Factoid:
Over the last 50 years, researchers have reported an increase in mean annual temperature in the Antarctic of 4.5 degrees Fahrenheit.
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Global Warming Seen as Cause of Antarctic Melting
New research shows that two large Antarctic ice shelves lost a combined total of nearly 1,100 square miles of ice in 1998, apparently due to global warming.
Start Date: 4/10/99
A new report from British and U.S. researchers says global warming is apparently causing the accelerated melting of two Antarctic ice shelves, according to an April 8, 1999 Associated Press story.
David Vaughan, a researcher with British Antarctic Survey, and Ted Scambos of the University of Colorado at Boulder's National Snow and Ice Data Center, reported that the Larsen B and Wilkins shelves on the Antarctic Peninsula are in "full retreat." During the last year, Larsen B has lost 660 square miles of area, the ice simply crumbling into the surrounding sea. During the same period, Wilkins has lost 420 square miles of area.
Vaughan said that British researchers have noted the gradual retreat of Antarctic ice shelves for 50 years, but during that whole period the area lost was about 2,700 square miles. Thus, the area lost in 1998 represents a major acceleration. Over the 50 years, researchers have reported an increase in mean annual temperature in the Antarctic of 4.5 degrees Fahrenheit.
For the time being, the breakup of the ice shelves is not regarded as a threat to local wildlife, nor does it threaten a rise in sea level, since the ice was already floating on the sea. But the conditions which promote the rapid breakup of the ice shelves could soon begin to affect ice deposits on the Antarctic landmass -- and that could have much larger environmental consequences.
 Excelsior, Michael Lindemann's new novel (written under the pen name Michael Paul), depicts a wholly plausible near future in which human cloning is both widespread and widely abused; terrorists have access to target-specific biological weapons; recreational space travel is commonplace; and mounting pressures of global climate change, environmental decline, population growth and civil unrest inspire radical new approaches to urban security.
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