The National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration has released its annual Arctic Report Card, assessing the state of the climate above 60º north, and region’s grades are not good: higher temperatures, lower snow and ice cover, and alarming biological activity marred the report’s findings.
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In what seems to be an encore to last winter’s disturbing display, temperatures in the Arctic have once again risen above the freezing mark. According to The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the average temperature for the Arctic winter is -40ºF (-40ºC), but instead is currently hovering around 32ºF (0ºC).
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Global sea level rise has been assumed to have been rising at an average rate of 1.5 centimeters (0.6 inches) per decade since 1900, as measured by NOAA. However, a new study has cast that figure into doubt: after having taken regional sea level increases into account, the previously accepted rate may be off by a great deal — from 5 to 28 percent in some regions.
The problem comes from the fact that sea level measurements have been historically taken from coastal tide gauges, from roughly a dozen select sites around the northern hemisphere. It was assumed in the past that ocean levels were rising relatively evenly across the globe, however:
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A mysterious pinging sound has been reported over the past year coming from the waters of Fury and Hecla Strait in Canada’s Nunavut territory. The sound, apparently readily detectable by sonar equipment, is being blamed for a sudden scarcity of marine wildlife, normally-abundant in the channel that runs between the western end of Baffin Island and the mainland.
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