Archive for the ‘Winter’ Category
October 7, 2011
Weather is not climate but winter is just a little early this year – again!
From the Local:
The season’s first winter storm walloped northern Sweden on Thursday night, dumping more than 10 centimetres of thick, wet snow, snarling traffic, and prompting warnings from police.
Between Sorsele och Arvidsjaur in Norrbotten Thursday night: image Aftonbladet
Kiruna on Friday morning: image Aftonbladet
“This is full-blown winter. I’ve been stuck for two-and-a-half hours,” truck driver Peter Härdfeldt told the Aftonbladet newspaper. A low pressure system moving across Sweden left parts of the far north covered in white on Friday morning following a night of gusty winds and wet snow.
Police in Norbotten urged drivers who had yet to change to winter tyres to “do so as quickly as possible” adding that “the snowploughs are on their way”. ….. On Saturday night, frost and below-freezing temperatures are expected to put a chill across much of the country. “It’s going to be one of the coldest nights this weekend,” meteorologist Lovisa Andersson from SMHI told Expressen.
Tags:early winter, first winter snow storm 2011, Snow, Snow tires, Sweden, Winter storm
Posted in Climate, Sweden, Weather, Winter | 1 Comment »
September 9, 2011
Yesterday the NOAA finally confirmed that La Niña was back.
The Indian monsoon has been reasonably good and we can expect greater evaporation leading to increased rains in the Western Pacific and in Australia. There should be less rain in the Eastern Pacific on the western coast of S. America (coastal Chile and Peru) but increased rain on the east coast in southern Brazil and northern Argentina. Dry conditions should persist in the Southern US but the Northern hemisphere can now expect another harsh winter for the third year in a row. Forecasters are beginning to warn about this and local authorities are preparing to stock adequate amounts of salt and grit.
Sweden: Forecasters promise another harsh winter
While Swedes are still enjoying the relatively clement weather of early autumn, weather experts are already forecasting another freezing winter to follow the last two. ”It is true that they generally follow each other,” said meteorologist Lisa Frost from the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI) to daily Aftonbladet.
According to experts, the last two winters have been the coldest for the last few decades and statistics from the institute all point to cold winters coming in threes. …. The three extremely cold winters 1940-43, during the war, were followed by four very clement winters. Since then, the weather would seem to have followed this 3.5 year pattern.
Scotland: New bid to avoid repeat of winter road chaos
The Scottish Government has called in the Red Cross to help prepare for the possibility of another harsh winter. In a bid to avoid a repeat of last year when motorists were stranded for hours on snow- bound motorways, transport minister Keith Brown has called a ‘Get Ready For Winter’ week next month.
Ireland: Heavy snow promised in Ireland
The Irish Government has told Irish households to stock up on disposable barbecues to avoid disasters during the freezing weather promised for the forthcoming winter. After studying the last two years bitterly cold winters and the situations which arose the Government has advised that citizens should have “some barbecue trays” to hand in case they get snowed in.
UK: Forecaster Predicts Early Winter Snowfall For Ireland And Britain
A long range weather forecaster is predicting an early start to winter 2011-2012 for many regions of the United Kingdom and Ireland. James Madden of Exacta Weather says heavy snowfalls are likely in places as soon as late October and early November.
US: Resurgent La Niña may enhance snowfall for northern Colo. ski areas this winter
… the Climate Prediction Center (CPC) at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA ) has issued a La Niña Advisory. This means La Niña conditions are likely to drive weather trends this winter. … “At this time, the Climate Forecast System (CFS) models are predicting an episode rivaling the same strength as last winter, but that forecast may change quite a bit as we get closer to the winter.”
Last winter, a moderate La Niña in the Pacific Ocean helped generate conditions just right for continuous massive snowfall in the Rocky Mountains of central and northern Colorado.
Related: Newborn La Niña: An Illustrated Guide
Tags:Climate Prediction Center, Earth Sciences, harsh winter expected, La Nina, National Oceanic And Atmospheric Administration, Northern Hemisphere
Posted in Climate, Natural Phenomena, Weather, Winter | 3 Comments »
February 14, 2011
An excavator removes snow from a road in Gangneung, Gangwon Province, Sunday. The heaviest snowfall in a century hit Gangneung and other cities in the eastern part of the province between Friday and Saturday, with hundreds of people stranded on roads and causing property damage. / Korea Times photo by Kim Joo-young
While all the snow and ice covering a large part of the Northern hemisphere does not prove anything about climate, in the style of the global warmists we could say that it is entirely consistent with the coming of a new Dalton-like solar minimum and a coming ice-age!!
