Last night, I listened to a fascinating (but depressing) program on Wisconsin Public Radio’s To the Best of Our Knowledge. The topic: “Polar Stories.” I especially paid attention to a rather downtrodden segment on the future of the polar bears (or lack thereof) as sea ice over the Arctic Ocean disappears. The verdict: they’ll be gone in my lifetime.
Even if polar bears aren’t your thing, the entire program is worth a listen. They cover polar geology, the sensation of cold at the poles, and even Antarctic fiction.
Public radio isn’t the only venue reporting on the polar regions. This morning, the New York Times jumped into the Arctic arena with an article on the demise of the harp seal.
All this talk of the Arctic thaw made me wish humankind had some sort of Arctic ice tracking service… and, as it turns out, we do! The National Science Foundation and NASA have teamed up to create the National Snow and Ice Data Center. They have maps and datasets tracking Arctic ice, as well as simple explanations for those of us who don’t eat, sleep, and breathe oceanography or climatology. Take a look!
Image: three polar bears investigate an intruder, the Los Angeles Class attack submarine U.S.S. Honolulu (SSN 718), after it surfaced through Arctic sea ice some 280 miles from the North Pole in 2003.
Image credit: Chief Yeoman Alphonso Braggs, United States Navy.
James Urton
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