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Fire under the ice: volcanic eruption under the Arctic
Laura:
Fire under the ice: Gigantic volcanic eruption discovered under the Arctic
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/160630-Fire-under-the-ice-Gigantic-
volcanic-eruption-discovered-under-the-Arctic
"a series of 300 strong earthquakes over a period of eight months indicated
an eruption at 85° N 85° E in 4 kilometres water depth in 1999"
Seems these scientists are surprised by this but it's just another semi-hit
for the Cs. On Feb. 18, 1995, they made the passing comment:
" Volcanic eruption under arctic ice in 1996."
Well, we know their dates and timing are often pretty terrible. But we
also don't know that there was NOT a smaller eruption under the Arctic in 1996...
For all we know, this is the main reason for the melting of the arctic ice cap.
Adrian Adcock:
Interestingly, having read the latest article on SOTT re the "possibility of the volcanism under the ice causing the melting" ..... go to the WHOI site and read their disclaimer which seems to be pointed at the article from Investor's business daily. Link here http://www.whoi.edu/page.do?pid=7545&tid=282&cid=44586&ct=162#sidebar.
Regards to all
Adrian
anart:
This phrase is interesting:
--- Quote from: whoi ---Colder and/or saltier seawater is denser than fresher and/or less salty seawater. Waters in the Arctic depths remain trapped near the bottom. They do not mix much with surface waters. Almost no heat is transmitted all the way up to the underside of the ice.
--- End quote ---
OK - but - once the volcano has spewed out hot lava, that water at the bottom near the volcano is no longer so cold or dense, thus, it must rise. The very fact that they've posted this disclaimer - and it is that - just read it - is really interesting. Granted, considering the volcanoes are over 2 miles under water, it very well may be that very little heat 'rises to the top' - however, there is an introduction of heat into the system - that was not there before, thus there must be some effect. There have also been other submarine volcanoes 'discovered' over the last four years, so heat is being introduced into the system.
I am certainly no expert on such things, though, so perhaps those with more expertise could comment - and it could be that the volcanoes do not affect the ice caps - but this disclaimer - this is interesting.
bngenoh:
Arctic volcanism, very interesting:
--- Quote from: _http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/ocean-bloom.html ---Scientists have made a biological discovery in Arctic Ocean waters as dramatic and unexpected as finding a rainforest in the middle of a desert. A NASA-sponsored expedition punched through three-foot thick sea ice to find waters richer in microscopic marine plants, essential to all sea life, than any other ocean region on Earth.
The finding reveals a new consequence of the Arctic's warming climate and provides an important clue to understanding the impacts of a changing climate and environment on the Arctic Ocean and its ecology. The discovery was made during a NASA oceanographic expedition in the summers of 2010 and 2011.
[...]
The microscopic plants, called phytoplankton, are the base of the marine food chain. Phytoplankton were thought to grow in the Arctic Ocean only after sea ice had retreated for the summer. Scientists now think that the thinning Arctic ice is allowing sunlight to reach the waters under the sea ice, catalyzing the plant blooms where they had never been observed. The findings were published today in the journal Science.
"If someone had asked me before the expedition whether we would see under-ice blooms, I would have told them it was impossible," said Kevin Arrigo of Stanford University in Stanford, Calif., leader of the ICESCAPE mission and lead author of the new study. "This discovery was a complete surprise."
--- End quote ---
That is an indication of warmer waters, is it not?
--- Quote from: http://www.sott.net/articles/show/136238-Thousand-of-new-volcanoes-revealed-beneath-the-waves ---"The distribution of underwater volcanoes tells us something about what is happening in the centre of the Earth," says John Hillier of the University of Cambridge in the UK. That is because they give information about the flows of hot rock in the mantle beneath. "But the problem is that we cannot see through the water to count them," he says.
[...]
Hiller says he was surprised to find that the density of small volcanoes dropped in the area around Iceland, as Iceland is known to be a hotspot for volcanic activity.
