THICK ICE FORCES RUSSIAN SHIPS TO TAKE THE LONG WAY ROUND
Arctic sea ice is melting so fast it will be GONE by 2008… 2013… 2014… 2016… certainly by the 2030s… definitely by the end of the century — that is, unless throw a chokepoint at human prosperity and drastically reduce our living standards, then all will be great.
Failed predictions are the AGW Party’s métier:
ABC News, April 27, 2008: “You know when climate change is biting hard when instead of a vast expanse of snow the North Pole is a vast expanse of water. This year, for the first time, Arctic scientists are preparing for that possibility”.
Mark Serreze, senior scientist at the NSIDC, Dec 12, 2007: Ice-free by 2012: “The Arctic is screaming.”
BBC News, Dec 12, 2007: Arctic ice-free by 2013: “Our projection of 2013 for the removal of ice in summer is not accounting for the last two minima, in 2005 and 2007 … So given that fact, you can argue that may be our projection of 2013 is already too conservative”.
Sierra Club Canada, June 10, 2013: Ice-free by 2014: I have become even more confident about my prediction of total Arctic sea ice destruction in 2013.”
The Guardian, Sept 17, 2012: Final collapse of sea ice within 4 years: “One of the world’s leading ice experts has predicted the final collapse of Arctic sea ice in summer months within four years.” (Prof Peter Wadhams of Cambridge University).
Here’s another:
Despite these agenda-driving headlines, Arctic sea has continued to do its own thing, as shown by the data.
Even on June 6, 2023 (the latest data point), large areas of thick, multi-year ice –of 4 to 5 meters (10 to 13 feet)– remain:
Those aforementioned failed prophesiers of the past would no doubt be shocked (delighted?) to hear that heavy ice in 2023 is forcing even Russia’s new icebreakers to take a southerly route in order to even reach the Arctic.
These nuclear-powered icebreakers are among the most powerful in the world, yet this year’s ice –even in May and June, so well after the March maximum– is proving too much even for them.
Putin’s newest icebreaker, the Yevpatii Kolovrat (4,020-long-ton) has joined its Pacific fleet off the Kamchatka peninsula, just across the Bering Sea from Alaska. However, instead of traversing Arctic waters from the St. Petersburg shipyard where it was built, the vessel sailed out into the Atlantic and south to the Mediterranean Sea. It then passed through the Suez Canal and crossed the Indian Ocean into the Philippine Sea before finally arriving at its home port in Petropavlovsk in the North Pacific.
This route is easily twice as long as the northern passage to Kamchatka. Why would Russia’s newest icebreaker not sail the Arctic waters for which it was intended? The inconvenient answer: thick, heavy ice.
Data from the Russian Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute showed a thick layer of sea ice covering Russian Arctic waters in early May. In the Laptev and East Siberian seas, two belts of multi-year ice were considered impassable, even for one of the world’s most powerful ice-breakers–named after a famous 13th century Russian war hero.
This has been the theme in recent years; that is, longstanding sea ice, not the seasonal variety that comes and goes, impeding Arctic traffic. Despite the predictions, banks of multi-year ice 10 to 13 feet thick are persisting well into the spring melt season.
Yevpatii Kolovrat is ‘only’ capable of breaking through ice 5 feet thick, and so, even in May, was forced to take ‘the long way round’. And it’s not alone, thick multi-year ice has prevented most vessels from from transiting Arctic waters since October 2022.
RECORD COLD ACROSS BELARUS AND LATVIA
Continuing Europe’s cool second-half of spring, Eastern swathes of the continent is shivering through its coldest June temperatures on record.
In Belarus on the morning of June 5, thermometers in Bobruisk dipped to 1.7C (35.1F).
This bested the lowest-ever June reading for the country which had stood since 1977 (solar minimum of cycle 20).
In Latvia, a low of 2.4C (36.3F) was posted at Liepaja.
This comfortably broke the previous June low of 3.8C (38.8F) set in 2010 (just exiting the deep minimum of solar cycle 23).
Shifting further east, summer is beginning very cold in European Russia, too.
As per gismeteo.ru, conditions in Saint Petersburg, for example, are hinting at a repeat of 2017 when June and then the entire summer season held exceptionally cold. “The polar trough will allow the penetration of cool air from high latitudes,” reads a passage from gismeteo.ru. “The temperature will continue to lag behind the climatic norm by 2-4 degrees (C).”
CHILL STRETCHES PERTH POWER TO THE BRINK
During this week’s record-breaking June cold, a host of Perth households were asked to cut their power consumption Tuesday night to avoid blackouts after evening energy demand soared to a near-record high.
On June 6, at least 15 lowest-max temperature records were set in the Western Australia, with the mercury in Perth sinking below 10C (50F) at 1.30pm on Tuesday, where it then stayed there making for an uncharacteristically frigid afternoon.
Power demand rose to 3600 megawatts between 5.30pm and 6pm — mostly driven by an extreme heating demand.
Separately, the operator of the state-owned power grid Western Power asked customers in parts of Pinjarra, Meadow Springs and Wembley Downs in the early evening to also reduce their electricity consumption: “Current conditions mean Western Power acting to avoid outages in your area and needs help. Please reduce power use now until 8.30pm,” read a text sent to customers.
Matching supply and demand in cold weather is not a normal concern for the south-west power market.
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