The Himalayas and Nearby Peaks Have Lost No Ice In Past 10 Years, Study Shows 409
DesScorp writes "A story from UK's Guardian reports on a study of ice levels from the Himalayas area, and finds that no significant melting has occurred, despite earlier predictions of losses of up to 50 billion tons of ice. 'The very unexpected result was the negligible mass loss from high mountain Asia, which is not significantly different from zero,' said Professor Jonathan Bamber, who also warns that 8 years simply isn't enough time to draw conclusions. 'It is awfully dangerous to take an eight-year record and predict even the next eight years, let alone the next century,' he said." Readers have sent in a few other stories today relating to melting (or persisting) ice around the globe; read on for more.
bonch writes "New research from the University of Colorado concludes that the polar ice caps are melting less than previously thought. Almost 230 billion tons of ice annually melt into the ocean, 30% less than past predictions. The new data comes from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment satellite, which provides more accurate estimates than previous methods." The earth being a complex thing, though, note that these observations don't mean an end to predictions of elevated sea level.
Finally, an anonymous reader writes with another ice story: "NASA's Terra satellite saw a huge crack in the Pine Island Glacier in Antarctica and it is all set to give rise to an iceberg the size of Manhattan! The huge gash in the snow is 30 kilometers (or 19 miles) long and nearly 100 meters wide, and is widening every passing minute. This is expected to create an iceberg more than 900 square kilometer in area, as compared to the 785 square kilometer area of Manhattan, Brooklyn, Staten Island and Bronx combined, said NASA."
Popcorn anyone? (Score:5, Funny)
Zealots...to your respective corners!
In this corner, we have Chicken Little, the frothing-at-the-mouth environmentalist who thinks the world is about to explode and every cute polar cub in going to drown if we don't do something RIGHT NOW! NOW! NOW! NOW!
And in this corner, we have Jesus H. Capitalist, the denier who thinks that pumping shit-tons of crap into the atmosphere and abolishing the EPA are good things because BP and Chevron say it's okay and Jesus says "Vote Republican!"
Gentlemen, when the bell sounds...begin your crazed hyperbole! Remember, bonus points are given for the most convoluted Nazi analogy.
Ding, ding.
It's obvious... (Score:5, Funny)
...Big Oil must've airlifted extra snow up there when nobody was looking! :)
Re:Skeptical != Scientific (Score:5, Funny)
Disbelieving things by default isn't really much better, from a scientific perspective, than believing everything you hear.
[Citation Needed]
Re:Maintaining a balanced position (Score:2, Funny)
This is Slashdot. Balanced positions mean you're obviously a shill for whatever the argument's opposing.
You're obviously a shill for the rational-thought camp. Most likely Consumers Union, the NHTSA, or maybe PBS. Probably PBS.
How could this be? (Score:5, Funny)
Shouldn't the vast global environmentalist "AGW" conspiracy have prevented these scientists from publishing their results? Isn't climate science controlled by a crowd that ensures their future prosperity by preventing dissenting opinions? How could this be?!
Re:Skeptical != Scientific (Score:4, Funny)
CITE YOUR GODDAM SOURCES... You. You have to be the first.
[Citation Needed]
Re:The 100% claim is essentially correct (Score:5, Funny)
Not retarded, politically motivated.
The two are often hard to distinguish, I'll grant.
Re:Skeptical != Scientific (Score:5, Funny)
Well, the numbers I have can be found here [slashdot.org]
84% support the earth is warming
74% support man influenced warming
67% warming due to man made CO2
14% that the earth is in fact cooling.
These are in complete agreement with this expert as well [slashdot.org].
Re:Fear Mongering (Score:4, Funny)
>>It was a no-win situation for IT professionals (at least in terms of the general public's view of them
We should have taken Newt's advice and let at least a couple big name disaster's happen then.
The only interesting thing from Y2K was my bank sending me a letter thanking me for my -95 years of loyalty to Wells Fargo.