From the BBC:
The heaviest snowfall in more than a century on South Korea’s east coast is causing widespread chaos. Hundreds of houses have collapsed under the weight of the snow. One newspaper described it as a snow bomb. The South Korean government has deployed 12,000 soldiers to rescue stranded residents.
The worst weather has been in Gangwon province. Weather experts say there will be more snowfall in the area in the coming hours. “I am 83 years old. It’s the heaviest snow in my life. I am really grateful for the soldiers’ help,” said Park Chae-ran. …..
….. January was the coldest since the 1960s. In Gangwon on the eastern coast, one city recorded 80cm (2.6 feet) of snow in a single day – the heaviest fall in 24 hours since records began there back in 1911.
The Han River in the capital, Seoul, iced over for the first time in years – but the latest snowfalls have left the capital unaffected so far.
More snow is forecast.
Tags:frozen Han river, Gangneung, heaviest snowfall, South Korea
Posted in Climate, Weather, Winter | Comments Off on Heaviest snowfall in a century in South Korea
January 11, 2011
Little news is coming out of Russia where icebreakers are battling to rescue the ships trapped in the Sea of Okhotsk. It all seems to be going much slower than hoped for and bringing the Sodruzhestvo out is clearly posing some challenges.
Itar-Tass reports:
The icebreakers Krasin and Admiral Makarov have escorted the Bereg Nadezhdy refrigerator ship to ice-free water in the Sea of Okhotsk and now are heading to rescue the Sodruzhestvo floating base still trapped in the ice, a spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Transport told Itar-Tass on Tuesday.
“Taking into account weather forecasts, it has been decided to leave the Bereg Nadezhdy refrigerator ship in a safe sea area and send the Krasin and Admiral Makarov icebreakers to the Sodruzhestvo floating base to help it get out of ice and reach the area where the Bereg Nadezhdy is waiting,” the spokesman said, adding that the move would cut back on the length of the rescue operation. The Sodruzhestvo remains trapped in ice. It has fuel and foodstuffs enough for 75 days. Experts believe that it will be harder to take it out to clear waters because its hull is wider than that of an icebreaker. The Krasin icebreaker is expected to widen the canal for the ship’s passage.
artar Straits: graphic Wikimedia
The Tartar Straits is reported to be frozen right down to its bottom for the first time in many years. The ice field in the Sea of Okhotsk is also reported to have grown from 25km wide to 45 km wide.
“The ice has hit the bottom and the ice field is spreading northwards. The icebreakers have broken through two big floes and are facing another one. After the icebreakers get the Sodruzhestvo base to the area, where they left the Bereg Nadezhdy, the four ships will proceed to a loose ice area in a single caravan. The Magadan icebreaker and a tanker ship are waiting for them there”.
Tags:Icebreaker, Icebreaker Admiral Makarov, icebreaker Magadan, Krasin, Sea of Okhotsk, Sodruzhestvo, Tartar Straits frozen
Posted in Engineering, Environment, Russia, Technology, Winter | 1 Comment »
January 9, 2011
Freeing the ships – and especially the factory ship Sodruzhestvo – trapped in the Sea of Okhutsk is going to be a slow process. In addition to the Magadan and the Admiral Makarov the icebreaker Krasin has also been deployed. (This is the second Krasin and was built in 1976 in Finland – the original Krasin was built in 1916 and designed by Admiral Stepan Makarov)
The Gulf of Sakahalin is still heavy with ice. In addition to the thick ice of upto 2 m reported earlier, local ice thickness can be 2 – 4 m with chunks upto 25 m thick. Bad weather is also hampering the rescue operations.
Icebreaker Krasin: Image via Wikipedia
Itar-Tass:
MOSCOW, January 9 (Itar-Tass) — Russia’s Minister of Transport Igor Levitin chaired on Sunday another meeting on the rescue operation in the Sea of Okhotsk.
“The participants in the meeting discussed the rescue operation in the anomalous bad weather conditions with persistent North-West stormy wind of 25 metres per second, zero visibility and heavy ice,” the Ministry’s press service said. On January 9, the Krasin icebreaker is expected to approach the Admiral Makarov icebreaker.
