World of two halves! Map shows most of Northern Hemisphere is covered in snow and ice

Daily Mail
Wed, 02 Feb 2011 23:59 UTC

It looks like a graphic from a Discovery Channel programme about a distant ice age. But this astonishing picture shows the world as it is today - with half the Northern Hemisphere covered with snow and ice.

The image was released by the National Oceanic And Atmospheric Association (NOAA) on the day half of North America suffered in the grip of a severe winter storm.

The map was created using multiple satellites from government agencies and the US Air Force.

© NOAA
A new satellite map from the government agency NOAA shows the size of the snow cover on regions going from the West coast of Canada to the East of China.

Stretching from the west coast of Canada to the eastern shores of China, the white stuff has rarely been shown covering this much ground.

The startling image was released on the same day Al Gore stepped up to defend his claim that global warming causes more snow. Thirty states in America were affected by a two-day blizzard.

'As it turns out, the scientific community has been addressing this particular question for some time now and they say that increased heavy snowfalls are completely consistent with what they have been predicting as a consequence of man-made global warming,' Gore wrote on his blog Al's Journal.

© AP

Hundreds of drivers on Lake Shore Drive in Chicago, which was blasted by 20 inches of snow, abandoned their cars in an almost apocalyptic scene as authorities closed the road

His response came after Fox News pundit Bill O'Reilly challenged the former Vice President to give his thoughts on 'why southern New York has turned into the tundra.'

Mother Nature's wrath is not confined to the top half of the world, of course.

Cyclone Yasi, with a destructive core of more than 20 miles wide, is walloping Queensland in north east Australian with 186mph winds. Authorities are calling it the worst storm to hit the country for generations. Tens of thousands of people are tucked away in evacuation shelters or their homes and the country is braced for many casualties.

© AP
The inside of a pickup truck that was stranded and left open on Lake Shore Drive on Wednesday shows the full ferocity of the blast as the white stuff almost covers the steering wheel

© AP
Quick escape! This driver forgot to close in the door in the scramble to safety in the record-breaking storm that smashed its way through the mid-west

Reader Comments

Noise · 2011-02-03T01:41:09Z

Those images..

Incredible! I'm sitting here comfortable, just bordering 40-50 miles away from the real dumping and 25'ish from Mt. Glacier, we seem very fortunate here in the Pac. NW (for the moment at least). I'm so thankful cause I think the building I'm in has a risk of collapse in a certain area. Then I have to wonder, what about a week, a month.. from now?

I hope you all are keeping warm, for those of you in the thick of it. If where I live were in it, it would actually be hard to type since the building I live in is breezy.

Amazing! Beautiful.

LouCypher · 2011-02-03T04:20:36Z

Isn't Africa Beautiful?

Like the heart of the world in the NOAA image. I sit here at the bottom of the left ventricle in temperatures of 32 degrees C - I cannot imagine what it must be like to experience Northern hemisphere weather..

shellycheval · 2011-02-03T04:46:20Z

Let me help. Go to a Western style restaurant. Give them a bribe to let you stand in their walk-in freezer (usually kept about 0 degrees F.) for about 15 minutes. Spin around in circles to get the effect of the wind at that temperature. Bring a coat! And yes, Africa is beautiful!
shellycheval

Appollynon · 2011-02-03T05:30:06Z

Ice Age Now

My first thought when I saw this, besides the obvious "Ice Age now", was that our weather systems have dumped an enormous amount of water (in the from of snow) over the Northern hemisphere, so much so, that had that water came form the oceans, there may be a decreasing trend in the sea-levels, however this is not the case, sea-levels are rising…so where does the water for all this precipitation come from?

Well we have satellites which monitor and record the amount of moisture in the atmosphere between the satellites and the ground, and the amount of water vapour being recorded in our recent inundations can’t be explained by the levels of moisture between the satellites and ground simply being moved around the planet by the jet streams form here to there. There is too much water being added to the level of water vapours, which is constantly increasing, as we see in increasing global sea-levels.

An Electric Universe model can and does explain this. The water vapour/moisture is being drawn into our atmosphere by our Earth’s Geomagnetic Field, which acts like the tail of a comet and draws in this moisture to our upper atmosphere. The Northern and Southern Jet Stream then move these bands of moisture around the globe, with most of this moisture being deposited at colder latitudes nearer the Northern and Southern poles. It then comes as no surprise that this precipitation falls as snow and causes the build up of the great ice sheets we see at our Northern and Southern poles. Now for the past few years, thanks to the work of Laura and the SOTT team and some of our satellite’s recording and measuring the thickness of our ice sheets at the poles, we know that the amount of precipitation is on the increase dramatically. This increased precipitation at northern and southern poles, has in turn has led to what were seeing now, thickening ice sheets at their centre. As the ice pack thickens at it’s centre, more and more ice sheets slide and flow over the warm Antarctic land mass, which has caused increased calving of smaller ice sheets and ice shelf’s at the margins, as the ice sheets spread outwards over the warmer land mass. The same thing can be seen happening over Greenland, due to the warmer land mass causing rivers of fresh water to cascade into the oceans.

