Time for Northwest - Passage 2018

[jackdale]

And now for next year.

The decline of Arctic ice didn’t set a record this year, with sea ice extent coming in eigth after record-setting 2012. On September 13, at the summer minimum, sea ice covered 4.64 million square kilometers; that’s 1.25 million square kilometers more than 2012.
However, that fact was overshadowed by another: experts say what matters most in the Arctic is the total volume of ice — a combination of thickness and extent. 2017 saw summer volumes among the lowest ever recorded.
The Arctic set still another record that concerns scientists: no other 12-month period (September 2016 to August 2017) has had such persistently low sea ice extent.
The Arctic ice is therefore showing no signs of recovery, scientists say, and its decline is likely continuing to impact the Earth’s weather in unpredictable and destabilizing ways.

https://news.mongabay.com/2017/09/at...-thin-ice-age/

[Kenomac]

Here we go again....

Don't you ever get tired of starting the same old thread over and over again, posting the same old internet links and trying to stir up the pot to argue with the same people? OCD

It's a beautiful sunny day today, go outside and enjoy it... and quit worrying about stuff you can't control.

[DeepFrz]

Thanks Jack.

[newhaul]

It's way to early to be thinking about next summer yet Jack. Let's revisit this thread at the earliest the beginning of winter freeze up and haul outs .

[newhaul]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

Here we go again....

Don't you ever get tired of starting the same old thread over and over again, posting the same old internet links and trying to stir up the pot to argue with the same people? OCD

It's a beautiful sunny day today, go outside and enjoy it... and quit worrying about stuff you can't control.

But Ken we have to do something during the winter freeze .

[DeepFrz]

Originally Posted by newhaul

It's way to early to be thinking about next summer yet Jack. Let's revisit this thread at the earliest the beginning of winter freeze up and haul outs .

Oh, are you the forum overseer?

[Foeboat]

So, anyway, ...

If one were considering a passage (E to W), possibly via the Hecla-Fury straights, in a barely appropriate boat using a wait-and-see what the ice does strategy, what weather, comms, and navigation tools would you suggest? The idea would be to wait/cruise in NFLD (or possibly Greenland) in July and make the go/no go decision in early Aug. Any insights would be much appreciated!

Best,

Foe

[victor15]

Going West through Labrador Narrows is suicidal mission. Going East is tough enough if overall ice will permit. May be you will use icebreaker. Good luck. Cheers

[newhaul]

As of today we have 10 million sq kilometers of arctic sea ice.

[victor15]

Originally Posted by newhaul

As of today we have 10 million sq kilometers of arctic sea ice.

Don't look at those millions. The reality speaks for it self. Just check "summer" navigation season for how the ice distribution happens. Have the short cut hair to prick way above in scare. No jokes. Cheers

[jdazey]

Jack, thanks for getting the new thread going. Bandwidth precludes a subscription, but I'll be following as often as connectivity permits.

Ken, Newhaul, no one forces you to endure these threads. Vote with your keyboard.

Deepfrz, many thanks for the George Carlin link in the 2017 thread. I'm still chuckling at that one.

Cheers,

[rbk]

For those seriously considering this or even if you’re just day dreaming. I would suggest hoping a plane or driving up to the Yukon, NWT and Alaska and drive up to Barrow, Inuvik and over to Tuktoyuktuk along the arctic coast in the summer months and see what conditions are actually like and if you even still want to after actually going there. There are tour operators that will take you out on the water as well.

[newhaul]

Anyone planning a future trip thru the nap should step up your plans if the britts and the Russians are correct.
Global warming OVERRIDDEN by 'mini ice age' that will plunge UK temperature in 2030, claim mathematicians - Mirror Online

[SailOar]

Originally Posted by newhaul

Anyone planning a future trip thru the nap should step up your plans if the britts and the Russians are correct.
Global warming OVERRIDDEN by 'mini ice age' that will plunge UK temperature in 2030, claim mathematicians - Mirror Online

Your undated [Correction: as Newhaul points out below, the article is in fact dated] Mirror Online article appears to be a "regurgitation" of a series of news articles which came out in 2015. This topic was discussed at length in a previous thread in Cruiser's Forum. As it turns out, one of CF's members, adoxograph, is an Astrophysicist, and professionally knows Valentina Zharkova, the mathematician who supposedly made this prediction. This is what adoxograph had to say about the topic:

Not at all. But for different reasons. Only big change in solar output would have a impact on temperature.