“If the weather permits, they will pull the Shore of Hope refrigerator to ice-free waters,” the source said. Earlier, the Admiral Makarov towed the Professor Kizevetter research vessel into an easily passable ice area and handed it over to the Magadan icebreaker which led it to open waters.
The third ship, the Sodruzhestvo floating base, remains stranded in the ice. Experts believe that it’s going to be harder to take it out to clear waters because its hull is wider than that of the icebreakers. The Krasin icebreaker is expected to widen the canal for the ship’s passage.
Three Russian vessels, the Sodruzhestvo, the Professor Kizevetter and the Shore of Hope got trapped in the ice of the Sakhalin Gulf, the Sea of Okhotsk, on December 30 of the past year. According to scientists who have carried out research, the thickness of ice in the Gulf in various periods may vary from two to four meters. Some chunks of ice may reach the thickness of 25 meters.
Tags:Admiral Makarov, icebreaker Magadan, Krasin, Sakhalin Gulf, Sea of Okhotsk, trapped ships
Posted in Engineering, Environment, Russia, Technology, Winter | 1 Comment »
January 6, 2011
Most homes in Delhi have no insulation and no central heating. Double glazing is almost unheard of. No doubt Pachauri’s home in the prestigious Golf Links area of Delhi is an exception. Current Delhi temperatures are running some 45°C lower than maximum summer temperatures. And from my week in Delhi during December 2010 I can testify that it is a mind and body numbing experience when temperatures inside the home are less than 10°C.
The claims that global warming is responsible and Pachauri’s IPCC must seem like bad jokes.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-12125207
A continuing cold snap has forced authorities in the Indian capital to keep schools closed till Sunday. Delhi has been badly hit by the cold, along with Indian-administered Kashmir, and the states of Haryana, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh.
Temperatures have been hovering around 4°C after dipping to 3.7°C on Tuesday morning, the city’s lowest this winter. The death toll in the cold snap that has disrupted life across northern India has reportedly risen to 47.
http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/north-india-in-the-grip-of-intense-cold-wave-77387
The cold wave intensified further in Kashmir division, including Ladakh region, as the minimum temperature across the state dipped several degrees further, with Leh town freezing at -23 °C.
Leh recorded the coldest temperature in Kashmir division at -23 °C, which was 2.8 degrees lower than the minimum temperature recorded on Tuesday. The maximum temperature recorded in Leh was three degrees below the freezing point. In Srinagar city, the minimum temperature dipped by 1.3 deg C to settle at -5.4 °C. Kargil town witnessed an extremely cold night as the minimum temperature remained -18 °C for the second consecutive night. In Kashmir Valley, the tourist resort of Pahalgam recorded a temperature of – 11.6 °C which was nearly four degrees lower compared to Tuesday’s minimum of -7.7 °C.
http://www.thehindu.com/news/states/other-states/article1032332.ece
Daily wage labourers on their way to work braving the cold and windy conditions in New Delhi even as the minimum temperature dropped below 3.4°C the season's lowest, on 04, January 2011. Photo: V.V.Krishnan
Tags:Delhi winter, global warming, India cold wave, IPCC, Pachauri
Posted in India, Weather, Winter | Comments Off on Northern India shivers: Schools closed in Delhi till Sunday
January 5, 2011
Icebreakers Admiral Makarov and Moskva: Image via Wikipedia
The icebreaker Admiral Makarov has reached its destination in the Sea of Okhotsk and the rescue operation to free the ships trapped in the ice has begun. One trawler has been escorted to safety. But there are “hummocks” in the ice which is upto 2 m thick in places. The second icebreaker Magadan is now itself stuck in the ice and the Admiral Makarov is racing to its rescue.
Itar-Tass reports:
VLADIVOSTOK, January 5 (Itar-Tass)The Admiral Makarov icebreaker that took the Mys Yelizavety to the clear waters is now moving at full tilt to help the icebreaker Magadan, which took part in the escorting effort but got stuck in the ice itself. Given that the Magadan, too, has stuck in the thick ice filling the spaces of the Sakhalin Bay, the number of ships drifting amid ice floes towards the shore has again increased to five.
A total of three ships – the Sodruzhetsvo floating factory, the Bereg Nadezhny refrigerating ship, and the Professor Kizivetter, all of them registered in the port of Vladivostok – found themselves stranded in the ice December 30. They are located at a distance of eleven to twelve nautical miles away from Sakhalin’s shore. One more ship, the Anton Gurin trawler registered in St Petersburg, joined the trapped ships January 3.
