there were 18 squirrels running all over.
shoot em
Uncle Sparkee will!!!!
change to Safflower seeds. Little more expensive but the seed lasts much longer. Squirrels don’t like the seed and some sparrows don’t like it. Cardinal and all the other birds love it.
I take that you don’t have dogs. The squirrels and our dogs a continually playing chase.
I wonder if we have a shot at one of the warmest winters ever recorded.
-November was +3.6 degrees above average (although not technically “winter”)
-December was +5.8 degrees above average
-January so far is coming in at +5.9 degrees above average (although I looked at only the high temps).
Going to get verry snowy around WEST MICHIGAN!! This week’nd!! INDYY
How was that 1-3″ of lake effect snow you were predicting last nite?
Lol
I don’t know- check the SE Mich Blogs??
Hummer13 old sparks will eat them squirrels!! INDYY
La La La La, (hands over eyes) I use to help rehab squirrels so I love those little guys/girls. They provide comic relief if you watch them long enough. I have one that returns and comes begging at our slider door and I give him a walnut or hazelnut, or even a pecan. But I don’t condem people who hunt to eat them. I just can’t/wont’.
Well that is a week after the winter thunderstorm from what I’ve been reading from some on the blog about 1wk after a thunderstorm in winter comes a snow storm? Do my readings for my Ambient Weater looks accurate?
Temp: 28.9
Wind: 2.2
Pressure: 30.00