The reference you quoted is very accurate and a nice understandable sumary, except the last paragraph. I'll tell you why the last paragraph is making Valentina pulling her hair out.

I met Prof. Valentina Zharkova at a convention in Tenarife. At breakfast one of our group called her the "ice queen": because of the storm of misinformation her paper has caused. She was not amused.

Nowhere in her paper did she mention any form of cooling. Her paper was about a model for the sun’s magnetic field and sunspots, which predicts a 60% fall in sunspot numbers when extrapolated to the 2030s.

Btw. I work with Zharkova's model determining spots and magnetic activities on exoplanetary host stars.

The whole thing started when the PR guy of the Royal Society called her preparing a press release. As he did not understand "solar activities at a minimum" she said something along the line of "you know like the Maunder minimum" in the middle ages. The overly diligent PR guy made a mini-iceage out of that and released the whole thing without her knowledge.

She regrets having done this every time a Journalist calls asking for information about global cooling predicted by her.

Why does it not matter? Earth systems will always reach a state of radiative equilibrium that is

incoming radiative energy from the Sun = outgoing radiation of planet

That means that the planet is in energy balance. If a planet is not in radiative equilibrium the temperature of the planet will increase or decrease.

The amount of incoming radiation depends on the albedo of the planet or in other word the amount of incoming radiation which is not reflected back out in space. The amount of incoming radiation is determined by

P_in=(σT_⊙^4)(4πR_⊙^2)(1-a)((πR_p^2)/(4πD^2 ))

where (σT_⊙^4 )(4πR_⊙^2 ) represents the luminosity and a the albedo. Rp is the radius of the planet and D the distance to the star.

Considering the planet as a blackbody any radiation reaching the planet is radiated as heat (Stefan-Boltzman Law) as follows:

P=σAT^4

where T is temperature. A is the area (=4πR_p^2) as a planet most likely emits radiation spread over the whole surface which is close to a sphere. Therefore the outgoing radiation is

P_out=(σT_eq^4)(4πR_p^2)
where Teq is ((L_⊙ (1-a))/(16σπD^2 ))^(1/4)

Consequently the planet is in radiative equilibrium when

(σT_⊙^4 )(4πR_⊙^2 )(1-a)((πR_p^2)/(4πD^2 ))=(σT_eq^4 )(4πR_p^2 )

What does that mean for Earth? Assuming the surface of the earth without atmosphere would pretty barren I assume an albedo a=0.12 (similar to the Moon). R_⊙=6.96×108m, T_⊙=5778K, D=1.496×1011m. Rearanging the above equations we can determine T_eq by

T_eq=T_⊙ (1-a)^(1/4) (R_⊙/2D)^(1/2)=5778K(1- 0.12)^(1/4) ((6.96×10^8 m)/(2*1.496×10^11 m))^(1/2)=269.9K

If we consider Earth’s real albedo of a=0.3 we get an even lower T_eq of 254.9K. The difference to the real measured average temperature on the surface of the earth of ~287K is caused by greenhouse effect of earth’s relatively thick atmosphere. So first of all we should be grateful for the greenhouse gases, because without them Earth would be a frozen ball of ice and we would most likely not existat all.

You see solar activity plays a rather minor role. Most of the temperature control happens in the atmosphere. Maybe I'll show you how that works when I have time to prepare something.

[newhaul]

Originally Posted by SailOar

This undated Mirror Online article appears to be a "regurgitation" of a series of news articles which came out in 2015. This topic was discussed at length in a previous thread in Cruiser's Forum. As it turns out, one of CF's members, adoxograph, is an Astrophysicist, and professionally knows Valentina Zharkova, the mathematician who supposedly made this prediction. This is what adoxograph had to say about this topic:

actually it does state the date of the article and it is less than 18 hours old
ByJeff ParsonsTech/Science Reporter
12:28, 27 DEC 2017UPDATED12:29, 27 DEC 2017
Here is a link to the paper referenced
https://academic.oup.com/astrogeo/ar...2/2.17/3074082
Astronomy & Geophysics, Volume 58, Issue 2, 1 April 2017, Pages 2.17–2.23,