While Europe is a little shaky, the Arctic was too hot

AFP

Tuesday, 27-feb-2018 14:28

UPDATE
Tuesday, 27-feb-2018 14:49

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While Europe is a little shaky as a wave of cold late, the North pole has experienced a heat spike, with temperatures 30 degrees above normal, a phenomenon that comes against the backdrop of warming of the Arctic.

The thermometer has posted up to -35°C in some regions of the central Russia Sunday, -12°C in Poland, or even -10°C in the east of France. During this time, the North pole, immersed in the permanent darkness of the polar night, recorded temperatures positive thanks to the wave of sweet air.

There is “a blocking pattern of high pressure over northern Scandinavia (…) with a surge of mild air from Iceland to the North pole on one side and the other side of the anticyclone, of the descents of cold air from the Urals and western Russia to the Western Europe”, explained Tuesday to the AFP Etienne Kapikian, a forecaster at Météo-France. “The peak of sweetness on the North pole and the cold wave over Europe are directly linked,” he continued.

Result, “it is estimated that it was at or around zero degree Celsius at the North pole,” said Mr. Kapikian, according to the estimates obtained by modelling, since no meteorological station is established in this area.

To get a more precise measurement, it is necessary to go to the extreme north of Greenland, where “it was noted on Sunday, 6.2°C,” adds Etienne Kapikian. “It is an exceptional value, about 30°C above the normal seasonal, or even 35°C for this measurement to be very accurate,” he continues.

Reduction of the sea ice

Is it an episode exceptional? Yes, but not that much, meet the scientists.

“The temperatures is positive near the North pole in the winter have been observed four times between 1980 and 2010 (…) They have now been identified in four of the last five winters,” said the AFP Robert Graham, a scientist at the Norwegian polar Institute.

“We have a winter exceptional on the Arctic, the previous winter had already been, and it does not take too much risk by saying that the next one will be. (…) The trend is very clear (…) it is the warming of the Arctic,” says Etienne Kapikian.

This phenomenon is to the extent attributable to the disruption of global climate? “It is difficult to say that an event is linked to global warming. But this trend that we see, that the Arctic warm, a continent of cold, may be linked to climate change,” responds Marlene Kretschmer, climatologist at the Potsdam Institute for climate change research.

These episodes of rising temperatures are not good news for the sea ice, the surface of which has never been reduced for the season from the beginning of the measurement there are more than 50 years.

Around the archipelago of Norwegian Svalbard, east of Greenland, the ice surface measured Monday was 205.727 km2, which is less than half of the average area over the period 1981-2010, according to the Norwegian data.

More generally, climate scientists consider it likely to see the Arctic ocean ice-free by 2050 during the summer.