Evidence Of Climate Breakdown Widespread In Siberia - Telegraph

[hatrack]

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"Environmental research already points to rapid climate change in the Arctic and sub-Arctic in years to come, endangering many animals native to the taiga. If some forecasts are to be believed, the polar bear could be extinct by the end of the century.

But in the remotest parts of Siberia the changes have been under way for more than a decade and are even now disrupting the lives of the nomadic herders, hunters and trappers. According to the locals, the problem is less a rise in temperature than the fact that the weather now varies dramatically from one day to the next, with temperatures sometimes rising or falling up to 30 degrees in the space of a few days.

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Valentin Adlasov, the local mayor, said: "The average temperature here in winter used to be minus 53 to 55 degrees and would last for two or three months continuously. Now temperatures vary from week to week. One week its warm, say minus 30, then the temperature falls suddenly to minus 55." Now that the ground no longer freezes properly in winter, in summer the roads and bridges built on the permafrost subside, making transport difficult. There is also frequent and widespread flooding in summer. "We have unfamiliar birds that come here now and insects that we have never seen before," the mayor said.

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Sergei Popov, an ethnic Yakut and a tourist guide, said: "There is no longer proper freezing in the winter and because of that the rivers flood in the summer. They carry away bridges, houses, sometimes whole villages. "The flooding also strands animals and disrupts their migratory patterns. For the reindeer herders it has made life much more difficult." The problem is not confined to Yuchyugay. Locals say communities all over Yakutia, a Russian republic larger than Europe, are also aghast. In Chukotka, the region to the east of Yakutia and hard up against the Bering Strait, the Chukchis say that, as the ice thins, the walrus, a mainstay of their diet, is becoming scarce."

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/03/05/wsib05.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/03/05/ixworld.html

[mcscajun]

1. So long as it's happening somewhere remote and out of sight…

…and to people we don't know or care about, it's not an issue, right?
/sarcasm off

From what I read in the article, Putin has yet to turn around on the issue, and we already know that * the blivet is mired in his faith that things will turn out right and there IS no Global Warming, that we still have time for more research on the issue.

Ugh.

I'm adding this one to my catalog of environmental damage and climate change articles, thanks.