Speaking of weather: Many of you will recall the segment of Vice President Gore's "Inconvenient Truth" (which also dealt with Hurricane Katrina) that focused on the melting of the polar ice cap and how global climate change could accelerate that - and in turn be accelerated by it. New evidence emerged this week that the melting of the ice cap in the Arctic Ocean is quickening and that - within a year or two - there could be no ice cap over the North Pole and environs during the summer months. Government flights over the Arctic Sea this past week noted nine polar bears swimming, looking for ice to rest on, and there was no ice anywhere. Some of these polar bears were swimming north - when the remaining ice cap was 400 miles away - when land (apparently Canada?) was only 50 miles away (but the bears expected the ice to be close, as it usually was). The Gore segment illustrated with animation the predicament of the polar bears. But this aspect of global climate change threatens not only individual bears and perhaps a whole species but also a catastrophic chain of events - perhaps like those displayed in the "Day After Tomorrow" movie.
-- Perry
1 comment:
Interestingly, this story has a direct connection to the presidential election. As Alaska governor, Sarah Palin opposed a federal government proposal to declare the polar bear an endangered species, because of the detrimental effect it might have on economic activity in her state. I'm picturing those half a dozen polar bears still out in the melted water this weekend trying to swim the 400 miles to the ice cap - shrunken because of climate change. Perry
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