Gulf Stream shutdown and the UK's harsh winter drought - a connection? 04 April 06

that a shutdown is underway. And neither were, if I remember correctly, RealClimate http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/01/atlantic-circulation-changes/ .

I’d like to see more evidence than one paper.

Unlike scientists I don’t need 95% certainty that something is happening, nor do I need “another good five to 10 years [to reach 95% certainty] to say something like that is happening.” In my books this is all due GW, until proven otherwise at 99% certainty. And we’re very far from that—maybe it’ll take 5,000 years to reach that level of certainty that GW is NOT causing these problems.

So meanwhile, let’s get to it & mitigate it!

And as for as being a “harsh” winter in the UK – check out the stats at The Met Office.

The extreme south of England was 0.1 Celcius colder than the (1961-1990) average, but Scotland was actually 1.1 Celcius warmer.

The drought in the SouthEast is not just related to light precipitation during the last winter. Again from the Met Office (from their January 2006 summary):

Out of the last 15 months (since November 2004), 13 months have had below average rainfall across England SE & Central S.

I’m wondering if some common features with 1984/85 have a common explanation.

Early 1985 also saw a long cold spell in southern England and an unusually slow spring, with snow down here as late as April. It was also the winter of East African drought/famine, which I have heard was partially attributed to the African monsoon falling too far north. Last Sunday there was monsoon-like rain in Israel and the West Bank which caused 5 fatalities and was some of the heaviest rain there for over 100 years.

anymore than anyone on this blog. I tend to oversimplify things too much and I think others here may know better. I have studied the science to a certain level but I am no expert.

Yet, I still wonder about the ocean currents and think maybe the evidence of the cold winter in Europe and the increased ice melt may have slowed currents explaining the higher SSTs in the Atlantic. And then all those hurricanes last year and possibly this year fit within the context of this scenario.

It all fits too nicely to be pure coincidence for me. I think all these aspects are related and there is a GW influence at work.

I’m not denying AGW – far from it! :)

It’s just that I’d expect Scotland to be the caged canary in the coal mine, as far as the “Gulf Stream” is concerned.

The Met Office has now released figures for March, which show that Scotland was 1.0 Celcius below average. In fact, March was colder than both February and January – something that happens pretty rarely (the last time was in 1976, and the temperature difference wasn’t anywhere near as great).

It was pretty strange seeing the gorse in full flower poking through snowdrifts.

However, this is just one month – and the last three years have been the warmest ever recorded in Scotland. I don’t think it’s a sign of any significant change in the thermohaline circulation.

UK Met Office temperatures for Scotland.

I know we use past climate records in an effort to predict future climate change. But what the ice cores show is a natural climate change. I mean those findings are a history of the natural climate system at work and changing over time. But now we have a completely new force at work ADDED to the natural cycles of earth’s climate. So, we may not be so sure about past climate history telling us all we need to know about how earths climate might change in future. If the north Atlantic currents are changing, they may change in unprecedented ways. We are forcing the climate out of it’s natural cycle. We may or may not see a rapid tipping point in ocean currents. Yes, Canada and the Northern US has seen some odd weather this winter. My family has a 130 year history on the shores of Lake Superior. This winter no ice at all formed on the lake’s open waters. I have never seen this in 55 years nor has any older family member and there is no collective memory of the lake having no winter ice formation at all. As a youth, I hiked 20-30 miles out onto the ice by early January. It was an adventure for us kids. Now we need a boat to experience the lake in winter. Now that is ODD by any standard of Northern Minnesota winters!

Just found this map of current sea surface temperatures in the North Atlantic, which was posted on realclimate: http://weather.unisys.com/surface/sst_anom.html

Muchg of the North Atlantic has a warm anomaly at present. Most importantly, the sea around the Azores is above normal at present. If that persists into May then, if I am not mistaken, the Met Office forecast for next winter will be for a positive North Atlantic Oscillation and a mild and wet winter over the UK and much of northern Europe.

Almuth Ernsting

Excellent article about this whole debate in this week’s New Scientist!

Almuth