Earth's ice cap

area of ​​the ice cap at the North Pole of the planet this summer fell to a record low in the history of satellite observations. In 1975, when the glaciers were measured for the first time, their area of ​​eight million square kilometers, and is now only four. In this August day Arctic become less by 75 thousand kilometers. At this rate, it could melt altogether. But scientists give pessimistic forecasts do not hurry. Roast Arctic summer. About five plus returned northern birds, and the ocean is full of puppies. Puppies - a professional term. Calling these small floes different scientists do not dare. Unusual warmth heats ice. The pictures can be seen from space: instead of endless desert of ice - open water. And the Northern Sea Route unusually svoboden.

"The sea route starts in Murmansk. You see, everything is free, the Kara Sea - free, the Laptev Sea - free "- show a map of the ice sailors. Just four million square kilometers of ice - it is five times less than it was at the beginning of the XX century. Surprised even polar bears. They have long been used arctic ice floes as comfortable boat, with the onset of summer to leave the New Earth. This year, the last large ice floes the bears prozevali.

"They are gone. And we were just in shock and horror. I will not say that they just swarmed, but we have always taken a two barrel, "- says a senior researcher at the Department of Ice Regime and forecasts, Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute Andrew Tyuryakov. With normal for ice experts on heat, they discuss the latest pictures of the expedition. Forms are unusual, but the reasons are clear. Just this year, the Arctic was really teplo.

"The general reason - warming in the 1990s. If we compare the curves of air temperature and the melting of ice, they are the same "- sums up the head of the department of ocean-atmosphere interaction Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute Henry Alexeev. It's just the weather noise, scientists say. It just happened, summer was warm. In general, a period of global warming, which with delight told the townsfolk and even scientists, frightened terrible floods, tsunamis, flooding most of Europe and drought in Siberia, because of which the people would have to travel across countries and continents, now, it is clear finishes. At the end of the nineties fell peaks of two ordinary periods of warming - two hundred and sixty. Apocalypse Now otmenyaetsya.

"The temperature will be reduced, postponed the question of the future stream of terrible no abnormalities not expect", - predicts a leading researcher of the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute Zalman Gudkovich. There are even advantages - the lack of ice would facilitate the work of drilling platforms in the ocean, would open the way for ships from Murmansk best in Japan and Southeast Asia. But even in this hot, the Northern Sea Route is not completely free of ice. In the region of Chukotka did not pass without icebreakers. In the future too, even icebreakers prigodyatsya.

Does the global warming of the cooling or vice versa, in the middle latitudes is still negligible. Weather makes Arctic and Antarctic. And this is where climate change is most visible. The current extreme melting ice is likely to nod farewell ended warming. Scientists believe the next year the Arctic Ocean once again turn into a white icy wilderness.

Source: www.vesti.ru/doc.html?id=891925&cid=2161