Researchers have discovered that as global warming causes the North Atlantic’s Gulf Stream to migrate further north, it blocks the flow of water flowing from the Arctic via the Labrador Current, a situation resulting in detrimental changes in the environment in the waters off of the North American Shelf. Typically,read more
A study just published in Nature Climate Change reports an "exceptional" weakening of the Gulf Stream system across the twentieth century, and suggests that the entire system of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation is in jeopardy. But the lack of measurements means that the degree to which this is true is unclear. The weakening of the system is the probable cause of the recent harsh winters in North America, as the polar vortex has ceased to be held in position by warm air that is normally driven northward by the current.read more
Sudden stratospheric warming has split the polar vortex in two. The polar vortex, which forms as the atmosphere loses heat to space in long Arctic winter night, was split in two by massive heating from below, as a series of intense storms in the far north Pacific intensified. Energy went upwards from the lower atmosphere around the Himalayas and Tibetan Plateau and broke into the stratosphere, causing major sudden warming.
But wouldn’t that make it warmer instead of colder? Surprisingly, no–this creates SEVERE winter weather.
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Over the past 15 years, a mass of fresh water from ice melt has been building under the Arctic ice cap. The water is trapped under the Beaufort Gyre in the western Arctic, and presently represents about 10% of all the fresh water in the Arctic. It appears in the form of a bulge under the ice, and is kept in place by the permanent anti-cyclonic winds that blow around the gyre. The water is coming from melt-swollen Siberian rivers, and the bulge is growing by about six inches a year, meaning that billions of gallons of water are continuing to accumulate in it.
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