Just think of all those pictures in the mainstream media of calving ice sheets, with Polar Bears atop, being seen at latitudes that we are not used to seeing them, and this starts to all fit with an electric universe and a Globally Cooling Climate, due to increased precipitation. NOT GLOBAL WARMING, as Al-drenched in-Gore would have us believe! Many scientists have now dated the southern ice pack, and realised it is much younger than we had previously thought, around 3,600 – 4,000yrs old, and the ice pack we see now is due to this rapid thickening process, brought about by a globally cooling climate.

Now the question is, what causes this Global Cooling, increased precipitation and lowers the precipitation bands as we are seeing now in our time? Well the SOTT team have presented us with the best explanations so far, an electrical exchange between our planet and the alignment of the nearby comets, moon, planets and sun, causing an electrical charging of our atmosphere, and causing the fluctuation’s, weakening and possibly reversal of our magnetic field

Barbara · 2011-02-03T08:54:19Z

"[...] there may be a decreasing trend in the sea-levels, however this is not the case, sea-levels are rising…[...]"

No, the rate of sea level rise is not increasing.
"Based on the most current data it appears that 2010 is going to show the largest drop in global sea level ever recorded in the modern era. "

[Link]

Topaz · 2011-02-03T19:15:12Z

that was pretty heavy duty man...

our best bet now would seem to be
to make as many
snow-angels
as we possibly
can.

mspaul8 · 2011-02-03T09:19:40Z

Big Deal

I am an ex-Chicago resident living now in central Wisconsin - I have been in the Wisconsin -Illinois environment for most my life (63 years) - I find the weather so far to be what I have already gone through (it has always been weird) - example Chicago 1973 - it snowed then much more than it did on Tues 2-1-2011 - in 73 it shut down O'HARA airport and we had back to back snow accumulation in the winters of 1978-79 and 79-80 that got my 4 wheel full size Chev Blazer stuck off and on and all the way back around 1957 our family left a suburb of Chicago to spend the Xmas with my Uncle in Wausau, WI - how we managed to get there in a 57 Buick is now beyond understanding but we did and the next day I and my cousins walked just below the telephone wires from pole to pole - that is how high the snow was back then - the cars had to have tall flags on the bumpers to move through intersections - so again I see no big difference from my view point from Illinois to Arkansas back to Wisconsin- just my observations.

TruthOutNOW! · 2011-02-03T10:13:41Z

Worth Noting......

The gulf stream is dead. There is a lot of speculation that the death of the gulf stream may be responsible for some of this crazy global weather.

"Global warming! Global warming! Global warming! Global warming! Global warming! Global warming!" - Saint Al of the Gore

avatarius · 2011-02-03T11:08:31Z

Barbara is right

Thyere is noe sea rise globally except on certain scientists computor models...which say everything but tell us nothing. The weather is a something akin to a refridgerartor...youb turn up the gas/electric heat and it gets colder...question is, where isthe extra heat coming from, from outer space or inner space...maybe the additional volcanic activity has something to do with it.

As for Apollynon, he is just a comments hack who needs to tell people what he finds interesting...probably cos nobody wants to listen to him in the real world. Some would say its a call for help.

Appollynon · 2011-02-03T12:03:28Z

Thank you for the psychological data avatarius, and thanks for unmasking yourself fully for us all to see :o)

"As for avatarius, he is just a comments hack who needs to tell people what he finds interesting...probably cos nobody wants to listen to him in the real world. Some would say its a call for help!"

I agree. You've now spent weeks on site obfuscating genuine commentators, including the work here by the SOTT team, as well as attacking any concepts or ideas that don't fit within your narrowly percieved world view...in the words of another mask wearing character who shares your collinear way of thinking..."Why so serious?"

Every time anyone gives you a poke to see if you are genuine and just misguided or a paid troll, you cunningly manage to avoid replying, often by simply trying to use emotionally charged language and manipulating behaviour, such as derogatory comment or slurs, against individuals you cannot take on in a fair and level debate. By doing this, you are making yourself look like the troll you most certainly are, and instead of reacting in a balanced and thoughtful manner, you are having strong emotionally charged reaction to anyone who does not agree with you. This would suggest to most people with a decent level of psychological knowledge that you have deep emotional issues within yourself, and that your projecting them onto anyone you see fit due to you own attention deficit issues and "cries for help". Attention seeking behaviour such as this, as well as the lack of empathy displayed, the callous disregard for the feeling of others, an inability to communicate within societal norms etc, are all hallmarks of deep Psychopathological issues. Now I’m the first to admit that my spelling at times leaves a lot to be desired in my comments and I need to work harder to reduce the noise in my signal, but your grammar and formation of word salads that make little or no sense are hilarious and a constant source of levity. If you find so much of what is shared hear to your obvious distaste, why continue to hang around, as Laura has recently mentioned, if you don't like the ideas and concepts shared here, I'm sure there are plenty of other places where your diatribes and word salads will get you the attention and lauding you seek.

