Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2009/01/17
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]sigh. Anecdotal reports about weather, or even a year's worth of weather reports don't deal with climate. That's dealt with over centuries. There's one fact about the arctic that is irrefutable: that the ice pack is less dense in the winter and that there are vast amounts of open water in the summer. This summer melt is increasing. So whatever they are experiencing in Wasilla the mean effect over the poles is one of sufficiently increasing temperatures to melt the pack ice and reveal blue water. The US Navy operates routinely under the ice and has done so for fifty years. Its clear from speaking to submarine captains that areas previously unreachable are now open and available for much longer of the course of the year. When my son was up under the pole ice they experienced the thinnest ice measured at that particular time of year. Something is happening. I don't think it's an excess of polar bear farts... Adam On Sat, Jan 17, 2009 at 1:56 AM, Marc James Small <marcsmall@comcast.net> wrote: > At 04:31 AM 1/17/2009, PHC wrote: > >>Neoprene is not ideal, but with breathable areas the Barbour gloves >>work pretty well for me. Not in Arctic conditions though! Not that >>I've ever tried. -20C is the lowest I've known. > > I have a pair of leather mittens with a fur lining which are great for > hand-warming in cold conditions but which, of course, are not suitable for > photography. (I started to say, "only suitable for digital photography but > then some wise instinct reminded me that very few of the LUG folks enjoy a > sense of humor, so it would be best to desist from such a crack.) The US > Army's shell gloves (a thin leather outer with a wool olive-green inner > part) are REALLY good cold-weather protection though they are not, of > course, water-proof. > > "-20C" is, for the USians in our midst, is only about -5 degrees > Fahrenheit. > In January, 1961, I joined the Boy Scouts at the order of my father, a > recovering Eagle Scout, and we went camping a week later in central > Pennsylvania. It hit forty below, Fahrenheit, in the still air, and I, of > course, the fat and clumsy kid, fell into the creek. Wow! I later learned > how to camp in such conditions and how to stay really warm in really cold > conditions: after all, those Cave guys weren't so dumb! If you want to > camp cold, camp when there has been a cold snap and snow, and then the > weather warms, and you end up with 32-degree F (0C) freezing rain. You > have > to be really cautious to ensure comfort in that case! > > My son lives in Wasilla, Alaska, a bit north of Anchorage. He has been > amused by the fixation in the lower 48 with this "cold" weather. They have > had several weeks of -20F (roughly, -30C) daily highs. Their weather is > now > warming up to around zero (-18C), which means they will now have snow > again: > really cold air cannot hold much moisture, so the temperature has to rise > to get snow. Global warming, indeed! Fairbanks had its earliest snowfall > in recorded history this year. I keep reminding Ian that Nina Tottenberg > or > someone else on NPR keeps moaning that those poor Polar Bears are going to > have to leave that sauna into which the Arctic Ocean is turning and thus > will romp, en masse, to Anchorage to find malls and theaters with air > condiioners, along with all that pop-corn to eat. He assures me that this > is not happening. And he works on the North Slope. > > Marc > > > msmall@aya.yale.edu > Cha robh b?s fir gun ghr?s fir! > > > > _______________________________________________ > Leica Users Group. > See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information >