The Magadan, a port area icebreaker, has the technical characteristics largely inferior to those of the Admiral Makarov. It has a length of 88 meters and a capacity of 13,000 horse-powers. The Admiral Makarov has the length of 135 meters and the capacity for 12,000 horse-powers.
A mass of ice floes has been driven into the Sakhalin Bay by northern winds. The ice is covered with hummocks and its thickness reaches 2 meters in some spots. The total number of seamen trapped by the ice at present stands at around 500. The Sodruzhestvo floating factory has the largest crew of 340 persons.
Tags:Icebreaker Admiral Makarov, icebreaker stuck in ice, Magadan, Okhotsk Sea, Sea of Okhotsk rescue
Posted in Engineering, Environment, Russia, Technology, Winter | 1 Comment »
January 3, 2011
Itar-Tass reports that the Magadan icebreaker is struggling through 2-meter-thick ice to reach stuck ships in the Sea of Okhotsk and another ice-breaker is on its way. This reports talks of 3 ships being trapped but other reports speak of 10 ships with over 600 crew being trapped.
Line icebreaker ADMIRAL MAKAROV: image fesco.ru
VLADIVOSTOK, January 2 (Itar-Tass) — The Magadan icebreaker of the Far Eastern Shipping Company is struggling its way through the two-meter-thick ice to rescue three ships stuck in the ice in the Sakhalin Bay of the Sea of Okhotsk, a spokesman for the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk sea rescue coordination center said on Sunday.
With a speed of 2.6 knots the icebreaker develops in conditions of the 10 point ice, she has to master five miles to reach the stuck ships, the spokesman said.
The Sodruzhestvo mother ship, the Professor Kizevetter research vessel and the Bereg Nadezhdy refrigerated cargo ship are trapped in the ice eleven to twelve miles off the Khabarovsk coastline. Their attempts to break free have been vain ….. According to the Sakhalin regional emergencies administration, there is no threat to the lives and health of crew members of the three ships. Of the three stuck ships, the Sodruzhestvo has the largest crew of 340 people. The ship has food reserves for 75 days.
The Admiral Makarov, the biggest icebreaker in Russia’s Far East, is also heading to join the rescue operations. She is expected to reach the Sakhalin Bay on January 4.
The BBC also carries a report also quoting Itar-Tass but their facts seem to have morphed along the way. Two metres is converted to 12 inches by the BBC calculator!!!!
Sea of Okhotsk: image BBC
Rescue efforts are under way to evacuate more than 600 crew on 10 ships trapped in ice in the Sea of Okhotsk. The ice is up to 30cm (12 inches) thick in some places, according to the Russian news agency Itar-Tass.
The temperature in the area is -22C, according to Itar-Tass, and forecasts suggest it will fall even lower.
An Itar-Tass update is here:
http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2.html?NewsID=15834220&PageNum=0
Tags:Admiral Makarov, Icebreaker, Magadan, Sea of Okhotsk, trapped ships in Sea of Okhotsk
Posted in Engineering, Environment, Russia, Technology, Winter | 5 Comments »
December 21, 2010
It used to be that the Global Warming zealots warned about the possible disappearance of snow and the mild and wet winters to come in Europe. But their arrogance knows no bounds. They have changed their tune and irrespective of what weather may prevail they mange to put it down to Global Warming. They now put the coldest December in a hundred years and the current white-out across Northern Europe down to Global Warming.
That snow outside is what global warming looks like
James Delingpole at The Telegraph is lauging his socks off.
Not to be outdone, the SMH thinks the possibility of having a White Christmas during the height of Australia’s summer is also due to Global Warming!!!!
The Alarmists cannot live with the thought that man made effects are puny and inconsequential compared to the effects of the sun.
Mild winters, warm winters, early winters, coldest winters in 100 years are all quoted in defence of global warming dogma. They are all merely grist to the mill of Global Warming arrogance.
Science has been left behind in some far and distant galaxy.
Tags:climate, climate change, early winter, global warming, weather, white Christmas
Posted in Alarmism, Climate, Science, Weather, Winter | Comments Off on Global warming arrogance takes “credit” for the white-out in Europe and the White Christmas in Australia
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