The straw that broke this camels back is your accusing other's of what you are very obviously doing yourself...I have to wonder, if, like our recent troll invader TOP GUN, you also have ties too, or an identification with the military, as your behaviour echo’s the same pathological traits...or maybe you run in the same circles? Your failure to grok the reason for this particular comment and it's link to the work being done on site lately, has me rolling on the floor laughing, so thanks for the belly laughs, they were much needed ;o)

As one hydra's head is cut off another will arise to take it's place and your work here is a fine example of that for all to see :o)

avatarius · 2011-02-03T13:23:23Z

My ,my

tantrum, tantrum - once again you show how utterly mistaken you are. I wonder whether "Laura" feels the same way...you seem to be like one of those little highly strung lap dogs that yaps and bites the air when any one walks into your zone...as for TOP GUN - I suggested he change his name to TOP CRUMB...judging by the faux remarks he has been wont to make. As for you Apollynon your diatribes are of no interest to me...I am just politely replying to your comment.

As for Laura - if she has any comment to make to me I am sure SHE will...I admire her perseverence and views that is why I read SOTT, as well as other sites...have a nice day

darrenobi · 2011-02-03T17:54:39Z

what a joke avatarius

you have some very strange ideas, laura couldn't care less about what you beleive or any body else, if you had read enough of her stuff you would know that. Then you go around calling people lap dogs.
I sorta suspect you want to be lauras lapdog.
Heres some advice lauras not into being worshipped you would know that from her material if you had read it and understood the message.
you certainly have the feel of being not what you seem.
And as for you and your extra heat must be blowing from your arse.
try eating less onion.

marc-0009 · 2011-02-03T19:11:49Z

So what?

What is the big deal... It snows in the winter months in the northern hemisphere - especially in Jan and Feb!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If any thing it has been a mostly normal and average winter in Toronto this year...

If the planet looked like this in May or June would say there would be something to worry about!

These continued top story reports on the weather make me feel like I am watching the sequel to an inconvenient truth!!

unit e · 2011-02-03T20:31:17Z

Really,

Apollynon could you maybe try giving it a rest? You have some interesting things to say, but your interminable comments so often lead to this silly and quite juvenile back and forth. If you can't get a handle on your compulsion to tell everyone what YOU think, then why don't you do it on the forum; that's where the more intelligent conversation happens.

Appollynon · 2011-02-04T04:17:10Z

Hey Unit e, thanks for the suggestions, but resting implies sleeping, and I’d rather be awake :o)

As is happening so often recently with the many resident trolls, you wrongly assume that my shared comment is merely what “I” think, and make “an ass of u and me”, by adding nothing to the topic at hand. Instead you join in the same emotionally coloured and charged baiting behaviour, and “Juvenile back and forth”, your accusing others of, very similar to some of our other resident trolls. Whilst you accuse someone else of acting on mere compulsion to share personal ideas or concepts that you obviously don’t like seeing on the news pages here, you feel a strong emotionally reactionary need to display the very behaviour you are condemning…why so serious?

Unfortunately for your present mask of sanity, you have failed to grok the comment relating to the Hydra, a similar mythical monster to those, us Brits are fond of slaying, and will continue to do so in our ever expanding present. But you need not take me at my word, most of the ideas and shared concept’s I have learned from to be able to form the above comment are taken from remarkable men such as McCanney, Talbot etc. So here’s some good links for you/anyone interested in those ideas and concepts, which are not exclusively mine, but are shared by a growing number of collinear thinkers everywhere.

Basic Physic's teaches us about Thermodynamics, so that's a good place to start looking for info.

Jim McCanney's site and research is incredible, so I'd head here first.
[Link]
..."More speculative aspects of the Electric Universe theory argue that some planetary features, such as craters are produced by cosmic mega-lightning electrical scarring rather than impacts with meteorites. It is also suggested that the Sun and stars are powered externally electrically (see the Electric Sun theory), and the behavior of comets is due to their interaction with electrified interplanetary plasma (see comet: Interaction with interplanetary medium)"...found here

[Link]
Some of the other sources I have learned from are the following:

[Link][Link]
Happy hunting :o)

T&J · 2011-02-04T06:41:06Z

In my humble opinion,

wherever the heat causing moisture to rise to the atmosphere may have originated, the net global effect is a COOLING of the planet. The long term trend is probably either relatively static or maybe decreasing.
For Australia's "esteemed" Professor Garnaut to tell us that the global average is still increasing is a leap into fantasy. Seemingly he has an agenda, somewhat remote from the facts and the science.

avatarius · 2011-02-04T08:13:00Z

Another plonker

so Darenobi-one-knobi - you want to get into the art of frothing off on the comments and using vulgar terms instead of expressing your points of viewrationally...another sycophant type to the intellect of the authoress of the site you decide to speak for her with your pathetic little opinion instead of minding your own business...well join Apollynon because he's another one who likes to jerk-off on the items of others. You both seem to have time for vanity in lieu of intellectuality - have a nice day.

Al Today · 2011-02-04T15:39:29Z

@ So What.

I agree. I've always said the last 2 weeks of January & the 1st two weeks of Febrary are ths peak of winter
.
"If the planet looked like this in May or June would say there would be something to worry about!"

We will see what we see, yes?