Russians Wonder What Happened To "General Winter"

[hatrack]

"As snow and ice melt away into puddles of dirty water months earlier than usual, Russians are asking what has happened to their once-dreaded winter.

Scientists say the mild temperatures, which may be linked to global warming, are close to record highs for a Russian winter, infamous for its ferocity and credited with frustrating invaders from Napoleon to Hitler. Roman Vilfant, the head of Russia's Gidromettentr weather monitoring centre says temperatures have been eight to nine degrees higher than normal. "The first ten days of January have been very warm," Mr Vilfant said.

With lows of about -40 degrees Celsius, the ferocious conditions of a Russian winter suffered by invading armies under Napoleon and Hitler have made the country's winters legendary and earned them the nickname 'General Winter' among military historians.

EDIT

"It is hard to give a single explanation for this, although you can link it to global warming. However, summers have not been getting warmer, they are the same as they were in the middle of the last century." But he had good news for Russian winter sports enthusiasts, who have had to cancel trips as snow and ice has melted away. "We expect that after the 16th, night temperatures will move back into negative territory. And then in the last 10 days of the month, they will be even lower."

EDIT/END

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200501/s1280417.htm

[Squatch]

1. That's right EVERYTHING can be attributed to global warming

instead of earth's naturally occuring cycles:

http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/NAO/NAO+.gif

-The Positive NAO index phase shows a stronger than usual subtropical high pressure center and a deeper than normal Icelandic low.


-The increased pressure difference results in more and stronger winter storms crossing the Atlantic Ocean on a more northerly track.


-This results in warm and wet winters in Europe and in cold and dry winters in northern Canada and Greenland


-The eastern US experiences mild and wet winter conditions

[On Par]

2. I've Always Been A Fan of The Sunspots Activity...

...that occurs in 9-11 year cycles. Over the past 100 years or so, harsh winters can be traced to high activity of sunspots. As we go through the cycle we have mild winters and progress to more harsh winters. We last peaked in 2000. At this point in 2005, we have entered a relatively mild period.

In Science speak what happens is: "And as sunspot numbers increase, coronal mass ejections and solar wind disturbances will trigger more and more geomagnetic storms. In some cases these disturbances can cause electric currents in the earth and oceans that interfere with electric power transmission."

More Science Speak...
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solarsystem/sunspot_991015.html

[Gman]

3. No doubt there is some relationship to global warming but...

the mild El Nino this season likely also has something to do with it. Europe has had some very frigid winters in recent years too.

[Dogmudgeon]

4. More Atmospheric Heat = More Atmospheric Chaos

It's a law of physics, actually.

Although isolated data can be written off as the expected statistical outliers, a lot of atmospheric scientists have made a strong case that global warming IS driving a big piece of the anomalous weather.

We don't have nearly as many monitoring buoys in the Atlantic as we did in the 1960s, so the thermohaline circulation could grind to a halt and we wouldn't be aware of it until well after Paris digs itself out of its first mid-summer blizzard. (Even then, many Americans would dismiss it until that coming winter set in).

Fortunately, the thermohaline circulation is not likely to just grind to a halt all of the sudden. But as for those buoys, there will be an Indian Ocean Tsunami monitoring web before we get some serious scientific hardware in the Atlantic.

--p!
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