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

By Whitley Strieber

The eastern half of the United States is experiencing one of the harshest winters ever recorded. In many places both snow accumulation and temperature lows are breaking century old records. Because of all this cold air and the heat that is rapidly building in the southern Caribbean, the stage is set for a spring and summer of great weather violence as well. Meanwhile, in Australia, two fierce cyclones hit on the same day, Friday, February 20. In Europe, last summer was characterized by violent weather, and that is likely to happen again this year. In Siberia more massive craters are appearing, leading some scientists to issue serious warnings.
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We have reached the climate tipping point much more quickly than anybody anticipated. But with methane outgassing in arctic tundra and beginning to boil up from under the Arctic Ocean, Greenland ice turning black due to lack of snowfall, and rapid warming of northern waters, the stage is set.

Nobody has any idea when dramatic changes will overtake us, but the form they will likely take is becoming more clear. It is likely that, when arctic temperatures spike during some summer soon, the jet stream will fail because the temperature difference between the atmosphere in the far north and mid-latitudes will not be enough to enable it to continue.
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This is a journal entry I hoped I would never have to write. For most of my career, I have been fighting to prevent this, to slow it down or at least to plan for it.

What is happening is that methane hydrates are melting in the Arctic Ocean and along the US Atlantic seaboard. The methane they are releasing is adding to that already pouring out of tundra in Siberia, Alaska and Canada.
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