Monday, April 06, 2009



This is what climate change looks like

wilkins0409breakup

The Wilkins ice shelf - hanging by a threard since last year - has finally collapsed, with the narrow finger of ice holding it in check collapsing into a shattered field of icebergs. With the ice-bridge gone, the rest of the shelf will be rapidly eroded by wave action, and Wilkins Sound will have clear water for the first time in thousands of years.

Of course, that has nothing to do with the fact that the Antarctic Peninsula has warmed by 3 degrees in the past 50 years - and that has nothing to do with the fact that we've been burning fossil fuels and filling the atmosphere with CO2. Really. Its all just an amazing coincidence, and the coal industry should be allowed to keep making money by externalising its costs until the last bit of ice melts.

[Hat tip: Hot Topic; "before" shot here]