It is with great sadness that we announce the death of Dr. Louis Fortier in Quebec City, on the 4th of October at the age of 66, following a courageous fight against leukemia. He was the son of Pierre Fortier (1923-2012) and Louise Roy (1925-1989).
– By contributors from Environment and Climate Change Canada, the University of Québec at Montréal, the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute, the Hydrometeorological Centre of Russia, The Norwegian Meteorological Institute, Finnish Meteorological Institute, World Meteorological Organization, Climate Prediction Center, and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration –
Highlights
Warmer than normal surface air temperatures over Eurasia and the Arctic Ocean contributed to below to near normal ice conditions during the 2019-2020 winter across the entire Arctic.
– By contributors from Environment and Climate Change Canada, the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute, the Hydrometeorological Centre of Russia, The Norwegian Meteorological Institute, Finnish Meteorological Institute, World Meteorological Organization, Climate Prediction Center, and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration –
And Summary of the 2020 Arctic Winter Season
CONTEXT
Arctic temperatures continue to warm at more than twice the global mean. Annual surface air temperatures over the last 4 years (2016–2019) in the Arctic (60°–85°N) have been the highest in the time series of observations for 1936-2019.
– By Dr. Doug Wallace (Scientific Director, MEOPAR) and Doug Bancroft (President and CEO, Canadian Scientific Submersible Facility)–
Research vessels (RVs) remain critical infrastructure for many classes of ocean-related research. Robots and autonomous vehicles are used increasingly for monitoring and some process-oriented research when appropriate sensors are available. However, there are also a growing number of questions related to ocean and seafloor resources, as well as complex physical, chemical, biological and atmospheric processes critical to climate change and biodiversity, which require that multidisciplinary teams of researchers can access the ocean with highly sophisticated instrumentation, from vessels.
– By Branden Walker and Philip Marsh, Cold Regions Research Centre, Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Ontario –
Snow is not evenly distributed across Arctic tundra landscapes. Strong winter winds and low-lying vegetation allow snow to easily be eroded, transported and deposited across the open landscape resulting in a heterogenous distribution of snow depth, snow density, and snow water equivalent (SWE). Understanding the distribution of snow in these environments is of upmost importance
– By Gabrielle Gascon1, Katherine Wilson1, Marko Markovic1*, Adrienne Tivy1, Bill Appleby1, Vasily Smolyanitsky2, Valentina Khan3, Helge Tangen4, Eivind Stoylen4, Lene Ostvand4, Johanna Ekman5, Arun Kumar6 and Shanna Combley6 –
Arctic temperatures continue to warm at more than twice the global mean. Annual surface air temperatures over the last 4 years (2014-2018) in the Arctic have been the highest on record since 1900.
– Review by Phil Chadwick, Meteorologist and Eco-Artist –
By Jon Gertner, Published by Penguin Random House, Hardcover, 448 pages, ISBN 9780812996623, $28.00 (USD)
You can’t make this stuff up! In fact, hard data and science might be the best things to really believe. “The Ice at the End of the World” is a terrific read. Historians and scientists, as well as anyone concerned about the future of the planet, would find this book fascinating.
– By Chantal Mears, Dalhousie University, Halifax –
I had the pleasure of chatting with Dalhousie undergraduate student Chantal Mears at the 2018 CMOS Congress in Halifax. Chantal went on to win the ASL Environmental Sciences Best Student Poster prize (for her poster titled: Using 226Ra and 228Ra isotopes to distinguish water mass distribution in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago) at the congress, and I was not surprised. She is a great communicator and full of passion for her studies, and for working to support a better understanding of our oceans. Here, Chantal tells us a bit about the important work that she is involved with in understanding ocean dynamics in the Canadian Arctic.
– by Michael Crowe, Katherine Wilson, and John Parker –
The effects of climate change are being felt around the world, but nowhere as intensely and as obviously as in the Arctic. Many sources can be cited that put the rate of temperature increase in the Arctic over the last 30-50 years as at least twice that over the rest of the globe. These temperature increases have led to significant reductions of sea ice, thawing permafrost and coastal erosion that affect all Northerners, including Indigenous communities and industry.
