Another coveted tenant of man-made warming fears bits the dust. Add yet another correction to Gore’s film which featured Larsen B prominently as example of impact of mankind.
Excerpt: When the 10,000-year-old 400-metre thick Larsen B ice shelf crumbled into the sea in 2002, it was assumed to be a victim of climate change. But a controversial paper published by Professor Neil Glasser from Aberystwyth University says the glacier may have crumbled anyway.It was riddled with cracks and fault lines and weakened by sea currents beneath, it says.Last night Prof Glasser told the Western Mail, “Climate change may have been the last straw, but it was not the only straw.
”The research, published in the prestigious Journal of Glaciology by Fulbright Scholar Prof Glasser and Dr Ted Scambos from the University of Colorado’s National Snow and Ice Data Centre, says that the shelf was already teetering on collapse before the final summer.“Ice shelf collapse is not as simple as we first thought,” said Prof Glasser, lead author of the paper.“Because large amounts of meltwater appeared on the ice shelf just before it collapsed, we had always assumed that air temperature increases were to blame.
“But our new study shows that ice-shelf break-up is not controlled simply by climate. A number of other atmospheric, oceanic and glaciological factors are involved.
by Abbie Wightwick, Western Mail
THE dramatic collapse of an Antarctic ice sheet in 2002 may not have been caused by global warming alone, research published by a Welsh academic today claims.
When the 10,000-year-old 400-metre thick Larsen B ice shelf crumbled into the sea in 2002, it was assumed to be a victim of climate change.
But a controversial paper published by Professor Neil Glasser from Aberystwyth University says the glacier may have crumbled anyway.
It was riddled with cracks and fault lines and weakened by sea currents beneath, it says.
Last night Prof Glasser told the Western Mail, “Climate change may have been the last straw, but it was not the only straw.”
The research, published in the prestigious Journal of Glaciology by Fulbright Scholar Prof Glasser and Dr Ted Scambos from the University of Colorado’s National Snow and Ice Data Centre, says that the shelf was already teetering on collapse before the final summer.
“Ice shelf collapse is not as simple as we first thought,” said Prof Glasser, lead author of the paper.
“Because large amounts of meltwater appeared on the ice shelf just before it collapsed, we had always assumed that air temperature increases were to blame.
“But our new study shows that ice-shelf break-up is not controlled simply by climate. A number of other atmospheric, oceanic and glaciological factors are involved.
“The location and spacing of fractures on the ice shelf such as crevasses and rifts are very important too, because they determine how strong or weak the ice shelf is.”
Observations by glaciologists and research by Nasa scientists had also pointed to an ice shelf “in distress for decades previously”, the research says.
But Prof Glasser doesn’t doubt that climate change exists and must be slowed.
“I don’t want to be a climate change sceptic,” he said.
“There are climate records showing it has been getting warmer.
“The claim we have made is that if you go through Nasa satellite images in sequence you see the changes (in the glacier) are not necessarily climate warming but to do with the way the shelf moves. It’s opening up anyway.
“There is a role for climate change in the collapse, but it is not everything.
“The glacier may have been at the point where it was going to collapse anyway.”
The scientists examined Nasa satellite images of the glacier from the 1980s to 2002.
“The images mapped out what structures, cracks and crevasses were there,” Prof Glasser said.
“Global warming is important but we now realise there are a lot of other things that need to be looked at such as ocean currents and how coherent the ice shelf is.
“But you have to believe in global warming. There are so many different lines of evidence.”
The research comes as the UK Government yesterday announced an extra £100m for research into the effect of climate change on the world’s poorest communities.
Announcing the money, Inter- national Development Secretary Douglas Alexander warned we ignore the effects of global warming at our peril.
He told a London conference that economic development would be reversed and millions of people condemned to poverty unless we tackle rising temperature and its results.
