© Ross SalawitchArctic polar stratospheric clouds like these lead to ozone destruction.
The ozone hole over the south pole is a well-known phenomenon, opening up every spring, letting excess ultraviolet light stream in from the sun and driving up skin cancer risk down under.
But this year, ozone levels at the opposite pole are poised to reach record lows thanks to the right weather patterns and possibly a contribution from the changing climate."Don't panic," said Markus Rex of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Potsdam, Germany. "It's nothing which is a reason for great concern. Still people should have in mind that when they are outside in spring, sunburn times can drop to 20 minutes. People don't expect that in late March. You wouldn't expect to get a sunburn in the northern U.S. then."
While the ozone-depleted area is currently centered over the Arctic, the zone will shift as weather patterns change, and will pass over more populated areas as far south as about 45 degrees north -- roughly through Oregon, Minnesota and the New York-Canada border in North America -- and possibly even further.
"That system is moving around," Rex said. "Those air masses will sooner or later appear right over our own heads." The team predicts the low-levels will hover over eastern Russia by late March and will move on from there.
Rex and a global team of researchers monitoring satellite readings of ozone and temperature released the findings this week. In the past two weeks,
ozone levels in the most ozone-rich part of the stratosphere have dropped by about 50 percent, Rex said, and about 30 percent overall, which is about as low as it has ever been.
Comment: If people in the California area are not awake enough to take these VERY strong indicators that the West Coast of the USA is next in line for a major quake then what can ANYONE do to help them?