Another surprise was that he found fewer volcanoes on the seabed around Hawaii, another volcanic hotspot. He says his findings may mean that researchers need to re-assess their understanding of how submarine volcanoes are formed.
In 2006, a team of researchers from Japan discovered a new type of volcano which also defied conventional theories of volcanism. The "petit-spot" volcanoes, aged between one to eight million years old, did not sit at tectonic plate boundaries or over volcanic hotspots.
--- End quote ---
And a blast from the past:
--- Quote from: http://www.sott.net/articles/show/182702-Global-Warming-in-the-Arctic-Or-Simply-Massive-Under-Sea-Volcanoes- ---
--- Quote ---Recent massive volcanoes have risen from the ocean floor deep under the Arctic ice cap, spewing plumes of fragmented magma into the sea, scientists who filmed the aftermath reported Wednesday.
The eruptions - as big as the one that buried Pompei - took place in 1999 along the Gakkel Ridge, an underwater mountain chain snaking 1,800 kilometres (1,100 miles) from the northern tip of Greenland to Siberia.
Scientists suspected even at the time that a simultaneous series of earthquakes were linked to these volcanic spasms.
But when a team led of scientists led by Robert Sohn of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts finally got a first-ever glimpse of the ocean floor 4,000 meters (13,000 feet) beneath the Arctic pack ice, they were astonished.
What they saw was unmistakable evidence of explosive eruptions rather than the gradual secretion of lava bubbling up from Earth's mantle onto the ocean floor.
--- End quote ---
Folks need to understand that the Arctic Ocean is a fairly closed system because it resides in a large bowl shaped depression with only limited outlets that rise to much shallower depths,
The natural basin that is the Arctic Ocean is possibly the reason why Arctic water temperatures were rising because the warming caused by these massive underwater explosions couldn't really circulate out of the basin. Is this the real culprit for why the ice and glaciers have been receding in the Arctic and ice as been growing in the Antarctic? Seems highly possible.
--- End quote ---
MnSportsman:
--- Quote from: anart on July 11, 2008, 05:08:41 AM ---This phrase is interesting:
--- Quote from: whoi ---Colder and/or saltier seawater is denser than fresher and/or less salty seawater. Waters in the Arctic depths remain trapped near the bottom. They do not mix much with surface waters. Almost no heat is transmitted all the way up to the underside of the ice.
--- End quote ---
--- End quote ---
I agree with you Anart...in your post above...
I hope I would not sound "flippant", but even though I can understand the Arctic is much bigger than an analogy I am going to try to use, the principle seems to be about the same:
Imagine you have a pot of water sitting outside in below the freezing point of water ( > 32 degF./0 degC. ) & it forms a skim of ice on the surface of the water, or perhaps you could imagine a pot that has many icecubes floating in that water. If you take that pot & place it on a burner, the heat at the bottom makes the molecules vibrate faster as they heat up & the heat will then rise up to the suface where the ice is. Whether it is a low heat or a high heat, the heat(heated water) will eventually reach the underside of the ice at the top, & dependant on the duration of the heating time/amount of heat generated, the ice will likely start to melt from below, & the below ice water will heat up, even if the ice continues to form above.
Maybe that analogy is over simplified, but since it seemed to me that the "principles" are the same. So, if a volcano is erupting below the surface & acting as a "heat source", no matter the depth, that warmed water is going to rise, & as it rises it encounters even warmer water, & so on til it reaches the ice.
Makes sense to me, although I am not a scientist. I have certainly heated pots of skim ice water here in the North while outside in below freezing weather & have boiled water for both cooking & making hot beverages. (It is a also a means to purify water if someone found the need.) So I know this works on this smaller scale. Would it not work the same as in a larger scale? Regardless of if it was salty water or not?
This "Whoi" I think... just might be full of "Hooeey".
;)
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