On Sep 7, 2:26*pm, Stephen Davenport wrote:
On Friday, September 7, 2012 12:42:34 PM UTC+1, Len Wood wrote:

Adam Scaife UKMO talked about how it could produce wetter summers and

colder easterly winters.

Presumably he was referring to England and Wales here? A bit of

southern UK bias as usual.

=================

I'm not sure why you would presume that. Adam Scaife's findings encompass the greater part of Europe, as they would if we're talking about colder E'ly or NE'ly types in winter.

A prediction of wetter summers would be because his findings support the idea of an average storm track closer to 40 deg N than 50 deg N - again manifesting over a larger area than than just England and Wales.

What's interesting is that he and the UKMO are working with an extended model with vertical extent up to 85km rather than the 45km up until now. This importantly takes in the stratosphere. A re-forecast of winter 2009-10 gives a much better result with the extended model.

Stephen.
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My point was that the much wetter than average summer just past was
not true for the whole of the UK.
Adam Scaife referred to the UK (north of 50) deg and spoke as follows:
'....for example, some studies suggest there is an increase risk of
wet low pressure summers over the UK as the ice melts, and the studies
suggest that the weather could become more easterly cold and snowy due
to the Arctic ice decline.

So he was referring to the UK here.

Good to see the UKMO is going to higher altitudes with its model.
The bulk of the stratosphere had already been include as it is about
12 to 50 km.
50 to 80 km is the mesosphere, clearly things like noctilucent clouds
can be considered here but their formation is still a bit of a
mystery.

Len
Wembury

On Friday, September 7, 2012 7:42:00 PM UTC+1, Len Wood wrote:


My point was that the much wetter than average summer just past was

not true for the whole of the UK.

Adam Scaife referred to the UK (north of 50) deg and spoke as follows:

'....for example, some studies suggest there is an increase risk of

wet low pressure summers over the UK as the ice melts, and the studies

suggest that the weather could become more easterly cold and snowy due

to the Arctic ice decline.

So he was referring to the UK here.


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Thanks. I didn't have the benefit of his exact words. I don't see where the putative "southern bias" is supposed to be, though.


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Good to see the UKMO is going to higher altitudes with its model.

The bulk of the stratosphere had already been include as it is about

12 to 50 km.

50 to 80 km is the mesosphere, clearly things like noctilucent clouds

can be considered here but their formation is still a bit of a

mystery.

=======

Of course. I meant to say *whole of* the stratosphere encompassed by the extended model. The success with re-forecasts clearly shows how important it is to model the whole... yea e'en unto the mesosphere.

Latest thoughts on noctilucent clouds from the University of Hampton, Virginia, are that microscopic dust particles left by meteor "smoke" act as nuclei around which ice crystals can form. Nobody seems to be sure where the water vapor comes from - maybe volcanoes can inject it that high or maybe chemical reactions in the stratosphere produce it. I'm no chemist. But there is a hypothesis that oxidization of methane produces methane that leaks upwards into the mesosphere, and that an apparent increase in the incidence of noctilucent clouds may be due to increased amounts of methane released from the Earth. Pretty speculative at the moment, though.

Stephen.

On Sep 7, 11:17*am, Weatherlawyer wrote:
On Sep 7, 10:49*am, "ron button" wrote:

Just another bunch of fools calling each other names. The MP was
suckered into some propaganda from an upcoming TV show.

Looking at those pictures showing the difference between 1979 and today
seems to show that most of the ice melt is occuring on the Russian/American
side of the pole whereas it looks virtually unchanged on the European side ,
am I wrong ?

No. NOAA has pointed that out. Something to do with the thermo-haline
column.

It was actually a joint paper from NASA and Washington University:

January 04, 2012

The NASA and National Science Foundation funded study were published 5
January in "Nature".

Redistribution of freshwater from the Eurasian to the Canadian half of
the Arctic Ocean brings no change in the net amount of freshwater in
the Arctic that might change the conveyor belt.

An eastward shift in the path of Russian run-off tied to an increase
in the strength of the Arctic Oscillation result in counter-clockwise
winds changing the direction of ocean circulation.

The stronger Arctic Oscillation is associated with two decades of
reduced atmospheric pressure over the Russian side of the Arctic.
Between 2003 and 2008, the equivalent of 10 feet of freshwater was
added to the Beaufort Sea.

Arctic Ocean salinity is similar the past but the Eurasian Basin has
become more saline, and the Canada Basin has freshened. In the
Beaufort Sea, the water is the freshest it's been in 50 years, with
only a tiny fraction of that freshwater originating from melting ice
and the vast majority coming from Russian river water.

The Beaufort Sea stores more freshwater when an atmospheric pressure
system called the Beaufort High strengthens but salinity began to
decline early in the 1990s, when the Beaufort High relaxed and the
counter-clockwise Arctic Oscillation pattern increased.

Russian river run-off to feeds the Beaufort gyre,"

For more on Grace and ICESat, visit:
http://www.csr.utexas.edu/grace/ ,
http://grace.jpl.nasa.gov/ , and
http://icesat.gsfc.nasa.gov/icesat/ .

JPL is managed for NASA by the California Institute of Technology in
Pasadena.

Too long, didn't read:
Ice levels and types depends heavily on the
anticyclonic behaviour of the Arctic air.

Pretty pictures and full article:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.ph...lease_2012-002

Don't panic; don't panic!
We are not all doomed.

Trawlers can now fish the Arctic and ruin the ocean floor there for a
change. That should bring down the price of fish-fingers.